by Laura Wright
“Not SoHo,” Sara called over the wind and white curtains of crashing waves, her hair slapping against her cheeks.
“Not yet,” Alexander called, then turned and carried her inside.
14
The round, glass room smelled faintly of mildew, and was sparsely furnished with two wooden chairs and a matching table.
Alexander set Sara down on one of the chairs, then stalked over to the window, spread his hands wide against the pane, and gazed out into the moon-brilliant night.
As Sara watched his muscles bunch and flex through his black sweater, she willed her legs to stop shaking. The mind-flying thing was going to take a while to get used to. “Are you all right?”
Alexander said nothing.
She tried again to engage him. “How long has it been since you’ve been back there, since you’ve seen them?”
Again, he remained silent.
Sara’s heart ached for him. She’d never seen anyone treated so despicably in all her life and she knew he must be feeling humiliated and angry and embarrassed that she’d seen it all. And so she waited, gave him time to seethe, to think.
Finally, after many moments, he released a breath and said, “I escaped my credenti over a hundred years ago.”
Escaped. A hundred years. Jesus.
“An older female,” he continued, still facing the window and sea and the moon, “a teacher of mine who ran with me, told me about this lighthouse. We came here and hid. This is where I waited for my brothers to arrive. They’d escaped too and I watched their ships come in, the light from this tower guiding them to me, to our new life, free from the ones that birthed us and the ones who wanted to control us.” He gave a bitter laugh. “Fuck the Order for forcing me to come back here.” He pushed away from the glass, walked over to the empty chair across from her and dropped into it.
Sara watched him, the downcast expression, the silent, seething anger clinging to every muscle in his body. Within the six-foot-three, heavily muscled, branded badass, was a deeply hurt child and she wanted to run or fly or cut her wrist or whatever it took to get back into that credenti so she could kick his parents in their respective asses—vampires or not.
“Alexander,” she said softly. “Hey.”
His head came up, eyes too. They were large and scarlet and wounded. “Yes.”
“Listen. The truth is ...” She paused. What was the truth? Really? We can’t choose our parents? He deserved better? What was the point? She shrugged and offered her best. “They’re assholes.”
He cocked his head to the side, no doubt wondering if he’d heard her correctly.
“They’re assholes,” she said again. “Plain and simple. It doesn’t matter who or what you are—every species has them, right?”
It took a moment, but a hint of humor lit his eyes, his mouth too. “Yes. I suppose so.”
She held his gaze, hoping the connection offered some molecule of strength. “And for whatever it’s worth, I know how it feels to be haunted by the past.”
“Do you?”
She nodded. “You know the man, the male, I was talking about before?”
The gentle smile on Alexander’s lips disappeared.
“He’s my brother.”
Alexander’s expression shifted in an instant. Shock now, interest too.
“When we were kids ...” Sara paused, took a breath. God. Did she really want to go here? There were very few people in her life who knew the truth about her past and she liked it that way. But it was Alexander. He was ... different. Unexpectedly, impossibly, surprisingly different. He needed something, and she had something to offer. She raised her eyes to his and prayed her tone would remain calm and even. “I caused a terrible accident, a fire that destroyed my home, took my father’s life, and ruined my brother’s physical and mental health.” Her throat tightened and she swallowed. “My mother wasn’t hurt, but she was destroyed too, in a whole different way.”
“Oh, Sara ...”
She didn’t want to look up at him, afraid she’d see the same look of disgust that she saw every time she looked in the mirror. And so she hurried forward. “My father and brother were her world, you know? So when I did this to her—”
“Stop,” Alexander interrupted fiercely. “Stop it right there. You did nothing to her. It was an accident.”
“It was,” she said, “but that didn’t matter, you know? Something I did took away two people she loved. She may say it was an accident, that’s there’s nothing to forgive, that the past is the past, but I know it holds both of us hostage. I know in her heart I won’t be forgiven until my brother’s well.” Tears pulsed at the back of her throat, but she wasn’t going there. This wasn’t her party. This was about helping him, getting him to understand that he wasn’t alone. “My point is, my face isn’t a welcome sight to my parent either. So I get it.”
Alexander stared at her for a long moment, his eyes softening before he closed them and pulled in a breath. Sara wondered what was happening with him, if they were about to take off, fly somewhere that again wasn’t SoHo, but then her chair began to tremble and jerk beneath her. She tried to jump up, but there wasn’t time, the chair shot forward, pulled toward Alexander by an unseen force. Sara gripped the sides of the thick wood, then gasped as she stopped just an inch from his chair.
He opened his eyes, inclined his head. “Thank you for that, for telling me that.”
She tried to catch her breath, slow her heart, but in this man’s—this vampire’s—presence it was nearly impossible. “It was just the truth.”
His gaze moved over her. “You do something to me. You affect me in a way that’s quite extraordinary.”
“That doesn’t sound like a good thing.”
“It’s a complicated thing. I should take you back to my home and yet ...”
“You can’t?” she finished for him.
“I won’t.”
He needed her. “Good.” And she needed him. “I don’t want you to.”
