by B. E. Larkin
“How long?” Michae glanced at T'Jean as he swept the photos into a pile, shoved them back at me. “Half an hour.” T'Jean came to life, rising, glancing at me with the same emotion he'd shown the murdered women. “Gather your things, Calla.”
“No!” Now I finally understood the hideous reason behind the never ending moves, the sporadically ruptured childhood and they expected I would just continue to go along? Had they ever considered how crazy I'd felt, how wordlessly blamed for the abrupt departures in the middle of the night after an 'incident' at yet another unfriendly school or an unsigned letter in our perpetually empty mailbox or, who the hell even knew why? And there they stood, the monsters who'd destroyed my life, waiting for me to follow blindly behind, to obey as always.
“You don't understand this, Calla.” T'Jean said. Micheal had less patience. He grabbed at me. I was quicker that he was. I made it out the door before he recovered his balance. “Stop!” He bellowed, but he wasn't fast enough. I leaped down the stairs, straddled the bike as the door banged all the way open and his boots hit the stairs. “Calla Broussard!” There was something in his voice, perhaps something I should have recognized earlier, when I was rational, when I could have put the pieces together and seen the jagged hole and stopped to see the danger.
That time was past. I gassed the Valkyrie, the bike leaped and slid, and bit down on the gravel as it ripped me free of a life that hadn't ever been my mine.
By the time the tires hit the actual road, I'd convinced myself that all I felt was relief.
Chapter Ten – ESCAPE
It was dark when I arrived. I parked in the same place and this time the only thing I left behind before I plunged down the riverbank was my knife. Unarmed, I headed straight through the brush, ignoring the path. Between the trees, moonlight sparkled on the river. Most likely, it was beautiful. I really didn't give a damn.
I'd been gutted, emptied of my former life, and I needed something either to fill the ache inside or to end it permanently. Where else could I go?
But when I reached the place Jax had brought me, there was no one there. Only the trees and that mocking moonlight. I spread my jacket and lay on my back and glared up and tried to quiet my mind.
I could hear the river, the sound of traffic beyond. In the trees to the right a bird murmured and fluttered, another answered. A nest. Everything had a family, a place to be. I pushed that Hallmark thought away and listened for sounds of people. I was still listening when the shadow fell over me. “Knew you'd be back.” Why hadn't I heard him approach? The old Calla would have freaked out at that mistake. What was left of her, a bloodied pile of loneliness and grief, just didn't give a damn. Calla was gone. Screw it, from now on I was just Needles.
Still, I stood up, I wasn't going to let anyone look down on me. I glanced around for the rest of his pack. “They aren't here,” he said. The way he stared at me I knew he'd seen straight into me. That was the last thing I wanted anymore. From now on the world could stay the hell out of my mind. I shivered, maybe cold, maybe lonely, maybe just the night settling around me.
Dorian started to peel off his jacket. For an instant I flashed on my interrupted dream, saw myself pinning him against the tree. That moment before Jimmy's text was likely the last normal moment in my life and I shivered again. “I have my own leathers,” I protested.
But he wrapped the jacket around me anyway and as he lowered his arm, I caught a glimpse of a tattoo on the back of his shoulder. There was no thought, I spun him around and let out my breath. No eyes. It wasn't even professional work. Just ragged wings outlined behind a blood spattered moon.
He remained motionless until I stepped back. “Mind if I turn around now?” “Sorry,” I muttered. He looked at me, probably wondering exactly how crazy I was, but that didn't matter anymore because the ground started doing its slipping away act again. Had I eaten at all today? I could hear a steady dull pounding somewhere nearby. I swayed and tried to lurch at the nearest tree for support. He caught me first and then it all went fuzzy and soft and dark.
Chapter Eleven - REUNION
I couldn't see the moon when I opened my eyes because Dorian's face blocked it out, his features sharper and darker courtesy of nature's back lighting. That frown didn't help lighten anything either. He stroked the hair away from my cheek and lifted me to a half sitting position, locking his arm behind me to keep me from falling back.“What's wrong?”
