For the Power (For the Blood Book 2)

by Debbie Cassidy

  “I should go out and bring in Carter and Bates,” Kira said. “Let them get some rest, and then we can make a plan as to where to go from here.”

  Her boot falls retreated.

  “Eva, we need to talk about this,” Jace said softly.

  I turned to face them with a tight smile. “Let’s get some rest, then we can plan strategy.”

  Jace and Logan exchanged glances.

  “Fuck strategy,” Logan said. “We need to discuss how we can save you.”

  “You can’t. Jamie made that clear. This is it. This was my purpose, and I’ve served it. I’d like to see it come to fruition, though.” Saying the words out loud were like stabbing myself in the chest with a knitting needle. No. I needed numbness. I needed the calm. “I’m going to take a nap.” I headed for the door.

  “You’re going to give up?” Logan called after me.

  “Logan …” Sage’s tone held a warning.

  “No,” Logan replied. “She doesn’t get to give up. This isn’t how this—”

  I slammed the door on his words and headed down the bland corridor and into the first cabin to my right. Stay serene, stay calm. Sleep and function and get this shit done. Get the cure out there, and then … whatever happens, happens.

  Fear reared its ugly head.

  No.

  Go the fuck away.

  Not now, not ever.

  The door behind me opened and closed. “Seriously? You’re going to do this?”

  “Go away, Logan.” My monotone echoed my emotions.

  Hard hands gripped my shoulders and spun me round. “Look at me. Look at me, dammit.”

  I raised my eyes to his glittering, angry ones. “What?”

  “You don’t get to do this. You don’t get to come into our lives, turn it inside out, and then just check out.”

  My voice was even and unemotional. “It’s not like I have a choice. I’m dying. Best to accept it and focus on the things we can make a difference on.”

  “You do have a choice. You have the choice to fight to live.”

  A spark of irritation broke through the self-imposed numbness. “Why the fuck do you even care? You’ve made it clear time and time again that you want me gone. Well guess what, now you get your wish.”

  His face went through a series of emotions, so quick they were hard to catch and decipher, and then he was yanking my head back by the hair, eliciting an involuntary yelp.

  “You want to know what I wish? What I really fucking wish?”

  The answer was in his grip, in the murky, swirling depths of his dark eyes.

  No. I didn’t. I didn’t want to hear it. “Don’t.”

  The corner of his mouth lifted. “Oh, Eva, we are so past that.” His mouth crushed mine in a punishing kiss.

  The heat that had been gathering behind my eyes melted to tears. “No!” I tore my mouth from him. “No. You don’t get to do this. Not now. I can’t. I won’t.”

  He kissed me again, hard and desperate and hungry, as if trying to cram a hundred kisses into one. My heart swelled in my chest, and the numbness threatened to retreat. I shoved at his immovable torso, wanting him gone, but in the next heartbeat, I fisted his shirt, pulling him closer.

  He moaned into my mouth, tongue deep, and pushed me up against the desk. One hand still tangled in my hair, he used the other to skim, rough and needy, over my body. He kneaded my breast then moved round to cup and squeeze my ass. He was claiming me, leaving a trail of delicious flames in the wake of his rough touch. There was fire in my veins, forcing me awake, but waking hurt. Waking meant facing the truth. It meant really facing my fate.

  I shoved him away, struggling to find the breath to speak. “Why are you doing this? Why now? Damn you, Logan. I’m dying. Do you get that? It’s over.”

  His mouth turned down in anger and his free hand pinched my chin, forcing me to look at him. “It’s only over if you give up. And I won’t let you. I won’t let you tear into my life and force my heart to beat again only to crush it. You don’t get to fucking check out. You have to live.”

  How dare he, how dare he show his hand now when it was too late. “Maybe I don’t want to fight.”

  “No?” He arched a brow and then he kissed me hard and rough—a passionate crush of lips—before spinning me away from him and pulling my back to his chest. “You don’t want to live?” His hand slid down my abdomen toward my waistband.

  Oh, God. My body was alive and aching for this. “Fuck you, Logan.”