A slow smile spread across his features, Sara’s too. Then suddenly, he reached for her and pulled her onto his lap. Sara gasped at the sudden nearness, of the abrupt sexuality of his erection, granite-hard, pressing unapologetically against the back of her thigh. Instinctively, she pushed her hips forward, grazing the head of his cock with her backside.
Alexander’s jaw went rigid and his eyes flashed with predatory fire. “I must have you near,” he uttered. “I must know that you are well, that you breathe, that you smile.”
His words, the low growl from deep in his throat sent shivers up Sara’s spine, made her skin tingle, her nipples harden. She could tell herself over and over that this wasn’t real, that he wasn’t real, that her feelings for him were nothing more than a delusion. But she would be lying. She wanted him, desired him.
His hands found hers, threading his fingers through hers and easing her arms behind her back, making her breasts jut forward. His gaze dropped to her mouth and his lips trembled, the tips of his fangs just visible.
She wanted to kiss him. She wanted to know what his mouth felt like, the warm wetness of his tongue and the thin, sharp jab of his fangs.
“What they said is true,” Alexander said, his gaze, his voice, fierce with emotion and need.
“Who?” she asked, breathless. “Your mother and that jerk?”
He closed his eyes, dropped his head against her breast. “There is an animal in me and it is loose and hungry.”
Heat pooled in Sara’s belly, threatening to sink lower. “What is it hungry for? Blood?”
“You,” he uttered, turning his head, nuzzling her nipple through her thick sweater. “I wish to mark you.”
She shivered at his words, his desire.
He lifted his head, stared at her with eyes cherry black with desire. “I wish to make claim to you—let any male who comes sniffing around you know that you belong to me.” He leaned forward, trailed the thin band of muscle in her neck with his nose, inhaling greedily. “You scent of blood and
sex.”
Her hips jerked against his cock. “How would you mark me?”
“It is like a tattoo, but the needle that is used is . . . well, in-house ...”
She gasped as she felt two sharp canines dragging gently across her throat. Her thighs shook now and the little heartbeat hidden within her cunt throbbed.
“Would it hurt?” she asked.
He froze, then lifted his head and held her gaze. He looked deadly serious. “I don’t know, but you’re never going to find out.”
“Why?” The fog in her brain, the raging desire in her body hummed too loudly. She hadn’t heard him right.
“I must protect you,” he said through clenched teeth. “From that little prick of a human, and from myself.”
She eased back then, took his face in her hands—took in the fierce glare, the hard angles, the key-shaped brands, the full lips. “I don’t need protection from you.” She leaned in and brushed her mouth against his. It was the softest of kisses, and yet Alexander exploded with a wicked growl.
“Oh, fuck! No, Sara.” He stood and set her on her feet, then walked to the door that led to the lighthouse balcony and opened it. Frozen sea air wafted into the room, making her shiver.
Bewildered, Sara stared at him, her body raging with both sudden cold and manic desire.
“The Order,” he said, his voice as strained as the hard cock in his pants.
“I know,” she said. She didn’t argue or question. Whatever it was he had—that she’d felt on his lap, in his arms—whatever it was he resisted giving her, she wanted it. For now, she wanted it. “Let’s go.”
He opened his arms and she went to him, curled into his chest, and together they walked outside onto the balcony. With the waves crashing against the exterior of the lighthouse, Alexander closed his eyes, dipped into his mind, and once again, they flew.
15
For Tom Trainer, the pain of having fangs plunged into his skin and his blood drained to the point of near unconsciousness was horrifying in the extreme. And yet it didn’t come close to the pain Dr. Donahue’s rejection caused him.
The massive Impure, Mear, was kind to him, each touch a slow, sweet seduction to his flesh, while the half-breed assured him he was getting stronger and that the commander and his recruits would help him capture the woman who had spurned him and the paven who held her.
Tom shifted uncomfortably on the brown leather couch. They were in Mear’s suite in the commander’s home and it was his turn to drink. It was his third “meal” and he hated it, hated the metallic taste, the thickness of the liquid as it hit his tongue and slid down his throat. But it had already made him stronger, his brain clearer in his goal. His two canines were loose, and as Mear had told him, he would lose them within the month and fangs would begin to grow in their place.
He would be one of them. Almost. An Imiti, Mear called it. A human with vampire qualities. As long as he drank.
Mear turned to him, licked the remaining blood from his lips, and grinned. “Ready?”
Bile rose in Tom’s throat, but he forced a nod, and when Mear slashed his own wrist with one sharp fang and held it to Tom’s lips, Tom shut his eyes and drank.
Anything for her.
Anything.
16
Alexander stood in the middle of a football field, Sara’s arms around him, gripping him possessively. This was not the location, the image, he’d pictured in his mind when they’d flashed a moment ago. He sought the Order, had tried to conjure their image in his head, but it had been pointless. Looking around him now, he had to acknowledge that he had no control over where he flashed and when. The Order had connected with him, and as he’d suspected they would, were messing with him.
