Contents
TITLE PAGE
Synopsis
Also by Tansey Morgan
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CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
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About the Author
Also by Tansey Morgan
Copyright
SERPENT’S HOLD
The Last Serpent
Book 5
By Tansey Morgan
The fifth book in Tansey Morgan's flagship reverse harem series continues... this time, there’s no going back from where Lilith is going.
I feel like I'm sitting on a boiling pot, and the water is starting to simmer. Soon, I fear, something is going to happen, something big and dangerous, but I can't put my finger on where or when that's going to happen. All I can do is deal with the problems at home; problems like Dante. I haven't seen him in a week, not since that night, and I'm worried he's left for good. Problems like Tom, who remains in the Alexandria as a refugee. Problems like Laura, who doesn't like me and has made it clear she's going to second guess me every chance she gets. Living in the Alexandria isn't easy, but it's home now, and I have to make the best of it.
At the same time, I can't shake this feeling of... dread... looming over me. I don't know exactly what's coming, but I do know that when it hits us, we my well not recover from it.
Also by Tansey Morgan
The Last Serpent
Serpent’s Touch, #1
Serpent’s Desire, #2
Serpent’s Kiss, #3
Serpent’s Bite, #4
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CHAPTER ONE
Sweat was dripping down my brow in spades, my right bicep ached, and my legs felt like they could give out at any moment, but I had to concentrate—had to pull through.
From across the mostly empty room, Aiden stared at me, his head low, eyes on me, his hair also wet with sweat. At least I’d given him a workout, too. He didn’t think I had it in me, neither did Leo, but I hadn’t given up yet, and I wasn’t going to. I was going to show the two of them just what I was made of.
“Had enough?” I asked Aiden.
“Me?” he asked, “I was about to ask you the same thing.”
“What makes you think I’ve had enough?”
“Are you both going to trash-talk each other all day, or are you actually going to keep working on your combat skills?” Leo asked.
I glared at him. “Why don’t you step in for him and we’ll see?”
“I could, but I want you to become as sharp as a sword’s edge; I don’t want to break the sword entirely.”
“Sounds like an excuse to me.”
“Enough,” he barked. “Go again, and this time don’t hold back, either of you.”
I turned my eyes on Aiden again and grinned. “Ready?” I asked.
“How about I let you come to me this time?”
“Alright, but it’s your funeral.”
Aiden shifted into a defensive position, his shirtless body rippling with power, and strength, muscles tensing, ready for my advance. Dante had showed me how to subtly enhance my own strength and reflexes by literally improving my muscle mass and the power in my joints. It wasn’t a permanent boost to my strength, but it was something I could do in the short term. Putting one foot in front of the other, I walked a step, then another, picking up the pace, moving faster and faster, until finally I was running, sprinting, and screaming the hesitation out of my lungs.
I threw myself at him, leaping through the air and winding back my arm. When my fist came down, Aiden blocked it and side-stepped, causing me to stagger forward, away from him. I whipped around and went for another punch, but Aiden, quick as he was, managed to put enough distance between us that my fist cut harmlessly through the air in front of him.
Before I could throw another punch, Aiden was on the offensive, advancing on me and throwing punch after punch in my direction, but I was just as quick as he was, and was easily able to keep out of his way. This was why we were both so tired. Neither of us had managed to land more than a couple of blows on the other during the course of the past hour, but Leo was insistent that one of us must come out the clear winner of this little sparring match, and it had to be me.
Deciding that a full-on attack wasn’t going to work, I spun around on my heel and made a break for the far wall, recalling a tactic I had used once, in the gymnasium back in Germany. Aiden, however, having been present that day, decided to stand his ground and not chase me across the room. He watched from where he stood, shoulders heaving, jaw clenched tightly.
A warm, feeling coiled in the pit of my stomach at the sight of him, this powerful man, glaring at me like some ancient gladiator might stare down a lion, waiting for it to come to him, instead of charging into its mouth headlong. He’d been clever enough not to take the bait, and now he was going to wait there for me to spend my own energy in getting to him.
“I’m getting bored,” Leo bellowed.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” I said, “I missed the part where we were doing this to amuse you.
“You’re meant to be besting each other in single combat, not staring at each other from opposite sides of this room.”
“God-dammit,” Aiden said, having had enough from Leo, and he started to advance. I readied myself for him, balling my hands into fists, and taking a sideways stance.
Aiden picked up the pace until he was running, and when he got close enough, he put his dukes up and started swinging at me. I dodged left to avoid a jab, then blocked a right hook with my right arm, and went to knee him in the stomach, but his stomach was as hard as the rock of Gibraltar, and despite the amount of power I had put into the attack, I had barely winded him.