Wrong? I couldn't decide whether to laugh hysterically or sob. Easier to tell him what could possibly be right, except that nothing came to mind on that count. I had no home, no family, I knew nothing about myself other than I was gradually going insane. I couldn't even truthfully say why I was there. Maybe I truly was a coward and hoped he might kill me, relieving me of my miserable existence. And, on a slightly more petty note, there was the fact that my butt was now seriously damp from the wet grass.
At the moment though, it seemed unfair to spill the story of my epic failure of a life to a guy who was staring at me with apparent worry, an extremely good looking guy whose curls fell forward across his forehead and whose arm muscles were taut with the strain of keeping me above the wet grass. “Tell me,” he said quietly. That was absolutely the last thing I wanted to do. So I did the only thing that made sense.
I pulled him down those last few inches and kissed him and felt the shock flash through my body like fire. I held on to Dorian and let go of everything else in the world until I couldn't breath and even then he didn't stop kissing me until I pushed him away, gasping and clinging at the same time. He let his lips slide down my neck and held on tighter. His arm slipped up to cushion my head before he lowered me back down to the grass. I slid my hands under his shirt, running them over the lean hard muscle there until even that wasn't enough. I snaked my arms around his back and pulled him closer as he bit my neck and still managed to unhook my bra with his other hand. He'd had a lot of practice, not a big surprise, but a needle of annoyance shot through me.
He was ready. Very, very ready, straining against those faded jeans. Too bad I wasn't as skilled with undoing zippers one handed as he obviously was with bras. I rubbed my hand against him, smiled as he groaned against my neck...and bit harder. Ow! Wow.
I turned and found his neck and licked and nibbled...and bit. If there was any pain in his cry I didn't hear it but it made me crazier. No more waiting. “Take off your jeans,” I ordered, trying to unfasten my own while not letting go of him. Hard, fast, urgent, the best path to oblivion every invented.
Until she laughed.
Chapter Twelve – LISSANDRA
Dorian froze. I twisted under him, until I could see her standing there, watching us. And the moments slowed as my lust addled mind attempted to make sense of what I saw.
She was pale, ice pale, diamond pale, with sapphire blue eyes. She was beautiful or exquisite or spectacular, whatever the word is for someone who left “pretty” in the dust long ago. Moonlight and reflections off the river lit her long light hair until it glowed silvery in the night. Anyone else wearing that long floaty tunic thing over skin tight leather pants would have looked like a high dollar whore. With the necklace of blue stones around her pale neck, she looked like a queen. She didn't so much as glance at me but I couldn't stop looking at her.
Her lips curled as she gazed at Dorian. “You didn't tell me you'd found her.” There was reproach in her voice, but he didn't hear it. He grinned at her, waiting, as if I was no longer there.
Why was I not angry? An instant earlier things had been hotter than I'd ever imagined in the best of dreams...and now, it just didn't matter. I pushed Dorian off me and yanked my shirt down as I scrambled to my feet. Who was she? How did Dorian know her? What was going on? The questions tumbled in my mind without any particular sense of urgency.
She was dangerous. She was hypnotic to the point I didn't notice the other two at first.and even I was dimly aware that any other time, those two men would have been the only things I could see.
Ice God and Loa, those we
re the words that worked their way through my confused mind. The guy who now stood behind her left shoulder could have cut throats with those cheekbones and the victim would probably have been grateful for the contact. Ice blue eyes, shoulder length blonde hair, long lean muscles. Faded jeans, faded Sabaton t-shirt. His eyes flickered over me and returned and I felt a prickle of fear. The other one looked over. Someone had taken the best of every god and poured it into into the dark skin of this guy. But like his blonde friend, his eyes also held only threat.
It took me a moment to realize that others had appeared in the darkness behind her, but they were only ordinary people, not even worth looking at.
Dimly I registered that Natalie was there and the other three missing girls. They stood closer to her while the others, Dorian's pack and a handful of similar freaks, twitched and yearned from a greater, respectful distance.
