by Tara Brown
“He never betrayed me?” My heart swelled.
Tristan flung his arms in the air. “Tada!”
Aimee eyed Phillip. “Can you flash?”
He rolled his eyes. “Lead on, I can track. But I want to try on your boots when we get there.”
Aimee grimaced. “What? No. Look how big your feet are.”
He giggled. “Look how tense she is.”
Aimee put a hand on me and instantly we were standing in Lydia's kitchen. Phillip and Tristan followed seconds later.
“Oh my God, this place is cute. Trist, this is exactly like that barn reno we saw on HGTV.”
Lydia paused, holding a cup of tea to her lips. “Is that your brother?”
“Yeah,” I replied. “And Phillip. He is Oliver's son.”
Lydia nodded. “Welcome.” Her smile was forced.
Annabelle rushed into the kitchen. “No. No way. Both of Lillith's only living kids in one house? No. No.”
Ignoring her, I jumped forward and hugged my brother tightly as tears flooded my eyes.
“O!” My sister came rushing in. “Oh my God, O, you got your brother back too.” Abbey jumped at us both and we hugged as a family. A weird family no one would ever understand.
I couldn’t help but wonder the fate of Oliver as I pulled back and studied Abbey. Tears poured from her face. “You’re back.”
“Abbs, you're okay. I missed you.”
“Ditto. It was so awful. They fed from me. Oh, and I called Mom and Dad. They asked me how camp was.”
“Camp was our best bet.” Lorri strode into the kitchen. “We had to say something. By the way, Daniel is residing with the wolves for a little while. They are almost positive they have a track on Aleks' dad too.”
My sister turned and smiled at Lorri.
I spun back to my brother. “You want to catch me up on Mom?”
He smiled a bright white grin. “We have like five days to save her and fight to the death for her magic.”
“Yeah, I know that part.” I swallowed hard.
Tristan burst into laughter. “You aren’t the fun group of badasses we kind of thought you would be.”
Lorri snorted. “Yeah, we like to keep the fun to the Christmas parties.”
Everyone in the kitchen laughed, except Tristan and Phillip.
Phillip beamed, “Dad has found a way to make it work so one of you gets power and the other one gets to live.”
“Really.” I glanced at my brother and we both shouted at the same time, “You can have it.”
We all laughed some more.
It was a win against so many losses.
Phillip pulled his phone from his pocket. “My dad’s in the yard. I guess he can't come in the house?”
“He is?” I ran out of the kitchen and burst through the porch door.
Oliver was smiling under a streetlight.
I ran across the grass and leapt into his arms. “You liar!”
“I told you, always you.”
“I thought you were on his side.” I gazed up into his eyes. He was in pain.
He cleared his throat. “No, but I couldn’t take a chance. Tristan was the only means for you to be able to get away. Everyone up there is loyal to him. I freed Trist and Phil while he went to torture your mother with the news.”
I pulled back. “Will he know?”
Oliver nodded. “He probably will.”
I hugged him again. “I'm just glad you're okay.”
He kissed the top of my head. “Me too. Now we need to get ready. You and Trist have a very hard week ahead of you. I'm going to stay at Marcus’. Henry hates your father more than anything on the planet.”
“I'm coming.”
He shook his head. “You stay here. You stay safe.” He kissed my lips once softly and stepped back. He was gone and I was alone on the street with the dark swirling around my feet. I stepped back into the guards as I sensed the night become creepy.
“Come in the house, girl.” Annabelle floated in the doorway.
I hugged myself and walked back to the door. “Annabelle, what happens if Jonathan gets the power?”
“He gets the world, baby girl. He gets the world.”
The End
Volume Five
Prologue
Once upon a bite
Portland, Oregon, 2012
Aimee
The heels of my boots clicked with every strike against the soaked cement. The dank night air crept in through my thin sweater. I shivered and wrapped my arms around myself, keeping up with his pace.
I rounded the corner, staying across the street from him. I didn’t want him to get too far ahead of me. The street was crowded enough that if I winked, people would notice.
His outdated pleather jacket made it easy to keep him in my sights. I rolled my eyes at the stupid jacket that no one but an immortal would be caught dead in. Who even wore pleather? Especially in Portland.
He turned down a dark alley.
Typical.
It would only get more stereotypical if he were actually in the dark and creepy alley searching for his next victim. He didn’t glance behind himself, maybe overconfident. They always were. His kind always believed they were the strongest animals in the urban jungle. Most of them didn’t know about me. The ones who had met me were usually in the throes of their own death. Introductions seemed like a waste at that point. As usual, his instincts lied to him and allowed for a false sense of security. He just didn’t know it yet.
I fingered the platinum ring on my right middle finger with my thumb. I always loved the thin red line running through the middle of it to the red rose engraved in the ring.
This ring was my mark.
It was my badge.
It permitted me to follow the man.
It made my brand of deadly force acceptable.
