“What the ever-loving fuck,” I uttered as I dipped my head to the water and, before I knew my intentions, I’d placed my lips flush against his and kissed him. He came up, wrapping his arms around me as he deepened the kiss and encircled me with his arms, holding me close against his naked chest.
My hands slowly slid up his back and buried into his hair, threading through it as I held him to me. We were unnatural to want this…this crazy thing that was happening between us. He was the storm out on the ocean, dangerous and deadly, and I was the idiot in the boat who danced upon those deadly waves, sailing the treacherous sea in chase of the adrenaline rush only he could give me.
He lifted us up and my senses came rushing back as our lips parted. He allowed me to slide from his body until my feet touched the smooth surface of the tub. He pushed me down and I didn’t argue, didn’t complain as he followed me back into the tub still wearing his pants. He reached for a bottle of shampoo and turned me until my back was against his chest.
“How’s the pain?” he asked gutturally.
“It’s…gone,” I murmured as I struggled to ignore the appendage I felt in his jeans. “You got in the bath in jeans?”
“You want me to remove them?” he asked, and I shook my head. “Didn’t think so,” he laughed softly.
“You healed me,” I pointed out.
“Yes,” he responded carefully. “Don’t ask it,” he started when my lips parted to do just that. “You’re not ready for that, and I am barely holding back the urge to tear you from this tub and bend you over that counter. Now, shut up and let me wash your hair, little witch.”
He washed it with strong fingers, massaging my scalp as I rested against him as he’d instructed. It was too intimate. The setting was everything a girl could dream up. Candlelight flickered in the dark bathroom and I gazed up, wondering when the lights had gone out or how I’d missed it when they did. Roses mixed with other types of flower petals as they danced on the water’s surface around my knees. His hands were magic as he washed my hair with something that smelled divine. I actually let loose a moan as he continued to massage it, sending pleasure racing from my head to my toes.
“Did you have to push me beneath the water?” I muttered as I rested my head against him as I peered up into his onyx depths.
“Would you have allowed it otherwise?” he asked deeply, his deep baritone voice rumbling against my skin. I shook my head, giving him my answer as I watched him lower his lips and place a gentle kiss against them. I swallowed as tears swam in my vision. I could handle anger. I could handle the hate that burned through me. I couldn’t handle this. Not this nice shit, this gentleness from him, not when I wanted to remain angry at him. I lifted my head, moving my mouth away from him as he pulled down another bottle. “Magic is touchy when you use blood. My blood heals; you’re no longer bruised or bleeding inside. Unlike Benjamin’s clumsy attempt to heal you with white magic, I used the magic of my blood. You’ll be fully recovered in the morning, but until then, you’ll sleep with me.”
“That’s not happening,” I argued as he finished washing my hair and I faced him.
“It wasn’t a question,” he growled. “Blood magic has a price, Lena, one that I won’t allow you to pay, so you will sleep in my bed,” he purred silkily. “You will be the first woman to ever sleep in it without getting fucked, so shut up, get dressed or don’t. That one is up to you but I warn you, sweet girl, I’m hanging by a fucking thread and it’s about to snap without being able to take what I want. Lucifer is still out there, and he’s made it known he wants you. Every fucking demon is itching to get to you to fall into favor with him. So no, you’re not sleeping alone tonight or any other fucking night, not even claimed.
“He’s lost his fucking mind in his need for revenge, and I promised you that I would protect you. I don’t break my fucking promises. I won’t force you to be with me, but I didn’t go through months of hell keeping my distance to lose you now. I’ve had Luna and your things brought to my room, so get changed. Seeing you naked is driving me bugfuck crazy and I’m a sinner, and you’re no fucking saint. Us naked, beautiful girl? We’re explosive, and I crave you like a drug addict on a fucking bender in need of a fix. Go get dressed, now.”
I stood up, ignoring him as his hungry gaze trailed down my body, following the rivulets of water. I stepped from the tub, eyeing the mirror as I took in the lack of bruises, leaving behind only the crude stitches.
