Release Me (Storm Lords Book 3)

by Nina Croft

  Then he smiled, and suddenly he wasn’t quite so scary. He held out a hand and she shuffled forward and shook it quickly. “Welcome. Our home is yours. Forever and always.”

  The words sounded almost ritualistic, but she forced a smile. “Thank you.”

  “And Caden Wolfe,” Finn said.

  The second man stepped forward. He wore an elegant silver-gray business suit, white shirt, and a dark-red tie that matched his short, dark-red hair. He had blue eyes and a smile that made her feel welcome. Maybe there were levels of scariness, and he looked positively benign next to Torrin Stormlord. “Hi,” he said. “Good to meet you. You want to see your boy?”

  “Yes, please.”

  He gestured to the screen they’d been watching, and she moved closer. It showed the outside of a large house, three floors high, with columns at the front. Caden reached out and swiped his hand over the screen, and the image changed to a room lit by a dull-red glow.

  “Infrared,” Cade said.

  She could make out a big bed and a small figure curled up in the middle, his head on the pillow, his eyes closed. As though sensing something, he turned but didn’t waken. Rachel’s heart ached, and she reached out with a trembling hand and touched the screen.

  “Where is this?” she asked.

  “A couple of miles away. Senator Danvers’s DC home,” Torr replied. “Jacob is safe. The senator won’t harm him, and we’re working on the best strategy to get him out and neutralize the threat.”

  “The threat?”

  “We need to make sure the senator doesn’t come after Jacob or you again.”

  “Oh.” Part of her wanted to ask how they would do that. But maybe best not to know. And most of her didn’t care. How dare he take her son? He deserved whatever came his way. He was an evil man. She’d known that when she was a child, and she knew it now.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I don’t know why you’re helping me, but I’m grateful.” Suddenly, she swayed. The events of the day—and night—taking their toll. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “But it’s been a long day.” Her stomach rumbled. “And I haven’t eaten since… I can’t remember.”

  Finn was in front of her straightaway. “Come on, I’ll show you where you can sleep. Tomorrow, we’ll have more of an idea of what to do next. You need to be bright and alert. There might be decisions to make.”

  She wasn’t sure she would be able to sleep, but just to lie down, close her eyes, stop thinking for a while, sounded wonderful. She followed Finn out of the room but paused at the door and glanced back at the sleeping form of her son, still on the screen. Soon, she’d see him for real. She had to hold onto that thought.

  Torr called out as they left the room. “Finn?”

  Just outside the door, he halted and looked back.

  “When Rachel is settled, can you come back here? There’s something you need to see. And we need to talk.”

  “I’ll be back.”

  “Where are we going?” she asked. She hoped it wasn’t far; she was dead on her feet.

  “No distance at all.” In fact, he had already come to a halt outside another door. “We have an apartment here for visitors.” He opened the door and gestured for her to enter.

  The door led into a sitting room with a big window on the far side that looked out over the city. They were high up. The walls were pale gray, and two black leather sofas stood facing each other with a coffee table between. “Sit down,” he said. “I’ll get you some food.”

  She took the few steps, sank down onto the nearest sofa, and closed her eyes. She could hear him moving around but didn’t have the energy to check out what he was doing.

  “Are you okay?” He sounded worried, and she opened her eyes, found him hovering above her, a tray in his hands.

  “Just tired and hungry and a little scared.” A lot scared.

  He set a tray on the table in front of her. There was enough food to feed the whole of Haven. Bread, cheese, half a chicken, grapes, tomatoes, other things. And a tumbler of water. “There’s wine if you want it. Do you drink? I mean are you allowed to?”

  “Of course. Jesus turned water into wine after all.”

  “I suppose he did.”

  “But water is fine.” Wine on an empty stomach would not be a good idea. Maybe later. She had a feeling that however tired she was, she was going to find sleep hard to come by. She picked up a piece of bread and nibbled the corner while he hovered above her.

