by Lynne, Donya
An apologetic smile graced the shy female's face, and her mouth twisted as she nibbled the inside of her lip. She didn't seem comfortable around males, or maybe that was just her personality.
"What's your name?" He opened the door of his dorm and waved her out into the hall.
"Eva." She let him pass but kept her arms tucked in front of her. Her steps were light as she fell in step behind him.
"You work in admin, right?" It wasn't that he wanted to make small talk with her, but in a way, he felt bad for having been so short with her. It wasn't her fault Micah was a dick.
She walked just behind him and to his left. "Yes. Part-time. I also help in Dispatch."
Malek only half listened as they rode down the elevator. The ache in his chest thrummed back to life now that he was fully awake. By the time he was within ten feet of Micah's office, his whole body ached again, distracting him so severely that he didn't even notice that Eva wasn't beside him anymore. He turned, looked behind him, and realized they had passed Dispatch. He vaguely remembered her telling him good-bye.
Whatever. Good-bye, hello, get lost. Right now, he didn't care. He was in misery's grip again.
So much for thinking he was getting better.
Without knocking, he twisted the doorknob to Tristan's—ugh, Micah's—office.
"Okay, you can get the meeting started, asshole. I'm here now, no thanks to—" He cut off as his gaze lifted.
The scent of tension throttled him, as well as the smell of some new guy he had never seen before standing beside Lakota. Huh? What was Lakota doing here? Oh yeah, he was on the team now. How lovely. But who was the new guy with the short, dark hair? And—
His balls locked up as his gaze swept to the left and landed on Gina. She stood behind Severin, partially blocked by his large body and wide shoulders. As if in a tunnel, he honed in on her. His senses catapulted into the stratosphere, and his breath hitched so violently that he had to take a step back to keep his balance.
Micah backed up and took Lakota and the new guy with him as if he was clearing a path. Severin even seemed to feel the coming storm, because he stepped away and left Gina exposed. Her gaze met his, and she took a heavy, shaky breath. In an instant, he flew up on her with the speed of a bullet, so fast he hadn't even felt the floor beneath his feet. One moment, he was across the room, and the next his body was pressed against hers. He pulled to her as if she were the center of the universe and had a gravitational pull more powerful than the sun's.
Her breath caught as he pushed her back against the wall and dragged his nose up the side of her throat to her ear and inhaled. Pure Gina. Perfect and provocatively fragrant. She smelled faintly of vanilla and cloves. He pinned her between his arms and planted his palms against the wall on either side of her shoulders.
She trembled, and her shaky hands rose and pressed against his chest as she took several rapid breaths, as if she was terrified of him.
"Ssshh." He circled her ear with his nose and wrapped one arm loosely around her back. "Sssshhh."
She calmed and relaxed against him.
Everyone fell away but the two of them. Her palms on his chest felt like the touch of an angel, and the warmth of her body enveloped him like a cloud.
Gina, Gina, Gina. God, her beauty captivated him, and the sound of her breathy sigh was a siren's song.
"You're here. God, you're really here," he whispered against her ear. His lips played over her smooth, scintillating skin as he spoke.
He was drugged, intoxicated by her, hungry to feel her beneath him, holding him. She was his, now and forever. She had returned to make him whole. He couldn't get enough of her scent and dragged his nose across the front of her neck to the other side as he inhaled deeply so he could capture her aroma and hold it. Perfect…she was so perfect…her scent was unbelievable and—
Wait!
Malek's eyes burst open as his back straightened. What was that smell? Another male? Another male's venom tainted Gina's blood. When had another male fed from her? Who—? Malek growled low in his chest, and his hold on Gina tightened.
His dark, narrowed eyes turned on the unknown male who stood next to Micah and Lakota.
It was his scent inside Gina. His venom. He had taken blood from his female.
With another low growl, he pressed more firmly against Gina as if shielding her. Then he bared his fangs and hissed at that fucker as he pulled her farther back along the wall, into the corner of the room. He wanted distance between her and that incubus who had sampled her. He hissed again, making it clear whom Gina belonged to. How dare that asshole partake of what belonged to him.