“I’ll remove them when you’re dressed and my cock stops aching,” he hissed from the tub, where he remained seated. “Clothes, Lena.” I grabbed a towel as I darted to the bedroom.
Inside the room, I dressed in a gown and crawled beneath the covers, waiting for Lucian. Luna jumped onto the bed, scaring me as she fried my already frayed nerves. I petted her thick, midnight coat and tried to ignore Lucian as he sauntered into the room with only a thick white towel wrapped around his narrow hips. He moved to the cupboard and withdrew a pair of sweats. I observed quietly as he tossed the towel aside and then faced me.
He clucked his tongue and Luna jumped up, mewling as she slunk her traitorous ass over to the edge of the bed before jumping into his waiting arms. He cradled her as he moved to the closet once more, withdrawing a huge velvet bed and setting it in the chair that sat at the end of the bed. She jumped into it, lying down as she started grooming her paws. He deftly moved around the room, putting out water and the expensive as shit cat food.
“Goodnight, Luna,” he purred as she watched him move to the bed.
“Thank you,” I whispered hoarsely.
“For what?”
“For taking care of her,” I replied. “When I found her she’d been abandoned. She was scared of her own shadow and covered in fleas. I nursed her back to life, and she’s been with me since. You’ve spoiled her rotten, though, and I’m not sure she’ll want to go with me now.” I laughed as Luna mewled in agreement.
“Do you have any idea how hard it was keeping her from her mother? Anytime you walked in she went crazy. No amount of expensive cat food will replace you in her life. You’re her mother, and I don’t think you realize that you were never alone. The coven watched you; they protected you even when you didn’t know they were. No witch is ever alone in this world. You’re all bonded until death, and sometimes not even death can break that bond.”
I watched as he pulled the blankets apart before sliding beneath them. His body rippled with masculine power, muscles moved with sinewy perfection as he reached for me. I didn’t fight him, instead letting him pull me close as he whispered words that turned off the lights. In the darkness, I prayed to Hecate.
I prayed for the strength to do what was needed when the time came. I prayed that he wasn’t what Benjamin said he was, because if he was, I’d fallen in love with a monster from the depths of Hell.
Chapter 26
The next few days were a blur of activity as more covens showed up, everything moving faster than I could keep up with. Some had come from as far as New Mexico to find protection with our coven. Each was known to us, which at least made it easier to accept them into the fold.
I’d steered clear of most of them, ignoring Lucian as well until bedtime. The latter wasn’t as easy since anytime he entered a room, my stomach did a summersault, and my heart sped up a little faster even without seeing him.
Tonight I was hunting my mother and grandmother down for a conversation I could no longer wait to have with them. Our family had secrets, the kind of secrets that left everything upside down and inside out.
Moving through the club’s main room, I slowed my pace as I watched Kendra approach Lucian. Her hand touched his shoulder and she giggled as she pulled it back, tucking her hair behind her ear as she spoke to him. I stood there, dumbfounded as she laughed at something he said and then pointed to a booth close to them. Lucian nodded and together they walked to it then slid into the seat on the same side.
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br /> Kendra smiled, leaning her shoulder entirely too close to Lucian as she lifted her lips to his ear, whispering into it. I felt my anger rising as if I had a right to be angry over her getting that close to him, but I didn’t. Hadn’t I pushed him away? My question was: If she’d been battered by Lucifer using Lucian’s image, wouldn’t she be hesitant or uncomfortable speaking to him? Instead, she looked like she was flirting, and he didn’t look immune to it, either. She was flirting with him with my face! Of course he wouldn’t be immune to it, she was me. He could easily go with her and just toss me aside because we were literally the same make and model.
I was so absorbed in observing them that I hadn’t heard Spyder come up beside me. He pushed me into the corner and laughed throatily as I gasped in shock.
“Jealous, kitty?” he inquired softly as his thumb captured my chin, lifting my gaze from Lucian and Kendra to meet his instead. I pursed my lips together and began to feed him the riot act when he shook his head. “She isn’t you,” he purred huskily. “He wants your fire, you burn red hot. She’s ice-fucking-cold and boring. Don’t do that jealousy bullshit. You’re better than that. Now run along before more people see you glaring daggers at your twin image.”