  “Your friends,” she said. “Are they like you?”

  He cocked his head to one side. “In what way?”

  “Can they change into wolves?”

  He was silent for a moment and she thought perhaps he wouldn’t answer.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “If you shouldn’t tell me or something.”

  “No. There are things I can’t tell you, but I think that’s maybe not one of them.” He didn’t sound sure. “Not the wolf thing, but they can do other stuff. And there are three more of us. Bryce and Devlin and Rourke. You’ll likely meet them tomorrow.”

  “What are you?”

  “That’s one of the things I can’t tell you. But trust me, there are good reasons.”

  “I just wish I understood it all. Nothing makes sense. And I feel as though everything is changing, and time is running out. But time for what?”

  “Try not to worry about it all?” He smiled. “At least until tomorrow. Eat. Sleep. Things will seem better in the morning.”

  He was leaving, and suddenly, she didn’t want him to go. “Where will you be?”

  “I won’t leave the building, and I’ll be here in the morning when you wake.”

  “Okay. Goodnight, Finn. Thank you for… everything.”

  “There’s nothing to thank me for. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  And he turned and walked away, the door closing behind him. As he left, the last of the tension drained from her, and she sagged. Jacob was safe for the moment; that was all that mattered.

  She kicked off her shoes, digging her toes in the softness of the carpet. Then she sat up straight. Time to stop being a wimp. But she couldn’t do that on an empty stomach. She studied the food, pulled off a chicken leg, and nibbled it. Delicious. Some cheese, grapes. She drank the water and could feel the strength flowing through her. She cleared at least half the food before she could fit no more in, then sat back and rested her head against the smooth leather.

  It was hard to believe it had only been that morning Finn had pulled her from the river and been shot. It seemed like a lifetime ago. Now she looked around and a tingle of excitement ran through her. She’d never yearned to leave Haven, never wanted to see the big cities and how the rest of the world lived. She’d been happy with her life. But she couldn’t help but feel a flicker of excitement. In the space of a day, the world as she had known it had changed beyond recognition.

  And there was more in the world than she had ever expected. Men who could turn into wolves. What else could there be?

  She was in Washington, DC.

  Would she get to see some of the place? The White House. Capitol Hill. The Lincoln Memorial. She’d read about them.

  Rachel jumped to her feet and crossed to the window, looking out over the city sprawled beneath her, the lights. It was the middle of the night, but she could still see cars snaking along the roads. Lights flashing. She turned away and wandered around the room, stroking her fingers over the velvet curtains, the smooth leather of the sofas. A door led into a big kitchen and she carried the tray through. The fridge was stocked with more food than she could imagine eating, plus bottles of beer and white wine. Even a bottle of champagne. She’d never tasted that before. At Haven, they made their own beer and wine, but not champagne. She washed her plate and cutlery, then went and explored the rest of the apartment.

  There was a bedroom with a wide bed covered in a pale grey spread and a white nightgown that someone had laid out across the bottom. For her?

  Why were these people being so kind?
>
  Off the bedroom was a huge bathroom, bigger than the bedroom she shared with Jacob. It had a walk-in shower and the biggest bathtub she had ever seen. She was used to washing with a basin of water and a sponge. The idea of submerging herself in that big tub was not a pleasant one. She didn’t know where her fear of water came from; she remembered her mother telling her she’d been born with it. That from a tiny baby, she’d screamed every time they’d tried to put her in the bath. She had a flashback to the dream—if that’s what it had been—she’d had when she was in the river that morning. It had seemed so real. She’d been drowning. In freezing water. So dark. And she had wanted to die because she’d lost everyone she had ever loved. And death could only be a release.

  She knew she’d had the dream before.

  She went back and got her bag, brushed her teeth, splashed her face. After turning off the lights, she stripped off her clothes, and pulled on the nightgown. The cotton was soft and smelled of lavender and reached her ankles. Slipping between the cool sheets, she’d never felt anything so comfortable.

