Bad Boys of the Night: Eight Sizzling Paranormal Romances: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set

by Jennifer Ashley

  Duty came first though. She had lived her life like that once too, and she could understand why he had to place it before his own needs.

  Both Oneiric and Lincoln needed to know about Adam’s plot to use Midnight, and she needed to work with Tor to formulate a plan to stop it.

  Then she would drag him to their room and make love with him again.

  “I’ll call Oneiric.” Because she wasn’t sure she was ready to speak with Lincoln. She preferred to meet people face to face the first time they talked so she could get a clear impression of them.

  Tor nodded and she slipped from his lap, drew her phone from her pocket, and found Oneiric’s number in the address book. She pressed the button to call him and paced away from Tor as he dialled Lincoln.

  Oneiric answered on the second ring. “Hello?”

  “It’s Eve.”

  “Eve? Thank the Devil. I thought—”

  “I know… but I’m fine.” Eve clutched the phone harder as he swore, his relief and disbelief as clear as day even though she couldn’t see him.

  “When I heard about the plane, I thought you were… but you are not. Where are you now?”

  She started pacing, giving herself something to focus on as she told Oneiric all about what had happened after the plane explosion, all about Amsterdam and Adam, leading up to saying words that she knew were going to hurt him.

  “I cannot tell you how relieved I am. I will have to thank Tor when I next see him.” Oneiric’s deep voice comforted her, easing away her tension, and she glanced across at Tor when she felt his eyes on her.

  He was deep in conversation, telling Lincoln everything she had told him about Midnight.

  “I’ll pass on your gratitude. Father,” she said, and for the first time calling him that didn’t make her feel weird inside. He had made it past her defences without her realising it, sneaking his way into her heart, becoming dear to her. “Adam is involved in something… in Amsterdam, they were capturing purebloods and taking their blood.”

  Oneiric cursed. “Midnight?”

  Well, that saved her having to break it to him gently. “Yes.”

  He loosed another string of swear words. “Have you told Lincoln?”

  “Tor is on the phone with him right now. We’re not sure where they’re doing the experiments, but with them taking blood from vampires in Amsterdam, it must be in the vicinity of the city.” Eve slumped into the chair Tor had occupied, swung her boots up onto the table and tilted her head back as she slouched. “We have to stop him.”

  “He’ll be abducting humans too. How detailed was the data on Midnight when you read it?”

  “The information in the database was sparse at best. It didn’t exactly give a method. It just mentioned blending blood from both weakling and pureblood with a toxin. A few other details but nothing that would give Adam a clear recipe for Midnight.” She was counting on him taking a while to find blood from both weakling and pureblood that was strong enough, the right quantities to combine in order to create a hybrid rather than a pure weakling or pureblood vampire, and the right poison.

  “See if you can find him again and track him, or any weakling in Amsterdam. Monitor their movements and you might be able to find out where they are taking the blood and the humans.”

  It shouldn’t be too difficult. They hadn’t been very covert about their methods of securing blood and she doubted they were going to be any more covert about kidnapping humans for their experiments.

  Tor paced into view on the other side of the table and looked across at her, a grim edge to his expression.

  “Be careful. We’re not sure if Adam knows about your involvement in stopping the weaklings last time. It might be best for you to head back to England.” It would at least buy him some time. Adam would have to find out where Oneiric’s club was in that country and it would slow him down.

  “You be careful too. If you need me, you know where to find me.”

  “I know. Lay low until we give you the all clear.” She hesitated before adding, “Speak to you soon.”

  “You too.” He hung up and she tipped her head back again, staring at the ceiling and hoping nothing bad happened to him. She didn’t like the thought of losing the father she had only just found.

  Tor stopped pacing and stared at her. She brought her chin down and smiled to show him that she was fine.

  He nodded and went back to his conversation. “I would rather the Vehemens one was available. I’d prefer to work with my own bloodline on this.”

  Vehemens what?

  Eve stood and crossed the room to him, and listened hard, trying to catch Lincoln’s voice on the other end of the line.

  “The Vehemens Law Keeper is tied up at the masquerade. The only ones we can pull from their current missions are the Caelestis, Aurorea and Validus Law Keepers.” The deep male voice had a bite to it that brooked no argument.

  It didn’t stop Tor.

  “Caelestis and Aurorea Law Keepers working together on a mission? I can just see that going well. Have they even worked together since their bloodlines were joined?” Tor pinched the bridge of his nose and Eve placed her hands against his chest, trying to offer him some comfort to chase away his mounting frustration.

  “Three Law Keepers are better than one though, right?” she said and Tor gave her a look that clearly stated ‘not you too’.

  “Is that Eve?” Lincoln said and Eve tensed. A familiar female voice cut above the din in the background. “Lilith would like to speak with her.”

  Eve shook her head and backed away from Tor. He caught her wrist and held her firm.

  “I’ll put her on the line,” he said and she glared at him as he pressed the phone to her ear. “Speak to her. She thought you were dead again. Lincoln said she took the plane explosion badly.”

  Eve’s stomach squirmed. She took the phone from Tor and dragged down a deep breath for courage.