I winked my right eye, flashing in front of him, smirking at the confusion in his eyes as I grabbed his arm. He struggled for a second, but I lifted him into the air before he had a chance to change into a worthy adversary. I shuddered when my hands made contact with the warm fleshy meat of his throat.
The sparks filled me and the air around us.
The touch of his skin made every moment magnify as my senses heightened from the feast. He choked and fought, but it was useless.
His eyes caught the ring on my finger, forcing recognition and fear across his face.
“You're a Rose,” he croaked. His last words.
“Stop!” another man's voice echoed through the alley.
The fire of the spark died, taking my meal with it.
I growled and dropped the corpse to the cold ground, hating to end my meal that way. Turning, I licked my lips, wondering if my eyes still glowed like molten steel. I had to admit, it looked cool when they did. I always thought Alise would be jealous if she ever saw them. She would think they were cool.
I suspected the man in the alley probably wouldn’t.
Narrowing my gaze, I realized it was a policeman who stood with his weapon drawn. His hands shook with the sizable gun in them. “Stay where you are.” His voice never wavered, but I sensed the fear coming off him. His voice was familiar. “Don’t move.”
Panic filled me.
Not him! Anyone but him.
Scanning the walls around me, I searched for an exit as his steps filled the silent alley.
I raised my hands, scared of what might come next but hopeful I could stop him in his tracks with my glowing eyes. “Run his prints and you’ll thank me.”
“Don’t move!” He continued to edge toward me cautiously. “Get down on the ground.” He waved the gun slowly.
A plan had still not formed in my mind. I contemplated stealing his gun and knocking him out but how would I explain being there? Would he think he had hallucinated? The dead body might ruin that.
“Get down!” he repeated himself.
“Really?” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Would you lay on this street? This alley’s filthy wit
h germs and God only knows what else.” I tried to be funny. He was going to recognize me any second.
A gust of wind blew past him, bringing with it the scent of laundry soap and deodorant. That, subtly mixed with windblown sea air, made me homesick for him.
When he got close enough, too close, he gaped in disbelief. “Aimes? Is that you? What are you doing here?” His eyes darted to the dead man on the ground and then back to me. “You—you’re the one? That's not possible.”
“I know,” I muttered, lost in the raw emotion on his face.
“Aimes?” His lower lip trembled.
I took a step back, putting my hands out farther. “Shane, just pretend you never saw me. The medics will say heart attack.”
“No, not you.” His face twisted in pain. “Anyone but you. Why? Why would you kill that man? Jesus, it’s you killing them all, isn’t it?”
Memories of every second of our life before crammed into my brain.
Every touch.
Every smile.
Every hope.
Even losing my virginity to him.
Ashamed, I glanced down and swallowed. “I have to eat, Shane. They make sense.”
“Eat?” He sounded disgusted. “You’re eating them? How? They have no marks. None of the others had marks.”
I let the shame fill me. I made myself remember his face the times I'd broken up with him. Broken him. I forced myself to feel it all. I deserved to suffer. Sam was right about me. I used Shane badly to pretend I was still that same girl. I used him to cling to my past.
It was wrong.
I knew deep down if I let myself be with Shane, I would again find the girl who wanted nothing more than to sit on the back steps of his house, listening to his dreams.
But here, in the real world, that girl was dead. She had died in the woods the moment she took a human life.
Knowing that was the reality, I turned and jumped onto the handrail of the stairs next to me and climbed the fire escape as fast as I could. He shouted at me but I ignored him.
I couldn’t wink. I couldn’t scare him like that.
And he was already scared. I could still smell his fear even if it had switched. It was a different kind of fear—emotional. I would know that smell anywhere.
The damp night air filled with his shouts as he begged me to come back down.
I tried to block out his desperate screams that consisted of one word: my name.
The only sound in the whole city was, “AIMEE!”
Chapter 1
A kiss with a fist
Aimee
I put my hand up to the old door and took a breath before knocking. Going there was a mistake I made too often.
“Just come in, you pain in the arse.” His English accent sounded muffled through the thick wood.
Smiling, I opened the door. “Hi.” I tried to start out nicely since I was there for a favor.
“Aimee, my love. What can I do for you?” His dark eyes mocked me. “Have you come to your senses about us?”
“No. I need your help,” I muttered and closed the door to his house.
“My help?” he beamed and crossed his arms. His sarcastic shit-eating grin pissed me off, but it didn’t change things. I needed him. “Again?” Dorian strolled across the hardwood floor silently in his socked feet and leaned against the marble counter. “Tell me everything, love.” His fitted dark jeans and pale-blue dress shirt made him appear as though he’d just gotten off work. The worn brown leather jacket slung over the back of the chair next to him was his attempt at badass American. I would have rolled my eyes at him for even owning it, but I couldn’t. I needed him. And at least his jacket wasn’t pleather.
He wouldn’t be caught dead in pleather.
He grinned and my pulse kicked into gear. His effect on me was beyond annoying. No one did to me what Dorian did.
“Do you need help with anything that would require me to take my shirt off? Or yours?”