  As she closed her eyes, an image of Finn filled her head. There was something different, and a memory hovered at the edge of her mind. Something important she had to remember, but before she could grasp hold of it, sleep dragged her under and the memory was gone.

  Chapter 10

  Finn pulled the door closed behind him and leaned back against it, closing his eyes and breathing deeply. He’d wanted to touch her, kiss her, so badly he ached with the force of holding himself back.

  She wasn’t ready for that. And he had to accept that maybe she would never be ready. He certainly couldn’t rely on her saying I love you in the specified five days to save her life. He had to come up with another plan.

  Torr wanted to talk to him, and Finn had an idea it wouldn’t be about anything good.

  He made his way back to the control room and found Torr alone. He was viewing the screens, flicking between images of the senator’s house. He turned as Finn entered. “How is she?”

  “Scared, confused, exhausted, but otherwise as well as can be expected.”

  “She was always a strong woman. She’ll be fine.”

  “She’ll be dead in less than five days unless I find a way around the Covenant.”

  “Or unless she remembers her love.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not even sure she ever loved me.”

  “She loved you.”

  “Not enough.”

  “So defeatist. I never understood why.”

  “That’s because you never doubted Bella’s love. And you still came close to losing her.”

  “But I didn’t. Just don’t give up hope.”

  Finn ran a hand through his hair, pressing his fingers into his scalp. “The life she’s led… it’s just so different. She won’t allow me to get close. She’s been brought up to think it’s wrong for a man and a woman to even touch unless they’re married.”

  “You are married.”

  “She doesn’t know that. To her I’m some stranger. If I push her, she might retreat from me completely. Never let me close.”

  “Or you might break through to her. Bella was the same, though for different reasons. The life she had led in this reincarnation, and I’m guessing previous ones, made her almost shut down completely.”

  Bella was an empath; she could feel others’ thoughts and feelings, could heal them, take away their pain. But it had a downside—too many negative thoughts and feelings could overwhelm her. Before she’d met Torr, she’d chosen to close down that part of her life as the only way to survive.

  “I couldn’t reach her,” Torr said. “She shut me out. But I persevered, and in the end, she remembered. It’s not hopeless. Maybe you have to be bold and make her see you.”

  Shit, she wasn’t the only one who was scared.

  “What have you got to lose?” Torr asked.

  Everything.

  Or maybe nothing.

  He’d already lost everything, so perhaps Torr was right. And he should push her. Make her notice him as a man. And at the same time, he’d hunt for another answer.

  But if he did come up with a plan, all the members of the Covenant would have to agree, and that included Lilith and Gabriel. If he found a compromise that was to Lilith’s liking, no doubt Gabriel would disagree and vice versa.

  A sense of hopelessness filled him. He remembered it from old and pushed it down. At least he would be trying, and if he took Torr’s advice, he could at least touch her, attempt to push past the reserves instilled by her strict upbringing. He nodded. “I’ll try.”

  “Good. Now, I have some… bad news. Or maybe not. I don’t know.”

  “What is it?”

  Torr turned back to the bank of screens. He swiped his hand over the central screen a few times and an image appeared. The senator’s office, by the looks of it, with the man himself behind a large mahogany desk.

  “This was taken earlier today,” Torr said. “Before we set up the surveillance, but Bryce pulled it from the senator’s own security.”

  Finn studied the screen. The man appeared annoyed, his brows drawn together. He tapped a pen on the table top. The door opened. From the angle of the camera, Finn couldn’t yet see who had entered. But the senator’s expression smoothed out, only a slight tic in his cheek revealing he wasn’t as calm as he appeared.

  A woman entered the picture and Finn’s breath caught in his throat. “Cassia,” he snarled. What the hell?

  “You have them?” she asked.

  He watched the rest of the film until she walked out, then he sank into one of the chairs around the room and tried to think it through, make some sense of it all. Work out what she planned and what the implications were. Lilith wasn’t allowed to directly interfere. But did that extend to Cassia? He didn’t know.