“I’m not jealous,” I lied. I totally was. The pain in my heart ached, and my stomach twirled with a new emotion I hadn’t felt in a very long time. Not since my ex had fucked Cassidy on my own bed.
“Liar, it’s written in your eyes and the stiffness of your spine. You’re pissed,” he argued.
“She was taken by Lucifer, and he was projecting Lucian’s image, yet she’s okay with whispering into his ear as her hand strokes his?”
Spyder paused as his stare turned to look at Lucian and Kendra. Exactly! She seemed cozy with him, and she shouldn’t. Not after what she’d endured. Hell, she barely spoke to me more than to order me about. Lately she’d asked me to take her places, places that we had no business being at. Shit, I’d barely managed to call Benjamin and warn him that she’d suggested we go investigate a cottage close to our house where an enemy may have hidden before the demons had been released.
She’d changed, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t connect with her. I’d tried to use the mental link—shit, I’d screamed at her through it for hours last night as I lay awake next to Lucian. Nothing, radio silence on her end. Not even the sight of Lucian’s bare chest distracted me as my mind replayed everything she’d been up to since she’d returned.
“Has she been different since she returned?” he asked, forcing my mind to focus on him. I wouldn’t betray her, not when whatever was going on with her was my fault.
“No, just forget it. I have to find my grandmother,” I replied as I moved away from him.
“Does she have a devil’s trap on her, Magdalena?” he asked as he grabbed my arm, preventing my escape.
“We all do, even Luna has one,” I admitted.
“You tattooed our Luna?” he asked, and I zeroed my gaze on him. Our Luna?
“According to what Alden told my mother, not even animals are immune to being possessed,” I retorted. “Furthermore, she’s mine and it’s my responsibility to protect her.”
“Calm your tits, kitty. Your grandmother is holding her court in the dungeon, with the other elders. I did supply whips and chains so if anyone steps out of line, I’m sure Sarah can handle them easily.”
I smirked as the mental image played through my mind. “That’s just wrong on so many levels that I’m not even sure where to start, Spyder,” I laughed.
“There it is,” he said as he reached up and pushed a stray piece of hair behind my ear. “They should be done soon, and if he doesn’t see through her shit, it will be his own fault, and then you and I? We’ll play cat and mouse a bit,” he laughed as he teased but the heat in his eyes said a totally different story.
I looked away from him to where Lucian had been watching us together. The look in his angry glare told me he wasn’t happy about it, so I did the only thing I could to let him know I didn’t care. I stood on my tiptoes, kissing Spyder on the lips before I moved away, leaving him with a dumbfounded look and Lucian with a clear message.
I’d made it to the end of the bar area before Lucian appeared in front of me, and I tilted my head a bit, knowing he hadn’t gotten here by walking.
“What the fuck was that?” he demanded.
“You tell me,” I demanded back, crossing my arms as I glared up at him.
“You fucking kissed him,” he growled.
“I gave him a peck on the lips,” I replied easily, as if Spyder’s lips hadn’t affected me any.
“You want to explain why the fuck you did it?” he asked icily, his jaw ticking wildly.
“You want to tell me what my sister whispered into your ear?” I countered angrily.
He smiled and grabbed my arm, pulling me into the hallway that led out of sight. Lucian pushed me against the wall and kissed me, hard. When he pulled away, he growled long and hard as he stared down at me.
“You can keep acting like you don’t want me, but you need me,” he whispered hoarsely.
“No, Lucian. The difference is I never needed you. I wanted you, and there’s a huge difference between the two. I wanted you with every fiber of my being and you fucking broke me, like I was some sort of promise you decided not to keep. Do you have any idea how that makes me feel? I feel worthless, like I wasn’t worth the chance you’d have taken to trust me to follow your lead. And now, now you’re all cozy as a stripper and a dollar bill with my sister. And you get mad when I kiss someone else you forced to claim me? Why are we here right now? Whose choices led us here? Because it sure as shit wasn’t mine. Mine would have been by your side, unwaveringly following you into the depths of Hell if you’d asked. So guess what, if I kiss someone else? You deal with it, because I didn’t push you away, you fucking threw me away like your unwanted trash.”