  “No, Eva. Fuck you.” With one deft move he yanked down my slacks and pushed me down over the desk.

  One huge hand pinned me to the wood and the other pulled down my panties and cupped me. I was wet for him, ready for the slide of his fingers as they slipped over my throbbing need.

  Oh, God. Oh, fucking God.

  “You want to die?” He adjusted the rhythm, making me squirm and gasp. “You want to not feel?”

  Oh, shit. Oh, fuck. My body was taking over, moving against his fingers, helping him to set the pace, a pace that would shatter me.

  “Logan, please …”

  “Fuck you, Eva.” His voice was raw, and then his hand was gone and his dick pressed against my entrance.

  I pushed back, and he sucked in a breath through his teeth. “Goddamn you.”

  He entered me with a single thrust. There was a burn—part pain, part pleasure—as he stretched me. He rocked his hips against my ass, rubbing against the spot, the fucking delicious spot that was spiraling me, tightening me, forcing me to claw at the desk and rock hard against him.

  “Dammit, Eva. Shit.” He gripped the back of my neck, his fingers unyielding. “Don’t. Fucking. Move.”

  My body went completely still at his command.

  “Good girl. That’s right.” His voice was a raw purr.

  The pressure was there, nirvana was there, just out of reach. I needed this, I needed him to … “Logan, please …”

  “Please what? Say it, Eva?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, hating myself. Hating him. Wanting him. “Please, fuck me.”

  “With pleasure.” He started to roll his hips against mine, building the pressure, winding me tighter. And then he began to thrust, long, powerful thrusts, harder and faster. Blood roared in my ears as sensation built and gathered, ready to explode. It shot outward, down my legs and my arms, until there was only the crashing wave and the ride as I bucked with the orgasm, my cry of release a shameful, wonderful thing.

  Long moments passed and then his chest pressed to my back and his mouth brushed my earlobe. “That’s what you’re giving up, Eva. Life, sensation, my cock inside you. You’re a fighter, a survivor, so fucking fight.”

  He withdrew, and a moment later the door opened and shut.

  He was gone, and I was left trembling with the memory of his touch.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Elias

  Eva slammed the door behind her, leaving nothing but stunned silence in her wake.

  “We have to do something,” the Fang named Jace said. “There has to be a way to save her.”

  “Just because Jamie doesn’t know how doesn’t mean there isn’t someone who does,” the huge djinn said. Sage, that was his name.

  They were right, of course they were right. “The Foundation has some of the most high-tech equipment in the world at its disposal and some of the brightest minds. Once we have it under our control, we can set them to work on the problem.”

  “That’s provided she lasts that long,” the dark-eyed Fang said softly. “You saw her face, she’s given up. She’s accepted she’s going to die. Half the battle against any sickness is psychological.”

  “This isn’t a sickness,” the djinn said.

  The large Fang with the pale eyes, the one she seemed to gravitate to the most, made hand gestures … Sign language, that was what it was called.

  The dark-eyed Fang shook his head in disgust. “You would say that. Let her do this her way. You give her too much space, too much con
trol. Right now, what she needs is someone else to take the reins and tell her what to do. Right now, she needs a wake-up call. She needs an injection of faith.” He made for the door, but the pale-eyed Fang, Ash, that was it, intercepted him.

  Tension rippled in the air.

  “Ash, Logan, come on,” Jace said.

  “Let them have it out,” the djinn said. “It’s been coming for a while. They need to blow off the steam.”

  “Ash …” Jace placed a hand on Ash’s arm, obviously not on board with Sage’s plan, and the big guy backed off.

  Ash’s body language screamed reluctance, though, and the steel in his eyes said he was a hairbreadth from changing his mind.

  “Talk to her,” Jace said to Logan. “If you think it will help.”

  Logan stormed from the room.

  Ash began to pace, his body rippling as he moved. He’d been hard to shrug off when he’d tried to pin me in the tent. Out of them all, he was probably closest to me in strength; the djinn was also a close second. He was watching me now with his fiery gaze.

  “What?”