I stared at him, eyes wide, and watched as he grabbed my arm, whipped me around, and threw me like a rag doll to the floor. I hit the ground hard with the back of my head, rolled, and stopped a few feet away from where I had been standing a moment ago. My head was throbbing, as was my arm, and now my ribs and back, too. I had fallen hard, and didn’t have it in me to get up.
“Oh my God… Lilith?” Aiden asked.
I didn’t reply. Didn’t even move, except to clutch my ribs, hugging myself tightly. Aiden then ran up to me, threw himself on his knees, and tried to pull me around, only as he went to turn me around, I sprang up, threw myself on him, and pressed my claws against his neck. Using claws, or powers, wasn’t part of the rules, but I wanted to win, and there was no way I was going to beat Aiden in a clean fight without getting a little dirty.
Aiden put his hands up and stared at me, wide eyed and scared that I was going to pierce his neck with my claws and let the blood spill out.
“Lilith?” he asked.
“This means I win, right?” I asked in return. I looked up at Leo. “Right?”
One of Leo’s eyebrows came up. “For pulling that? You’ve got to
be kidding me.”
I got up and dusted myself down, allowing my claws to relax and turn into regular fingers again. “That’s unfair. How am I supposed to beat Aiden in a fist fight? The guy is six feet.”
“That doesn’t matter. The point of this exercise was to fight without resorting to your powers, which is something that could happen in the real world. You don’t know what kind of magic someone has, and if you’re ever in a situation where you can’t shape shift, you need to know your body is up to the challenge. Don’t think I didn’t notice your shape shifting. You fought dirty from the beginning, and for that reason you’re disqualified.”
“Bullshit, I’m disqualified! Disqualified from what? This is a sparring match.”
“I don’t care from what, the point is you cheated, and now you have to deal with the consequences.”
Aiden got to his feet and stood by my side, smirked, and looked over at Leo. “Damn right,” he said.
Leo scowled at Aiden. “Don’t look so damn smug,” Leo said, “She may have cheated with her powers, but you’re the idiot who fell for her wounded princess act. I don’t know which of you is more disappointing right now.”
Without saying another word, Leo barged past both of us and made his way out of the small, stony, basement room we had carved out to train our combat skills in. I allowed myself a second to exhale the breath I had held in my lungs when Leo left, and the door swung shut behind him. We’d gone through over an hour of intense training, and it had ended on a downer.
I looked over at Aiden and frowned. “Damn right?” I asked, shoving him, “Do you really want to be teacher’s pet that badly?”
“Hey, you’re the one who cheated.”
“Oh yeah? And what are you going to do about it?”
Aiden turned toward me, held my waist, and pulled me closer to his warm, sweaty body. “I could think of a few things I could do to you.”
“I guess I am feeling a little peckish after that session…” I tilted my head up toward him and found his lips with mine, kissing him lightly, “But I can’t stay.”
“No?”
“No, I’ve got things to do today. You do, too.”
“Is it about Dante?”
I shrugged. “No.”
He caressed my cheek. “Don’t lie to me… you can tell me if you’re nervous about seeing him again; he’ll be here in a few hours.”
“I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s nerves, maybe it isn’t. He just…”
“He left, I know. But he had a job to do.”
“He didn’t just leave, like… he left. We’d spent that night together, and then he was gone in the morning.”
“Finding out where he’d gone from the Keeper probably didn’t help.”
“Fuck no. It’s like he ran away from me, and then I had to tell you guys what had happened, and how he had left, and I have all this stuff I wanna say to him when I see him, but I don’t know if I can do it.”
“Look, telling us was the smart thing to do. I know you were nervous about it, but Lilith… we all knew Dante was in this thing with us too. The only people who didn’t know it were you and him. I’m happy for you, we all are. What we want now is for the two of you to talk about it like adults, without anyone screaming at the other. Think you can do that?”
I sighed. “Yeah,” I said, “I think so.”
Aiden kissed me on my forehead. “That’s my girl.”
I smiled at that. “I’m gonna go back to my room and shower. You got plans tonight?”
He shrugged. “I’ll figure something out. I think Vik wants to go to the pub across the road. If you’re free, you’re welcome to join us.”
“Yeah, okay, maybe.”
We walked out of the room together, headed up the stairs holding hands, then split off and headed in different directions once we’d reached the ground floor—Aiden to his room, and me to mine. Walking around the Alexandria, my cheeks and chest flushed, sweat clinging to my already tight sports bra, it was easy to understand why most, if not all, of the guys wandering the halls may have had their eyes on me. I couldn’t say I didn’t welcome the attention, but I was starting to question how many of them saw more than what their eyes presented to them. I counted myself lucky to have found at least four men who did.