"Malek…" Gina's voice brought his gaze back around, and he instantly softened, under her command. Whatever she had been about to say caught in her throat, and her brown eyes locked to his, full of surprise.
Still, the simple passing of his name through her lips soothed him, and he gazed drunkenly at her delicate mouth before leaning in and rubbing the side of his face against hers with a sigh.
"Gina…"
She was here. She was his. And whoever that other male was, he held no claim on her. Malek's gaze steered back around, and he bared his fangs again in a silent snarl as he hid Gina from the other male's view. How dare he defile what belonged to him. Gina was his to feed from…his to hold…his to savor against his tongue and body. He wrapped his fingers around her wrist—the wrist that still bore the faint mark of a bite—and this time when he bared his fangs, it was to issue a lethal, low snarl of warning. No one was permitted to take from his mate, or they would answer to him. To make that point clear to her other suitor, he lifted her wrist to his mouth, and, while fixing the male in his gaze once more, sank his fangs in where the other had obviously bitten her. The message was clear: This one is mine.
Warm, vibrant blood flowed down his throat, and Gina's body trembled and fell instantly limp in his arms as she moaned and dropped her head back. Euphoria flooded her from his venom.
She tasted so good, so damn good. Not since Carmen had he sampled such exquisite blood. Not since the loss of—
He froze. What? Who?
Fuck!
How had this happened?
With a gasp, he released Gina's wrist and flung himself away as if she were the devil trying to claim his soul. Talk about an incubus. She was a succubus, here to steal him from Carmen. Well, damn her. He wouldn't let that happen.
"What is she doing here?" He stumbled backward until he fell against the far wall. His heart hammered against his ribcage.
The smug smile on Micah's face appeared surreal among the gaping, gawking stares of the others in the room, including Gina, whose mouth hung open as wordless gasps of surprise escaped her throat. She struggled to stay upright.
I told you she was your mate.
Shut up. He wasn't in the mood for The Voice's snarky I-told-you-so right now.
"Fuck. Me." Lakota shook his head. The guy looked like he was about to shit himself.
Severin only swallowed heavily and looked away as if uncomfortable.
Even the new guy seemed too surprised to speak as he met Gina's gaze and seemed to ask with his eyes what had just happened. She only stared back, her face flushed, still affected by his venom enough that she slumped to the floor, her legs bent to the side.
What had he done? How could he betray Carmen like that?
Gagging, he rushed from the room, making it to the restroom just in time before yacking up what was left of the cottage cheese he'd eaten earlier. So much for making the effort to keep it down in the first place.
When he left the stall, still wiping his mouth, Micah was there.
"You fucking asshole." He shoved past him and dropped his head down in front of one of the sinks and cupped his hands under the stream of cold water, and then lifted them to his mouth and drank.
"She just showed up here." Micah held out a paper towel as Malek stood.
He took the towel, wiped his hands, wadded it up, and tossed it in Micah's face. "Yeah, w
ell, I know you had something to do that. But it won't work. I won't accept her. I won't." But, damn, he felt good. His chest no longer ached, and his balls felt like they were back to normal. Sort of. His dick was still hard, but he didn't want to think about the reason for that.
The shit-eating grin on Micah's face said it all. "Your dick's hard because you want to claim her, and no amount of denial will change that."
"Fuck you, Micah. And get out of my head."
Micah chuckled, the sound of a guy who had him by the short and curlies and knew it. Micah reminded Malek of a bully who had just stolen the weak kid's lunch money and his Trapper Keeper.
"You're just pissed off because you let your Johnson out of your pants in there and showed your hand, and now everyone knows what's going on up here." Micah flicked his middle finger against Malek's forehead as if he were testing a cantaloupe. "And they don't need to have my special ability to poke around your thoughts to know it, either."
