He looked at me without any emotion now, his expression like ice for a moment, and I wondered if he might kill me right now after all.
“Like father, like son, eh, Portia?” he said, with a sudden laugh as he stood up and walked to the door, pausing to turn and look at me. “Who’d have thought you’d be the one to stir up the lust in both of us?”
He turned and smiled a purely evil smile before he walked out, closing the door behind him.
I jumped from the bed and ran into the bathroom, slipping to my knees on the wet floor I had forgotten I had left behind the night before, sliding precariously across the tile. I crawled the rest of the way over to the toilet and heaved the contents of my already empty stomach over and over again, uncontrollably.
When I was finally able to stop retching, I stood up and shakily made my way over to the glass shower. I opened the door, hugging the wall as I climbed inside, clothing and all.
I turned the water on as hot as I could stand it and sat on the seat, sobbing in horrible spasms, as I took a bar of soap and scrubbed at my skin, clothing, everything that I could reach, wanting desperately to get the feel and the taste of him off my body and out of my mouth.
“Vance! Where are you? I need you!” I called out in my mind, wishing desperately that he could hear me but knowing he was much too far away for that to be possible.
“Portia? I’m here!” his voice came back, and I jumped against the glass before sliding into the bottom of the shower in shock at the sound.
I must be dreaming, or worse I was starting to hallucinate.
“Vance?” I called out again, holding my breath in fear that he wouldn’t answer, that my brain was playing some horrible trick on me.
“I’m here, Portia!” he called back to me again, and I could hear the desperation in his voice. “I’m on an airplane just coming into Las Vegas from Phoenix! I didn’t even think I was close enough for you to hear me yet.”
Phoenix! Apparently Damien’s spies had been wrong. Either that or he had lied to me, which was always a very real possibility.
“Hurry, Vance!” I sobbed, this time in relief, knowing now he really was on his way to me.
“Portia, are you okay? Has he harmed you?” his frantic voice asked me, and I could feel his great concern over my wellbeing.
“He kissed me … hard. He tried to … tried to ….” I began sobbing even harder, my tears mixing in with shower water as it ran down my face.
The anger burst immediately through him, and I could feel it strongly. It was a rage that burned more powerfully than anything I had ever felt or experienced in my life.
“I’ll kill him!” he yelled, his emotions coursing through me as they ran wildly through him, and I knew he meant every word.
“I’m all right,” I hiccupped, trying to explain, knowing I needed him to be thinking calmly and rationally right now. “He didn’t … hurt me … he only threatened to. I bit him, and he stopped, but he says if you don’t join him willingly, he’ll take me away from you in every way possible.”
This perhaps was not the best thing I could be telling him right now. I could feel his fury as it seethed through every cell of his being, like little flames igniting every particle in him until he was a giant firework, ready to explode.
“Portia, where are you?” he asked, and I felt dizzy as his anger and hatred toward his father began to overpower me.
“I don’t know,” I replied, trying to steel my own body against his emotions. “We’re somewhere on the strip in a really big penthouse.”
“Can you look out the window?” he asked me.
“Yes.”
“I want you to go to the window and look out, Portia. Start describing everything you can see. I’ll need some landmarks so I can find out where you are.”
I climbed out of the shower, running carefully this time as I dripped across the wet floor, and out to stand at the French doors that led to the balcony, moving the curtains back so I could look out.
“I can see a lot of the big-name hotels down the road.”
“Which ones?”
“Um, Mandalay Bay, New York, New York, and Excalibur; they’re on the opposite side of the street. I can see a lot of limos pulling in at the base of this hotel also. I’m in a white tower on the very top. There’s a large balcony off my room, but he’s sealed the door somehow so I can’t get out onto it.”
“I’ll find it,” he said. “We’re coming in for landing now. I’ll be over as soon as I can get there.”
“He has set this all up for your benefit,” I reminded him as a flash of fear for him streaked through my veins. “You’re the one he really wants. You’ll be running straight into his trap.”
“No. I’m going to attempt a rescue first.”
“How can you possibly do that without alerting him to your presence?” I asked, my anxiety level reaching an all-time high.
“Leave that to me,” he replied, his voice thick with emotion. “If he comes to you again, try not to antagonize him any more. I just want you to do your best to stay locked in your room right now and wait for me to come.”
“I will,” I said, my mind racing with things I wanted to tell him in this very moment. “Vance, he says you have powers that you aren’t aware of. He says you can replenish yourself and that you would never be in danger of losing all your powers. He says he could perform a demon kiss on you repeatedly and you’d never be human. That’s why he wants you so badly. He hasn’t ever been able to find anyone else as powerful as you in his life. The transfer is like a drug to him. He’s addicted to it. He wants to change you so the two of you can rule over everyone in the world, like some demon empire.”
“He told you all this?”
I could hear the worry laced in his voice. “Yes. He figured out that we must be linked, but he doesn’t know I can speak to you mentally. Otherwise, I’m sure he would’ve never said anything.”