I tried to refocus on the missing girls, they were silent but they seemed healthy. One of them appeared pregnant, and as they moved I noticed all of them had tiny, discrete bite marks on their necks. Nothing like the nasty sores the freaks behind them exhibited. And unlike that pack, Natalie and the three girls appeared tranquil...and very, very watchful. They stared at me jealously until she looked at me too.
Those jewel blue eyes, the red, red wet lips. And when she smiled, there was no room left for doubt. Well, damn.
So, maybe I'd used up the week's emotions finding out that I had a serial killer in the family. Or possibly the recent lust flare up had burned what was left of my survival instincts into ash. There was even a chance I was surprised that the guy I'd chosen as a recovery hook up had not only betrayed me but turned me over to what appeared to be a an incredibly beautiful vampire. But I wasn't even surprised. And I wasn't afraid. Because I knew her. And in what was left of my mind, that made the least sense of all.
“She's been waiting to meet you,” Dorian smirked. He was watching me. I could sense his amusement disguised an undercurrent of, what? There was something hidden under his show of satisfaction. But it didn't matter. He and the others were quickly becoming irrelevant. Invisible. In the darkness only she existed. I couldn't look away from her.
“You know me,” she murmured, moving closer and I felt the strength that ran under her beauty. Power and something else. Something so familiar. Reflexively I curled my fingers into my palms to keep from reaching out to her. Her smile deepened and Dorian stepped away from me. He was a lot less happy about this than he'd acted but I no longer cared.
I did know her, if I could just remember. I brushed the grass from my jeans, ashamed of how I must have looked to this woman. I wanted her to accept me. I needed her to approve, to allow me to remain near her. She stopped to watch me, to read my thoughts. And laughed.
“Bring her here,” she ordered. Dorian's hand closed over my wrist and he hesitated. I felt the struggle inside him as I listened to his heartbeat. THRUM, THRUM, THRUM. My focus on her slipped. There was no way I could hear his pulse. I looked at him to find the source of this trick and saw a flash of something behind his eyes. He released his hold on me. “Go if you wish,” he said.
There is always an instant, a moment between choice, when another path is still open, when escape is possible. In his eyes, I saw the other path and knew he would not stop me if I ran. For a breath I stood there and then she spoke.
“I created you,” she said.
So I stayed.
It all made sense. Of course she knew me. Where had she been all these years? Did it even matter?
She held out her hand, smiling at someone behind me. “Let her come. You know this is where she belongs.”
I stepped forward and heard a shotgun clack as the round chambered. T'Jean's hand clamped over my wrist and dragged me backward. What was he doing here? Before I could make sense of anything, Micheal stepped forward, a Saiga clamped in each arm.
The pack behind her whimpered and shivered as she spoke, her eyes on me as she addressed my father. “You can't hide her from me forever, T'Jean.” I twisted in my father's grasp and fought to break free and return to her. I couldn't let him hurt her.
“Calla, listen to me!” Instead, I bit him and brought my head back into his nose, heard it snap. For the first time in my life, T' Jean slapped me. Hard. He yanked me around to face him as the blood pulsed down his face. “Why are you doing this?” I screamed at him. “Why did you have to lie to me?” I kicked at him and he swept my leg from under me, kept me upright as he shook me. I spat at him. “Come on, T'Jean, tell me the truth for once.”
I turned my head to see her. She hadn't moved, hadn't stopped smiling even with Micheal's guns trained on her. Dorian stood near her, the Ice God and Loa still beside her, all of them waiting for me. I wanted to tear T'Jean apart.
“You've been hiding me from her all my life,” I shrieked at him.
He was quiet until I looked at him and the grief in his eyes shook me.
“We've been protecting you. Her name is Lissandra.”
She was still watching me, but Dorian turned his face away, refusing to meet my eyes. The second shotgun racked a round into the chamber and I struggled to break free until T'Jean spoke again.
“She's what killed your Mama.”
END PART ONE
Part Two – LISSANDRA – available July 27, 2012 on Amazon Kindle.