Malek ricocheted away from the tap on his head and glared sideways at Micah in the mirror. "Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't I?" Micah crossed his arms and leaned sideways against the wall next to the towel dispenser. "That's why you're so pissed off. Because you can't hide the truth, anymore." He nodded toward the door. "Everyone in that room knows what Gina means to you now. Secret's out, buddy. Can of worms. Open." Micah uncrossed his arms and gestured, mimicking an explosion with his hands.
The asshole seemed to be enjoying himself a little too much.
Not wanting to hear Micah's philosophical horseshit any longer, Malek spun for the door. "I'm out of here."
"Oh, no you're not. Not unless you're taking Gina with you."
"Why's that?"
"I'm assigning her to you."
"Assigning?"
Micah smiled like the Cheshire cat. Oh yeah, he was too pleased with himself. "Yep. You're her new trainer."
"Trainer? Fuck you. I'm not training her or anybody else."
"Yes. You are."
"Or what?" This shit wasn't going to fly. Micah couldn't force him to take Gina under his wing.
Micah jerked him around and got up in his grill, nose-to-nose. "If you don't train her, Malek, I will hand her over to Lakota and let him do what he wants to her."
He growled. Gina would go nowhere near Lakota. Not on his watch. Lakota had been inside her. Had probably fed from her. And now he wanted to kill her. Talk about a recipe for bad medicine.
"You wouldn't." Surely Micah would never do something like that, so cruel and ruthless. Would he?
"Try me." Micah held his gaze, serious as shit, his navy eyes sharp with intent.
"You bastard." He was out of moves. After showing his hand and laying his mated dick out on the table, it was clear that no one but him would be allowed near Gina, and he had to face facts that Micah was right. Everyone knew that now. Nothing he said to the contrary would convince anyone that she meant nothing to him, because his actions had spoken more loudly than words. She was his, and whether he claimed her as his mate or not, the people in that room knew the truth.
"Yeah well…I've been called worse." Micah shrugged then grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and maneuvered him out of the bathroom and back to his office. "Now, get in there and sit down. The team meeting isn't over, yet."
Gina was on the couch next to Severin, while Incubus over there had Lakota tucked into a chair in the corner. The four looked about as cozy as cats in the rain, their expressions icy and guarded.
He took up post behind the desk, in the corner where he could avoid Gina like she was infested with plague. Even so, it took all his self-control to keep from crossing the room to pull her into the shelter of his body. Without even looking at her, he felt every breath she took, heard every blink of her eyes, and was enthralled by her scent. The Voice was gone, at least for now, and for the first time in weeks, he actually hungered for food and sleep. Damn, just one drink of her blood, and look at how weak it made him.
Snap out of it. He couldn't let Gina win, not at the cost of losing Carmen forever. But her proximity combined with his wilted willpower made for one nasty opponent. While she had remained out of sight and out of mind, forgetting about her and focusing on Carmen had been easier. Now, his efforts of restraint had him feeling like a kitten trying to draw blood from an elephant with its itsy-bitsy claws.
"Who's the new guy?" Malek shifted his attention and glowered at the incubus sitting next to Kota. The male who had defiled Gina's blood.
Micah cut the guy a cursory glance as he circled his desk. "That's Trevor. And he was about to tell us how it is he hitched a ride back here with Gina." Micah settled into his chair, leaned back, and steepled his fingers in front of his chest. "And I'm practically creaming myself to hear this story."
"Look, it's my—" Gina's voice cut off when Micah's hand jutted out, palm toward her.
"No, I want to hear from Trevor," Micah said, keeping his eyes on the strange male. "What brings you to my world, Trev. You don't mind if I call you Trev, do you?"
"What if I do?"
"I'd tell you to get over it."
"Are you always like this?"
"Only to my friends."
The two locked gazes for several seconds until Trevor chuckled and looked away. "I'm not sure whether I like you or hate your guts."
Micah grinned. "I get that a lot."
"I bet you do."
"I like to keep people guessing." Micah took a deep breath, cleared his throat, and leaned the chair back so he could prop his booted feet up on the desk. "Okay, mine's-bigger-than-yours aside…seriously, who are you, and why did you come here with Gina?"