“I would never throw you away, Lena. I saved your foolhardy life, and right now you’re making it very hard not to slam you against that wall and prove it to you. You think I want Kendra? I assure you, you couldn’t be further from the truth. She’s even colder than she was before, and my feelings for you didn’t change one fucking iota when you thought you were her. Staying away from you was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do, and trust me, I’ve done a lot of hard things in my lifetime, but none of them affected me as you have. So throw your fucking fit and get the fuck over it, because you and me? We’re far from done. You want me and I want you, and that’s all that should fucking matter right now. People outside are dying and you’re too pissed off to see past your anger to grab what is right in front of you,” he seethed as he boxed me against the wall. “There’s not another woman that roams this world or any other who I want more than you.”
I swallowed as I closed my eyes against the angry tears. “Then why didn’t you let me choose? Why did you take away pieces of me?” I uttered painfully.
“Because you would have run right to Lucifer in your pain to get her back, and I couldn’t allow that. You think we weren’t being watched? You think he didn’t have fucking minions up here watching me? I made them keep you away from me until I was sure the glamour we’d cloaked you in had worked on the demons. Once I knew, I made them send you to me every fucking chance I got, every fucking excuse to see you I took. Life isn’t fucking black and white, Magdalena, wake the fuck up and get past it. Be pissed, but get the fuck over it.”
“You think it’s that easy?” I demanded angrily. “You erased my brother, and then you went even further and you erased my tattoos, which meant something to me. They were proof I’d survived something, and you obliterated it from my past like it was written in fucking sharpie. I was falling for you and then you played God in my world; you didn’t trust me and that hurts the most. You made me into something I’m not, and now you expect me to just go back to the girl I was before. Why? Bec
ause your world didn’t change? Mine has been shaken from its foundation and left in a pile of fucking rubble to rebuild alone. You burned my world down, and in the same breath, you didn’t let the flames touch me, but in the end, you were the flames that burned me the most. You protected me and let someone I love take the fall. She’ll never be the same, and neither will I.”
Footsteps sounded down the hall and Lucian took a step away from me as we watched my grandmother and mother converge on our location. I turned my head from them, wiping away the tears before I walked in their direction.
“I need to speak to you, both of you. Now,” I announced.
“Is everything all right?” my mother questioned.
“We need to talk about Drake,” I growled.
My mother’s blue eyes grew rounded as she moved hers between me and my grandmother. She knew that I knew she’d lied to me from birth. My grandmother asked Lucian for a room and he directed us to one, which I entered silently. Once the door had closed, I rounded on my mother and stared at her shaken pallor.
“You need to explain why you would withhold it from the coven and us,” I snapped.
“Drake was a born dark witch,” my grandmother answered for her sternly. “It was forbidden by the coven. We weren’t aware of it when they first got together; he was awakened by the ancestors, or so we had assumed. He used dark magic to make a deal with a witch; in exchange, he was given a mate of pure blood. He got Fiona. We were unaware of what he was, or what he’d done at the time. They conceived the boys on that very night. They fell in love, Lena. You and I both know the heart doesn’t care what is wrong or right. It goes after what it wants no matter what the brain says otherwise.
“We didn’t know what had happened until it was too late, and even then, they were in love. When Benjamin turned dark, it was too late to drive the darkness out of him. Drake took him to the cottage for a while, hid him from the others. I myself took them food and supplies. Months later, I watched Joshua as your mother snuck up to see him, to tell him it was time to go away from here, as the others had begun to notice his presence, or lack of. Your mother became pregnant that very night as they said their goodbyes. That was why, on summer solstice every year, we took you girls to the seer in the woods. You were both protected from the darkness. So, when Drake and Benjamin disappeared, we vowed to find her another mate immediately and claim he sired you and Kendra.”
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