  “You’re attracted to her, aren’t you?” Sage said.

  My blood turned to ice, because until that moment I’d been deliberately oblivious to that fact, but now… Fuck.

  The djinn smiled. “It’s the only reason you’re not dead.”

  “Oh, and you think you could take me?”

  He smiled, slow and wicked. “I wouldn’t be alone.”

  Ash was glaring at me now, his arms crossed over his chest, and Jace was staring at me with open curiosity. Sage watched with evident glee. The bastard. He was enjoying this, but he couldn’t know the truth, not yet, not until I’d confirmed it.

  “She’s a formidable woman.” I smiled thinly and shrugged. “There’s a sense of power about her, and now, with her origins revealed, it makes sense. Yes, there is an attraction I guess.”

  Ash signed something.

  Sage chuckled. “He says if you touch her without her permission he’ll rip your arms off.”

  I met Ash’s eyes. He actually believed he’d be able to. I guess love made lions out of men. “I’m sure if I touched Eva without her permission she’d chop my hands off herself. There’d be no need for anyone else to do it.”

  Ash’s eyes narrowed, and then he inclined his head, short and sharp.

  The door behind us opened and Logan strode back into the lab, but he didn’t come alone, he brought with him the scent of sex and Eva. My stomach clenched, and a growl vibrated in my chest. It was purely involuntary and shocking. I bit it back, but Ash had no such qualms; his eyes narrowed to slits, and he lunged at Logan. Jace made a grab for the big guy, but it was too late. Ash was across the room and on Logan in a blur. Fists flew, resulting in thuds and grunts and colorful curses from Logan.

  Sage shook his head slowly and then stepped into the fray to pull Logan out from beneath an enraged Ash. The dark-haired Fang’s lip was bleeding, and Ash’s cheekbone was red. But the wounds would heal soon; they were, after all, Fangs.

  Logan straightened his clothes. “You don’t own her, Ash, and you know it. She wanted me.”

  Ash signed, his movements jerky with anger.

  Logan’s jaw ticked. “That’s none of your fucking business. I’m going to get some air.” He strode off toward the lift.

  Ash yanked open the door to the cabins and disappeared.

  I looked to Jace. “What did Ash say?”

  Jace exhaled through his nose. “He asked Logan if Logan wanted Eva too. He asked him if he cared.” Jace pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m gonna go lie down.”

  He followed Ash out of the lab.

  Sage turned to me. “Looks like it’s just you and me. Since Eva seems to have recruited you as part of the team, maybe we should get better acquainted.”

  There was no slyness in the request; in fact, he looked more resigned than anything else.

  Dammit. I’d wanted to speak to Jamie, but it looked like my chat with the scientist would have to wait.

  I’d finally managed to shake Sage and make my way to Jamie’s small lab. The scientist didn’t even hear me enter his private domain. He was hunched over a microscope, muttering to himself. I cleared my throat, and he sat back with a start.

  “Oh, um, hello? Can I help you?” he said.

  I smiled, my pulse pounding a little too hard. “I need to know something.”

  “Of course, what is it?”

  “The Vladul gene … Where did you get that?”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Hot water sluiced off my body, washing Logan’s scent away. But it couldn’t wash away the memory of him inside me or his words. There were no spare clothes here, but there was an oversized bathrobe. Slipping it on, I went back into the bedroom to find Ash sitting on the edge of my bed. His face was set in harsh lines, and his eyes were stormy. A bruise bloomed high on his cheekbone.

  “Shit, Ash?” I knelt between his knees and peered up into his face. “Logan?”

  He nodded and held up a scraped fist. Yeah, he’d given as good as he’d gotten— probably better, to be honest. His fist uncurled against my cheek to cup it, his other hand settled at the nape of my neck, massaging gently. His gaze was enquiring as it scanned my features.

  “I’m okay.”

  He sighed and pressed a kiss to my forehead.

  “I had sex with Logan.” The words just tumbled out. “But I guess you know that.”

  His hand tightened a fraction on the back of my neck and then he pressed a kiss to my cheek.