* * *
Gina listened as Trevor relayed what had happened in Florida with Searcy and Vaydon, but she couldn't take her eyes off Malek.
He had a partially healed laceration on his cheek, along with the remnants of a bite on the front of his neck that had clearly been given to him by someone in power. Most likely Micah from the looks of it. But why? Bites like that were only given in cases of extreme insubordination, but the Malek she remembered didn't have an insubordinate bone in his body.
But this wasn't the same Malek she had met a month ago. Something wasn't right with him. Malek had lost weight and looked perpetually pissed off.
At first glance, he definitely looked like a male in the grip of his calling phase without his mate. All the signs were there. He appeared gaunt and pale, and his clothes hung off him. He looked like he hadn't been eating or feeding. And he had the violent mood swing thing down pat.
There was only one problem. The mood swings and all the peripheral mental bullshit were supposed to stop once he was in the presence of his mate, not get worse. So if Malek was her mate, why wasn't he dragging her caveman-style to the nearest private room to claim her? Not that she was exactly eager for that to happen, given that barely twenty-four hours ago the last thing she'd wanted was to be mated. But she had said she would give him a chance. Still, Malek's behavior begged the question, was he or wasn't he mated to her?
On one hand, he had come into the office, stormed her, and taken her blood as if he owned her. On the other, after drinking from her and showing his pecker to every male in the room, he had then shot away from her as if disgusted. So, over here he acted like her mate, but over there, he acted like he couldn't stand her.
Gina was more confused now than ever. She had wanted to come here for closure. To tell Malek to get lost and forget about her. And then Trevor and his silver tongue ended up convincing her to run like those "running people" from Mexico—to leave her baggage, expectations, and preconceived notions about mates and abuse and her defunct womb behind and to give Malek a chance. So here she was. Chance being given. If he wanted her, she was his to woo. But instead of wooing her and beating his chest like Tarzan to her Jane, he stood with his arms crossed, shoulders hunched, gaze averted, as if she didn't even exist. Or worse, that she did exist, but that she was the last person he wanted t
o see.
And that shit hurt, whether she wanted to admit it or not.
"Dacians, huh?" Micah rocked back and forward, lowering his feet to the floor with a thud. "Interesting. And now you've led them to Chicago. Lucky us."
Gina finally turned away from Malek and glanced back at Trevor and Micah.
"I take it you don't get many Dacians in Chicago," Trevor said.
"No, we don't." Micah kicked back and grumbled unintelligibly under his breath.
Next to her, Severin shifted forward, elbows on his knees. "Excuse me, but what the hell is a Dacian?"
Micah spun in his chair and faced him. "That's right. You had a…um…unique upbringing and probably haven't heard about the first rulers of the vampire race, have you?"
The color drained from Lakota's face, and shame poured off him in sour waves. It didn't take a genius to figure out what he was thinking. As the absentee vampire father Severin never had, it would have been Lakota's job to educate Sev on the history of the race. With a dreck mother who didn't necessarily know the history or feel qualified to teach it, Sev had missed out on a lot that other vampires took for granted.
"First rulers of the race?" Severin frowned, obviously confused. "So, the throne hasn't always belonged to King Bain's bloodline?"
Lakota shook his head, clearly wanting to speak, but he kept his mouth shut and let Micah tell the story.
"No. First were the Dacians. They were powerful and brutal, and were among the first clans of vampires, along with the Thracians, who are now extinct. Many clans have gone extinct, and of those, most were driven to extinction by the Dacians themselves. Except for the Thracians. They were like this with the Dacians." Micah crossed his fingers. "After the Dacians were ousted from power, it was thought they had been driven to extinction, too. But even though their numbers dwindled, they were able to slowly establish another colony, albeit a weakened one due to their small population. They don't mate like other vampire clans do, either. It takes them longer to repopulate, which is why we haven't seen much of them for a while. They went in to hiding for centuries to rebuild their clan, but little by little, we've seen them venturing out into society again over the past hundred years or so."