One of them, I knew, was in my bedroom right now, still fast asleep…
CHAPTER TWO
I opened my bedroom door to the sounds of muffled, light breathing. Raphael was in my bed, the upper half of his torso exposed and heaving, his head turned to the side, eyes shut, his wavy, chestnut hair sprawled out over the pillow, Morticia curled up next to him. Like I had suspected, he was fast asleep. They both were. I padded around the room, my footfalls silent on the carpeted floor, and quickly gathered the clothes I had set out to wear before going to my training session. After that, I headed into the bathroom and hit the shower, trying my best not to think about Dante.
The problem was, Dante was constantly on my mind. Ever since the last night we were together, I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him. Sure, I would be able to busy myself from time to time and shut my mind up, but the moment I got some time to myself, free from distractions, he would come barging back into my consciousness carrying with him a big old bag of questions.
What happened between us? What did it mean? Why did he leave? Why hasn’t he called?
I knew only because the Keeper had told me that Dante had gone on a recruitment, but that didn’t make me feel any better; about him, at any rate. I had plenty to feel good about, not the least of which was the safe recovery of Vik and Raph’s mentors, who had been resting in the infirmary until about two days ago, when they had started feeling well enough to get up and out of bed.
Having never met them in person, I had, really, no idea what they looked like before they had gone missing, but from the look on Vik’s face when he first laid eyes upon his mentor, I understood that both men hadn’t been nearly as thin, or as pale, as they were now, leaving me to wonder exactly what kinds of conditions they had been subjected to during their imprisonment.
But whatever had happened to them, I didn’t think I would ever find out. Leo, the Keeper, even Madeline had this habit of keeping things from all of us, but I figured that was because we weren’t as high up as they were on the supernatural food chain, no matter what we had done during our time together.
The warm water felt like magic falling on my aching body, and maybe I stayed in the shower a little longer than I should have, but I needed to feel comfortable again after that workout with Aiden. Besides, I still had plenty of time before I had to meet Kyle, who had asked me to go out shopping with him in London’s Camden district. Considering all I’d done since the night we brought Tom back to the Alexandria was train, taking a break to explore London a little bit sounded like heaven.
I stepped out of the shower and walked, carefully, into the bedroom to collect my clothes with a towel wrapped around my chest. I thought Raph was still asleep, but he shifted on the bed as I walked past and looked up at me, his hazel eyes sparkling brightly against the morning light. “Buenos días,” he said.
“Morning,” I said, moving toward the bed. “How’d you sleep?”
“Good. Have you been gone long?”
“Since… about seven?”
Raph checked his watch. “You woke up very early again.”
“I had to. Leo wanted another training session.”
His eyes darkened when he noticed the bruise on my arm. I hadn’t noticed it myself until I followed his eyeline. “Are you alright?”
“Oh, yeah… this is nothing, and it’ll heal soon anyway. Aiden and I just went at it a little rough today.”
Raph sat up, slipped his naked legs out of the side of the bed, then he grabbed my ass and pulled me toward him. “I don’t like how hard Leo is working you.”
I couldn’t help but glance, and grin, at Raph’s nakedness. His body was incredible, easily the most muscular and toned of the other men in my lif
e, but his taut abdomen wasn’t what was making me grin. “Is someone feeling a little protective?” I asked.
“Maybe I am. Is that a bad thing?”
“No. I like it when you get protective and possessive.”
“I am glad you do, but I am also serious. Leo should understand what your strengths are.”
“I think he knows that throwing a fist isn’t one of my strengths, but I need to learn how to do it because… what if I’m caught out there on my own without my powers one day? He makes a good point.”
“Yes, I suppose it is a good point. Still, you should be allowed plenty of time to rest between sessions.”
“Don’t worry,” I said, running my fingers through his thick, wavy hair. “I’m getting plenty of rest and relaxation thanks to you.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Speaking of…” he said, his hands gripping the towel around me, ready to pull.
“No…” I said, finding his hands and holding them where they were. “I can’t.”
Raph stretched his neck, clutched the top of the towel with his mouth, and began to draw it down, exposing my breasts. Shaking the towel loose, he then brought his lips against one of my nipples, and wrapped them around it, flicking it gently with his tongue. His mouth was warm, and wet, and my nipples hardened immediately.
A warning flashed in my mind, but like an alarm clock going off early in the morning on a Saturday, I dismissed it. “Alright,” I said, “Maybe I could stay a little while…”
Raph looked up at me, kissed the space between my breasts, then pulled the towel completely off me. “I promise I’ll make it worth your while,” he said.
I ran my hands through his hair again, gripping it tightly, guiding him to where I wanted him to place his lips, his tongue, but before his mouth reached the place I was guiding him to, he tossed me onto the bed on my back and turned around to face me. “I know you will,” I said, grinning at him.
Serpent's Hold (The Last Serpent, Book 5) Page 1