  “Eve?” Lilith’s bright voice leaped through the receiver.

  Tears rose into her eyes and she turned away from Tor, not wanting him to see her like this. “Yeah.”

  “Thank God!” Lilith said and Eve heard Lincoln murmur something soothing to her. “We thought you were dead.”

  “Again.” Eve smiled, needing to lighten the atmosphere before she started crying. She felt warm from head to toe, filled with light inside, overwhelmed by finally making contact with her sister again after so many long, dark years apart.

  “This isn’t something to joke about,” Lilith snapped and Eve’s smile widened. God, how she had missed her sister chastising her.

  “You sound the same… like I was just caught running in the halls.”

  Lilith laughed, or it might have been a sob. She wasn’t sure. It had sounded strained. Eve held the phone closer to her ear, holding it as if it was Lilith, clutching it to her.

  “You were always getting caught doing something you shouldn’t have been.”

  Eve couldn’t stop smiling as she thought about their time at Section Seven together, growing up there in Oxford, the only children resident in a building filled with vampire hunters. “You were always snitching on me.”

  “I was not!” The indignant edge to Lilith’s voice made her laugh.

  “Were too…” Eve looked over her shoulder at Tor. He was watching her, his blue gaze constant and steady, and she appreciated his silent support. He was telling her that he was there for her if she needed him. “Did Lincoln tell you about our little problem?”

  “I always thought Adam was a complete and utter bastard,” Lilith growled down the line. “Slimeball. If I wasn’t stuck here at this bloody ball I would be there with you to kick his arse.”

  “Ball?” Eve said and remembered Lincoln had mentioned a masquerade.

  Lilith sighed. “It’s the Creator Day ball. Lincoln insisted we come. My first year as official finally-in-house leader of our bloodline. I couldn’t very well refuse. He’s been going alone since my turning. There’s a whole thing about them wearing
masks and basically shunning their laws for a night. No fraternising with the enemy.”

  “I feel like that’s my whole life right now,” Eve said and Tor started pacing again, his gaze constantly coming back to her and holding hers for long meaningful seconds in which she could feel he wanted to comfort her. “I’m not over the whole vampire thing yet. I’ve been in this mansion for five minutes and I’ve already contemplated stabbing the three vampires in charge.”

  “It takes some getting used to. Is Tor taking care of you?”

  Eve met his gaze again. “Yeah. He’s good to me.”

  “Because I know you haven’t been feeding.”

  Her smile fell and she scowled at him now, knowing that it probably hadn’t been her father who had snitched on her about that, or at least it hadn’t only been him.

  Tor shrugged off her glare, not denying her silent accusation.

  She wanted to be angry with him but she couldn’t muster it. She liked how he was in a way. Honest. Blunt. He didn’t pander to anyone. Not even her.

  “I have been feeding,” she said and her eyes fell to Tor’s neck and the twin puncture wounds on it. Her stomach rumbled, hunger rising again, swamping her and pulling her focus to Tor and his rich blood scent.

  Damn, she wanted to bite him again.

  Her fangs extended, scraping against her lip as she talked to her sister. “Besides, you’re one to talk. I know you feed from Lincoln.”

  “Oh my god!” Lilith snapped, a high bright note in her voice. “You’ve bitten Tor!”

  “Have not,” Eve said a little too quickly and Lilith laughed. Damn. Her sister knew her tells and denying something before her accuser had even finished what they were saying was a dead giveaway that she had done it. “Shut up. I’ll have you know I was dying.”

  Her sister stopped laughing. “Dying?”

  “I had a little mishap in a fight. It was nothing serious.” And she hadn’t really bitten Tor because she had been physically dying. She had just been dying to taste him.

  “Nothing serious? You said you were dying.”

  Eve regretted saying it now. There was a panicked edge to her sister’s voice.

  “Not dying then. Just injured. I needed blood. He supplied.” Eve’s gaze went back to his throat and he turned to face her, a towering wall of muscle and menace, and dark allure. She raked her gaze over him, letting it wander to places she wanted to touch and stroke, to kiss and caress. She wanted to lick every inch of his powerful honed body and kiss every scar, lavishing the marks of his bravery and honour with the affection they deserved.

  He growled low in his throat and stalked towards her.

  “I have to go,” Eve said distractedly into the phone, captured by Tor’s intense blue eyes and the hunger flaring to life in them, passion that threatened to devour her and leave her as boneless and sated as the first time they had made love.

  “Eve?”

  She ended the call and Tor swept her up into his arms and kissed her. Eve melted into him, looping her legs around his waist to support her weight and her arms around his neck.

  He turned with her and pressed her back against a bookcase, pinning her with his hard body. She moaned into his mouth.

  There was a knock at the door.

  Tor growled and kissed her harder, stoking her need for him until it burned like an inferno inside her.

  Someone knocked again.

  She shook her head but Tor was already setting her back down on her feet. He broke away from her and she frowned when he didn’t stop moving until he was more than two metres away, beyond her reach, and his eyes turned cold again.

  The door opened, revealing the same female servant who had been in the room with her earlier, when the delightful trio had been mocking Tor.