  My throat pinched. “I don’t know what I’m doing right now, Ash. But in that moment, I wanted him. I think … there’s a part of me that’s wanted him for a while now.”

  His gray eyes were warm with understanding. He carefully pulled me up and onto his lap.

  God, I didn’t deserve him. He was kindness and safety and warmth, and there was no lying to him, not about anything. “Ash … I don’t want to die.”

  He held me tighter, cradling me in his arms.

  “I really, really don’t.” The dam I’d erected cracked and my vision blurred. “I’m scared, Ash. I’m so scared.”

  He rolled us onto the bed and wrapped himself around me. His breath was even and comforting, his hand soothing as I allowed the tsunami of fear to wash over me.

  It lasted minutes, but it felt like hours, and when it was over my soul felt bruised and battered. Ash leaned over me, his face determined, his eyes blazing with conviction.

  That’s it, that look said. You’ve purged the fear, now we get up and we fight. We find a solution. We find a way. I buried my head in his shoulder and inhaled his scent before reluctantly pulling back.

  “Let’s go check on Jamie’s progress.”

  His smile was filled with pride.

  The cure was almost ready, and everyone was locked away in their cabins getting some rest. Not me, though. With my days numbered, I needed to understand what I was, how I worked, and what was happening inside me if we were ever to find a way to stop it. Jamie had provided me with all the data, and I’d ignored the pitying look in his eyes. He didn’t know me. He didn’t know the world outside. He had no idea what I was capable of. He had no idea what the scientists at the Foundation could do.

  Yes, Elias had filled me in about the advanced systems they had. There was hope.

  There had to be.

  Logan hadn’t surfaced, so our paths hadn’t crossed. Thank goodness, because I wasn’t ready to look into his eyes and see indifference again. Instead, I stared at the data on the holo-screen. My genetic makeup, the notes, and the work leading up to my creation scrolled across the surface. Noah had screened my blood when we’d met, but he’d been looking only for the virus, he hadn’t been looking at my DNA. On the surface, my blood looked human. Normal. What would he think of me now? If anyone could understand what it felt like to be different, it was the guys.

  Jace had tried contacting Noah twice, but there’d been no response. It was worrying
, but there was nothing we could do from here. Right now, the priority had to be the cure. We’d be back at the bunker soon enough.

  I sensed Sage’s presence as soon as he entered the room.

  “This explains a lot,” Sage said softly from behind me.

  “Your ignited heart?” My mouth twisted wryly. “Yes, the percentage of djinn is quite high.”

  “Not as high as the Vladul and the fey.” He studied the data. “But not only that, it explains why your blood is so intoxicating to the Fangs. A long time ago, Fangs would feed on fey as an aphrodisiac, but a treaty between the races put a stop to that after a psychotic Fang went on a killing spree targeting fey children. War was prevented when the insane Fang was handed over to the fey nobility and an enchanted treaty was signed.”

  Everything he was saying reinforced Jamie’s warning, that the stabilizing marker was breaking down. My fey side was shining through in the taste of my blood, and the djinn side had broken through to ignite Sage’s heart. I was devolving, or whatever the fuck it was called.

  Sage’s gaze was warm on the side of my face. There was more he wanted to say, and I could sense he was holding back.

  I sighed and turned my head to lock gazes with him. “Sage, if there’s something you want to say, then now is the time. Just … say it.”

  His chest heaved in a hearty sigh. “I can’t lose you.” He pressed his lips together as if to cut off any further words.

  He was powerful, he was otherworldly, and he was looking at me as if I was woven from magic and starlight.

  My chest tightened. “Sage …”

  “Fuck it.” He cupped my face in his huge hands. “You ignited my heart and that means something. That’s a connection I won’t lose. Of all the djinn DNA in all the world, you were woven with the spark that was meant to burn alongside mine. There has to be a way to save you, and I vow to you now that I will find it. I’ll find it, or I will burn alongside you.”

  There was powerful sincerity in his words that slammed into my heart and squeezed my lungs. A new heat bloomed behind my eyes, and my vision blurred. No. No more tears. I blinked them back.