“Either that, or he intends to kill you no matter what,” Vance said, and I could feel the hot surge of his anger flash again.
“I’m more concerned about what he intends to do to you. I love you, Vance. Please be careful!” I wished there was something else I could do to help him.
“Portia, do whatever you need to do to get ready to leave with me,” he ordered. “If I can get in there, we’re going to need to leave in a hurry, so make sure you’re dressed appropriately.”
“I will, but where will we go? He’ll hunt us both down.” I ran into the closet to look for something to change into, my dripping clothes leaving a trail of water on the carpet behind me.
“I have no intention of letting him live long enough to do that,” he replied angrily. “But you’re my first priority; I can deal with him later. I just want to get you out of there right now. I’ll take care of him when you’re safely deposited back with your family.”
“Where’s the rest of the coven?” I rummaged through the clothes in the closet looking for something suitable to wear, finally settling on a designer track suit I found toward the back of the rack.
“They’re in Sedona by now probably. I hopped the first flight I could get on in Phoenix.”
“How did you know where to go?” I asked, truly amazed that he had gotten here so quickly.
“After we searched the beach house for you and found the note he left behind, we went to the local airport. I found out a flight for Las Vegas had left the airport in Rocky Point. It was the only flight that had gone out. I took a chance, and it paid off.”
“So Damien thinks you’re just barely in Sedona then?” I smiled. “He has no idea that you’d get here this quickly!”
“Taxi! Taxi!” I heard him shouting and knew he was calling for a cab outside the airport.
He must have run through the entire facility, I realized, wondering how he had been able to get off the plane so fast.
“Take me to the strip, please,” I heard him tell the driver, and I assumed he must have handed the driver a significant wad of cash when he spo
ke again. “All this is yours if you can get me there with as much speed as possible.”
There was a quick pause before he spoke again.
“I’m on my way, Portia. Are you getting ready to leave?”
“Yes.” I went into the bathroom to comb through my wet tangled hair and pull it back into a ponytail.
“All right, I’m going to make a stop to purchase some rope and binoculars,” he explained. “I’m going to try to get to the balcony off your bedroom from the roof of your hotel after I find it, okay?”
“Please be careful.” I came back into the bedroom and sat down to put a pair of running shoes on. “I’d imagine he probably has people watching for you all over the hotel.”
“I’m hoping that won’t be the case, since I’m earlier than expected, but I’ll come in through one of the service entrances to try and avoid detection,” he replied, trying to reassure me.
The door to my room opened suddenly, and I severed the mental connection with Vance just in case Damien could see it.
It was Darcy, though, not Damien, carrying a tray of food for lunch.
She placed it on the table without looking at me, then turned and left the room again, this time only to step out into the hall before returning with supplies to clean up the bedroom and bathroom.
I thought I was going to die as she moved about the rooms, taking her time cleaning up my messes.
She made the bed, fluffing it up all proper, before she marched into the bathroom. She emerged a short minute later with a glare on her face after she had discovered the flood in there.
To her credit, she didn’t speak a word to me, and it was all I could do to not pace the floor in agony as she mopped at the water-sopped area. I finally made myself go sit in a chair in front of the fireplace and click it on so I could stare into the dancing flames as a distraction. It seemed like hours passed before she went back out with all her cleaning gear.
“I’m okay,” I said as soon as she shut the door behind her.
“What happened?” Vance asked, and I could hear the nervousness along with relief in his voice.
“The maid came in. I thought Damien might be coming into the room also. I was worried that he’d be able to see our mental connection somehow.”
“I don’t think he can,” Vance replied. “Otherwise, he’d have known about it that night on the beach when he took you.”
“That’s true,” I said, remembering that awful night, kicking myself one more time for being so careless as to have gone to the beach by myself. “How close are you?” I felt very impatient as I paced the floor.
“I’m riding in the taxi up and down the strip trying to find a hotel matching your description. Portia, do you have something that’s brightly colored you can put up to the glass in your window? I’m going to be searching for your room with the binoculars now.”
I looked quickly around the room before deciding I’d have better luck in the closet.
I found a long neon green scarf folded in one of the drawers. I yanked it out and ran back into the other room where I hung it from the rod over the window, pushing it against the curtain from behind so it would drape closer down the glass pane.
“It’s a long fluorescent green neck scarf,” I told him.
“Okay. Give me a minute,” he said, and I heard him give some more instructions to the driver.
It turned out to be about five minutes of pure agony on my part before he spoke up excitedly.
“I see it! It’s a green scarf hanging in the window next to the balcony, correct?”
“Yes! That’s it!” I pushed the curtains to the side and pressed myself to the window to look for him.
I saw a cab pull up into the parking lot far below, and a figure I would recognize anywhere emerged from it.
“I’m here, baby! Just hang on! I’m coming!” he mentally called out to me.
Chapter 23
I paced the room anxiously as I waited, every second seeming like an hour had passed as the clock ticked away.