  She couldn’t understand why they treated him so poorly because he was a hunter. She was a hunter too. Just like Tor, she was a product of rigorous training and had never led a normal life, not the type of life these entitled vampires led anyway.

  She didn’t know what that entailed.

  She had watched movies and TV shows, had seen people in the streets, in restaurants and cafes. That slice of life she had witnessed had seemed like the strange one to her. She was used to other things, like hunting vampires, tracking people, living at night and sleeping during the day.

  It didn’t make her feel abnormal though. It made her feel that the lives she saw on TV, the world that didn’t believe in vampires and didn’t know werewolves existed, was the abnormal one.

  It made her feel the vampires who lived their nights socialising and living an empty existence filled with trivial things, none of them worth anything or of any help to anyone, were abnormal.

  She and Tor were the normal ones. They fought for something. They dedicated their lives to protecting people, risking themselves to ensure others were safe. They owned the shadows and rode with death at their side, a constant companion throughout their lonely lives.

  Eve went back to him, took his hand and ignored the pointed look he threw down at her. She didn’t care that the servant was present. She didn’t care if the vampires in this hellhole saw her holding his hand.

  She only cared that he knew she was here with him, and that these people who had labelled him as and therefore made him feel inferior, as if he didn’t belong in this world, was a sort of darkness and vile creature unworthy of them, were in fact inferior to and unworthy of him.

  She didn’t give a damn about them.

  But she cared the world about him.

  CHAPTER 14

  Tor sat at the desk in Eve’s room, poring over a map of Amsterdam and the surrounding area, trying to figure out where the weaklings would have set up their base of operation. The lamp on the walnut desk provided the only light, but his heightened vision allowed him to see as if it was day, making it easy to pick out every detail in the room.

  A room in which he had slept with Eve.

  She had insisted he share it with her.

  That had caused interest in the servant who had brought them to it. The woman had offered to show him to his own quarters and Eve had inquired as to where they were, a sharp edge to her tone that could have cut like a knife. When the servant had mentioned they were in the basement, with the other servants, Eve had practically thrown the woman out of the room and snarled that Tor was staying with her.

  The servant had cast a glance at the only bed in the spacious apartment and then hurried away.

  No doubt there were rumours about them spreading in the servant ranks.

  He didn’t care for his sake, but he cared for Eve’s.

  She needed to behave in a way that fitted her position within the family and he had tried to make that clear to her this evening when they had received word that the heads of the household wanted to throw a ball to honour her.

  Eve had wanted to refuse their invitation.

  Tor had warned her that it would be extremely rude of her to turn them down, especially when tonight was the Creator Day masquerade and they were setting aside their usual ball celebrating that in order to hold one celebrating her. On top of that, they were offering them rooms and blood, and a secure base to call home until the Law Keepers arrived.

  She had pressed him to join her. When he had refused, she had snapped that he was being extremely rude now.

  She had demanded he come down, but he hadn’t agreed to it. He had simply stated that they had little time in the mansion before the Law Keepers arrived and he needed to plan their next move. It seemed like a reasonable excuse to him.

  Apparently, it wasn’t a reasonable excuse in her eyes. She had stomped around the room, complaining under her breath about his behaviour and leaving her out in the cold, making her face the vampires alone. There had been hurt and fear buried deep in her eyes the whole time, pain that had cut him whenever she had looked his way, her dark eyebrows furrowing and soulful brown eyes meeting his.

  To avoid giving in to her demands, he had thrown himself into his work, kee
ping his focus solely on the maps and his notepad in front of him. Well, almost solely. It had kept darting back to her while she dressed, the soft rustle of material firing his imagination, making him envisage her not dressing but stripping for him.

  He rubbed a hand over his mouth and shifted on his seat, trying to get more comfortable as his jeans bit into his groin.

  He glanced at the clock. Half past midnight. The ball had started thirty minutes ago.

  Maybe he should go down.

  He didn’t like the thought of her feeling he had cast her away from him. Women had a tendency to behave badly to spite a man when one had hurt them, and she was currently in a room filled with many eligible males of good standing.

  Tor perused the map again. He didn’t need to go down. She was where she should be, mixing with the elite. If he went down, he would only give her reason to pull away from them, seeking him instead and upsetting their hosts.

  Like the man who had sat on the couch with her, his eyes lingering on her body, possessing it in a way that had made Tor’s blood boil.

  Still made it boil.

  He stood sharply, toppling the wooden chair, and stormed towards the door. He halted with his hand on the knob and looked himself over.

  He didn’t possess the fancy clothes that men at balls wore, but he did own a shirt. He stalked to his duffle bag, pulled out the wrinkled black cotton shirt, and changed into it, dumping his used t-shirt on the desk. He left the top two buttons undone, exited the room and strolled along the corridor, following the sound of the string quartet and Eve’s unique sweet scent.

  It led him down the elegant wooden staircase to the ground floor and through a long corridor to a large ballroom. Candles glowed from the chandeliers, bathing the room in warm light that bounced off the gilt work on the inset columns lining the cream walls. A bank of French doors lined the wall off to his right, some of them open to allow the night air to come in.