  This was obviously not her first meeting with the senator. “When she first planned this, I hadn’t met Rachel. And she couldn’t have known that we’d meet today. This was pre-arranged before the five days began.” Christ, he’d saved that bitch’s life. He should have left her to the demons.

  “She obviously planned to put Rachel out of your reach. Maybe even have her killed,” Torr said. “With the Covenant at this stage that would likely mean the end of your chances.”

  He wanted to believe she wouldn’t do that. Hell, she’d said she loved him. But he suspected Cassia’s love wasn’t the selfless type. And she was a demon; they hardly valued human life. She would probably think nothing of it

  He reached across and swiped the screen to replay the image, studying Cassia.

  Demons only had limited access to Earth. They could visit in three ways. Mostly, they did so by possessing a human’s body. There were always humans open to the sweet persuasions of a demon. Humans who thought they could benefit from the possession, only realizing too late that their souls were damned for eternity. But there were limitations to such possessions; the host’s body and mind started deteriorating almost immediately. And the demon took on the image of the human. That clearly wasn’t the case. Cassia looked like Cassia.

  The second and most likely method was an astral projection. They had great strength for a limited period of time, but the projection took an enormous amount of power, which could not be maintained for long. However, they did have the advantage that if they were killed here on earth, their physical form re-manifested itself in the Abyss. So his natural inclination to wring Cassia’s neck would hardly be effective.

  The final option was by opening a portal between the Abyss and Earth. But that was beyond the powers of most demons. Finn and his brothers were not creatures of the Abyss, and as such, they had the ability to open the portals and move freely between the realms. That was one of the reasons they’d been so valuable to Lilith. They could also open a portal to Heaven, but they wouldn’t be welcomed there. Once, they had all called it home, but none of them had entered Heaven in more than two thousand years.

  “Now the five days have begun,�
�� Torr said. “I’m guessing she must be desperate to get Rachel away from you.”

  “Is she allowed to do that?”

  “She shouldn’t even know of the Covenant. If Lilith told her, likely she’s breaking the rules. But whether it would be considered enough to break the terms, I don’t know. We’ll find out. Tomorrow. There’s another thing. I think we should get the boy back as soon as possible. With only the senator involved, he was safe. But now Cassia is in the picture. I wouldn’t like him to be used as a bargaining chip.”

  No. Rachel would no doubt agree to anything to keep her son safe. And how could he blame her?

  “We’ll get a plan together,” Torr said. “And I’ll try and sort out a meeting with Lilith. And Gabriel.”

  “Oh goody.” He hated fucking Gabriel. “Asshole.”

  Torr smiled. “Yeah. Why don’t you go and rest? There’s nothing else we can do for now. Go to your woman.”

  Finn nodded and left the room. He didn’t think Rachel would be too happy if she woke and he was in her bedroom. But somehow, he found himself outside the door to the apartment.

  Then inside. He stood in the sitting room. Maybe if he stayed in here, she wouldn’t be too pissed off. But now that he was this close, he needed to see her. Hell, he needed to touch her. And he had a feeling that wouldn’t go down so well. She would probably freak out. But maybe there was a way around this.

  She might not be happy with a man in her bedroom. But how about a wolf?

  Without giving himself time to think it was a bad idea, he willed the change to come over him. His skin prickled and, seconds later, he stood in wolf form. He shook himself, raised his head, and breathed deeply. He could smell her now, and her sweet scent filled him with longing.

  He padded across the sitting room and nudged open the bedroom door with his nose, pausing in the doorway. She was asleep. She’d pushed off the covers and lay on the sheet in a long, white nightgown that covered her from neck to ankle, though he could see the shape of her body beneath the thin cotton. He stepped forward slowly, not wanting to wake her, partly because she might tell him to go and partly because she needed her rest. He jumped lightly on the bed, went down on his belly and shuffled closer.