He felt Sara’s small, supple body shake. From cold, from desire, from fear? He wasn’t certain, but he pulled her closer. Yes, he’d vowed to protect her, but there was something in him that warned that he needed protection too. A shift had occurred back at the lighthouse—his lighthouse, the one that had once been his salvation, had brought him back to life. A switch had been flipped when he’d heard her speak of her past, her pain, when he’d pulled her onto his lap and her body had responded so intuitively, so perfectly. The craving to mark her wasn’t out of a desperate need to take her blood—that he could understand, he could deal with—that he was accustomed to.
No. The longing that pulsed within him now was something else entirely. He wanted her to feed him, fill him with something greater than blood.
She eased back then, looked up at him with those lovely blueberry eyes. “Any idea where we are, vampire?”
Yes, he thought, as his body pulsed with life, with need. He was well and truly fucked. This woman ruled his heart while the Order ruled his mind.
“Scotland.” He glanced around at the campus, not so very different than it had been a hundred years before. “On the grounds of Creglock Academy.”
“A school?”
“Lucian went here.”
“A vampire school?”
“No. Hard-core military academy for rebellious, law-breaking human children. His mother put him here when he was a balas, not even eight years old, then walked away for good. It was a nightmare. He was a vampire, so he grew slower than the other children.”
Sara looked appalled. “His mother put him in a human school knowing he wouldn’t grow like the other kids, and then never came back? She didn’t even check on him?”
Alexander frowned. It was little wonder that Lucian distrusted all females as he did. “He went from a small vampire credenti outside Glasgow to this. He was broken here, every bit of a young one’s softness destroyed.”
“His mother sounds like just as big a prize as yours.”
“Yes.”
“Did Nicholas have the same situation?”
“No. Nicholas’s mother never punished him for his existence. He did it for her. Still does.” Alexander caught her looking at him with that same expression of care he’d seen back at the lighthouse and he pulled the plug on the questions and answers. “What time is it?”
She glanced down at her watch. “One thirty.”
“Shit. I need to pull my mind from everything and everyone and concentrate on the Order.” Alexander closed his eyes and thrust every image away, every image but one. It was only his perception of them, but it was all he had to go on.
The familiar hum began at his feet, shot upward, and with a rush of wind, they were gone. This time, when they hit ground they were in the woods, outside a cave and it was warm, summer.
“Fucking hell.” This was a battleground, long ago, for him and his brothers. It was where they’d learned to use primitive weapons, where Alexander’s friend and teacher had gone missing. Why was the Order playing this game? Was it simply to humble him?
A growl rumbled deep in his throat. They’d be waiting for all eternity for such an event, and even after he was dust they could go fuck themselves.
Sara coughed, moved away from him, and went to the mouth of the cave, sat down with her back against the rock. She looked pale, tired, yet so fragile in her beauty. He went to her and knelt down beside her. “Are you okay?”
“A little nauseous.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think about what all the flashing would do to your system.”
“It’s okay. I’ll be fine. I’ve never really been a solid flier.”
He grinned.
Dropping her head back against the cool rock, she looked out at the brush. “Maybe it’s me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe they won’t see you because you’re with me.”
“Tough shit.” But he’d wondered the same thing. “No doubt they’re just playing with me.” Controlling bastards. “If they want me bad enough to force my body through morpho before its time, then they’ll take me any way they can get me.”
“Morpho?”
“The time of maturity for a paven, a Pureblood male vampire.”
“Is that what happened outsid
e my apartment? The sunlight and the brands on your skin?”
“Yes.”
“Why would they do that?”
“I don’t know, but I will—” There was a loud boom, like thunder against a mile of sky. Instinctively, Alexander started toward Sara, but an invisible hook wrapped his waist and pulled. He clawed at the air, but it was useless. He was sucked into a tunnel, seeing nothing but black, and seconds later, he was standing on sand and Sara was nowhere in sight.
“Welcome, Alexander, son of the Breeding Male.”
Alexander dropped into fighting position, his eyes flickering around, looking for the origin of the voice and a weapon he could use against it. A sheet of sand whipped up in front of him, then just as quickly dropped to the ground as though weights were attached to each grain.
Before him, seated at a long glass table, looking remarkably like a modern version of the Last Supper were the ten ancient members of the Order. They were nothing like what he’d imagined them to be when he was a balas—even as a grown paven: ghostlike, other-worldly, paper thin, yet lethal to the core. No doubt the latter was true, but the ruling ten were as solid, as three dimensional as he was. They sat in their chairs, hands folded on the glass table, eyes trained on him. Each wore a red monklike robe, had a black circle, a perfect O, branded around each of their left eyes, and except for the three veana members, each had a full beard.
“Where is she?” Alexander growled menacingly.
The Order member at the far left, a paven with electric sky blue eyes and a black beard that tapered into a perfect point at the end, spoke first. “She is well. Asleep. She won’t even realize you’ve gone.”
Alexander’s fingers twitched as he imagined them wrapping around the neck of each member of the Order and squeezing until their eyes popped as wide as their brands. “You’d better be right or we’re going to have a serious problem.”
The older paven grinned, displaying his set of brick red fangs—another symbol that he was Order, that his hunger had been completely fulfilled, that his long existence consuming blood was over. “Morpho agrees with you, son of the Breeding Male.”