“No.” I shivered from the thought of it. “You don’t want to wrestle with me. I could kill you, Dorian.”
He held his hands up. “It's why I've maintained my efforts to get into your pants. I think it would be quite the death.”
“Gross.” I scowled.
He chuckled and his accent got thicker. “My pet, you really are in a jam this time, aren’t you? You've got some desperation, just right there on your cheek.” He brushed a finger against my face. His finger left a heat trail on my skin.
“This was a mistake.” I turned to leave but he grabbed me and swung me into his embrace, forcing his lips on mine.
My fingers tingled to defend myself, but I pushed it back. I needed him alive.
And truth be told, kissing Dorian was not awful.
It wasn’t even close to awful.
It was the opposite of awful.
He was awful but his kisses were bliss.
His fingers trailed up and down my back as his tongue met mine, tasting like every fantasy I’d ever had. I fought for a moment before giving in and returning the kiss, with fervor.
It was his gift: tormenting me by making me hate and want him at all times.
The love-hate relationship was summed up perfectly by the kiss.
I wanted it. He wanted it. But he had to force it on me because he pissed me off with every breath that left his lips.
My back slammed into the cupboard behind me as his hands roamed the sides of my body, creating sparks everywhere he touched.
When he let go and stepped back, I gasped for air, fighting to see past the stars that clouded my vision.
“That is how you should be kissed.” His words were a dark whisper, threatening me with more. My body wanted to agree with him. I couldn’t hate him, not the way I wanted to.
I covered my face and breathed hard. “If I asked you to do something and not tell Aleks, would you?” I needed to focus on why I was there.
He laughed. “That's all you have to say after a kiss like that?”
“Yes.” I maintained my composure.
“Fine.” He cooled quickly. “But for the record, we just did something I can’t tell Aleks about, so whatever you need to ask me, will make it two things I’m keeping secret.”
“You kissed me!” I snapped.
“You kissed me back.” He winked. “So if you want a favor, I want one too.” He flashed a grin and walked by, nudging me. He grabbed a bottle of wine from the huge rack and uncorked it slowly as if waiting for my answer.
“Fine, whatever you want.” I wished I could hate him. But it contradicted the desperate need I had to rip his clothes off. It was confusing being us.
“Are you thinking naughty thoughts about me?” He read my expression. He always did.
“No.” I growled, hoping anger would make my flushed face appear mad and not turned on. “Can you do me the favor or not?”
“Possibly.” He poured the whole bottle of deep red wine into a crystal carafe and swirled it around and around. He was making me wait on purpose. He strode over to the cupboard and pulled out two large glasses. They were the size of fish bowls. “What is it?” His dark eyes sparkled. “Before I agree I want to know what I am agreeing to.”
“I've messed up. I need you to wipe Shane's memory, again.”
“Again?” He laughed. It was bitter and sarcastic, like his soul. “Oh, Aimee, you really have the most conflicted feelings for that boy, don’t you? And what a waste. He won’t ever be anything more than some flunky bobby with a schoolboy crush on a demon-slaying savage.”
I clenched my jaw. My hands tingled.
“Keep it in your pants, love.” His eyes darted to my fingertips.
“It isn’t whether I love him or not. It’s who's right for me and who I won't kill by loving.”
“Humor me a moment.” He poured a glass of wine and handed it to me. “If he weren’t human, who would you pick?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Not playing that game, Dorian. I made my choice. I don’t regret it. I know I am
meant to be with Aleks.” My hands trembled when I tilted the glass back. I drank the room temperature spiced wine in gulps and wiped my mouth.
“Do you ever wonder how much of your love for Aleks is his spell?” His grin told me he knew the answer to the question as he refilled my glass.
“No.” I sipped the wine and watched him.
“Someone putting a spell on you isn’t actually love. At all. Neither is wanting to be with a boy who reminds you of home. Having to convince yourself to be with someone is exactly the reason you shouldn’t be with them.” He too drank in large sips. “You should be with someone who you need to convince yourself not to be with, but you can’t avoid it because the love is so strong.” His eyes widened as if he was trying to be sincere.
I gulped.
“I want you, Aimee. There is no denying it. I’ve wanted you from the minute I saw—I mean, from the moment I frightened you in the elevator. I had to make certain you were good and scared of me.” His eyes flashed to my hands. “Didn’t want you thinking you could do everything you wanted with what I’d given you.”
“I know you hurt me and scared me on purpose. You like doing that.”
“No. I didn’t just enjoy scaring you.” He laughed. “You’re smarter than that. You know I had to. We couldn’t have you thinking you were the highest on the food chain.”
“Am I?” His words made me even more uncomfortable.
“Let’s not discuss this. It’s veering off from the point I’m trying to make. Since I can’t have you the way I want you”—his dark eyes roamed my body—“then I want to know the answer to the question of who. If the little bobby were immortal, would you choose him or Aleks? Or would you rather I started taking my pants off and my favor changes to the thing I desperately want?”
“I don’t have an answer to that question but keep your pants on in case one comes.”