He wasn’t speaking to me as he traveled through the hotel, being extra cautious to avoid any kind of magical detection.
I was terrified for both of us.
“I’m on the roof.” he finally said in my head. “Give me a minute to secure this rope to a good spot and then I’ll be down to get you.”
“Okay.” I felt the breath I had been holding release slowly, as I looked around to make sure we were still undetected from this side of things.
Long excruciating minutes passed before I saw the rope hit the balcony in front of the glass windowed doors. Then he suddenly slid into my view, stepping away from the rope to move toward me.
He took my breath away, just standing there in front of me. Even clad in a black t-shirt and blue jeans, he was still the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I didn’t even want to blink because I was afraid he would disappear before my very eyes, and I didn’t think I could possibly ever love him more than I did in this very moment.
I placed my hands up on the square glass panes as I looked out at him.
He raised a finger to his lips, and I nodded my head in understanding. I wouldn’t make a sound.
He grabbed the knob to the door, and I watched as his hand turned a bright red color. The knob on my side of the door began to glow right in front of me, and the fixture began to melt in his grasp until it was molten liquid running down the frame. Then he reached his hand into the latch and melted it also.
When he was finished, I heard a little popping sound and the door swung open easily as he pushed on it. I rushed out to him, throwing my arms gratefully around his neck.
He grabbed me to him and kissed me with a force I had never experienced. If the situation still hadn’t been so desperate, I would have never let go.
“We need to leave, Portia!” he whispered as he pulled my arms from around him. “Do you remember our lesson in levitation?”
“Yes.” My thoughts bounced back to the night he had taken me to the high school to show me what we could do.
“We’re going to use those powers to climb back up the rope to the roof. You ready?”
“Yes,” I answered. He placed the scratchy rope into my hands, and I gripped it tightly.
“You go first this time,” Vance said with encouragement in his voice. “I’ll be right behind you.”
In essence it was as if we were rappelling up the wall. We would bounce off with one step and take a couple up into the air before bouncing off again, using the rope as a guide as we ran up the exterior of the building.
We had almost cleared the wall when Damien suddenly burst out onto the balcony, leaning back to look up at us.
“Stop!” he yelled, and he lifted a hand toward us to fire some sort of magical burst of power through the air.
“Run!” Vance said, pushing me the rest of the way over the ledge. He jumped over right behind me.
The two of us took off in a fast sprint over the roof until we reached the edge, then levitated in a leap across from one tower over to another, hitting the roof lightly with our feet, until we reached the stairwell that led back down into this building.
Vance grabbed my hand as we tore down the stairs together. We pushed through a set of double doors and out into a large hallway.
Two men in dark suits turned to look at us as we entered.
“There they are!” one of them shouted, lowering the handheld radio he had up to his ear.
Vance shot a fireball at them, not waiting to see if he hit his mark, pulling me back through the doors we had just run through.
We scrambled down two more flights of stairs before we tried going through another door.
This hallway was empty, and we turned left and raced down the carpeted path stretched before us.
Vance stopped abruptly when we passed a door marked as the entrance to the service area. He turned quickly, pulling me back in this direction, and we raced through it.
“Where are we going?” I gasped, my lungs feeling li
ke they were about to explode from our sprint.
“I’m trying to get us out of the building right now!” he explained, sounding as out of breath as I was, as he dragged me through a noisy laundry area filled with many workers.
He used magic to slide full laundry carts into the path behind us, not caring that there were confused workers standing all over the room shouting at us as we ran through the area.
We turned the corner, ran down another hallway, turned once again, and found ourselves in a huge vacant loading bay. We ran toward the open delivery door.
“Almost there!” Vance said, and I felt the surge of hope shoot through me. We raced to the exit only to have all hope dashed in the next second. Damien stepped around the corner in front of us.
We slid to a halt, and Vance grabbed me up to him as I lost my footing.
Damien slowly walked toward us, a large smile spread over his face.
“Welcome home, son,” he said, with a nod toward Vance. “It’s good to see my boy again.”
“You’ve lost the right to call me that,” Vance said, and I noticed that the red flames had shot instantly back into his eyes.
“What, no kiss for Daddy?” Damien asked in feigned shock, placing a hand over his heart as if he were mortally wounded by this. “Portia was kind enough to give me one, weren’t you, baby?” he added, inadvertently using Vance’s pet name for me as he winked at me.
I felt Vance’s temper flare, and he pushed me behind him, shielding me from Damien. I also noticed the two men who had been chasing us in the hallway had finally caught up and were closing in on us from the rear.
I placed my back against Vance’s as I watched them approach, never taking my eyes off of them, watching as their demon masks slipped into place.
“You got those two covered?” Vance asked into my mind, as he continued to face Damien.
“Yes. You take care of your dad,” I replied back into his head, not wanting him to be distracted.
Damien continued forward, goading Vance as he walked.
Of Witches and Warlocks: The Demon Kiss Page 25