by Kaia Bennett
A slow unfurling happened on the edges of my mind, like a closed flower had been planted there, and now began to open up. Her mind tickled mine, teasing me with disclosure. Then she bared her teeth and slammed shut again. She rocketed off my lap, spun away from me, screeched, “Goddammit!”
Then spun and punched me square in the jaw.
The blow rocked me even though I saw her fist coming. I took the punishment, slamming my lifted chair legs into the ground.
I laughed, couldn’t help myself. I licked my bloody lip and gave her a fanged grin.
“If you wanted a taste of me, Evie, all you had to do was ask.”
Her whole body shivered with the heat of my stare. Hunger hit the air, and the scent of cunt growing slick and swollen assaulted me. Her thoughts may have been closed, but her emotions were bleeding all over me.
“Come here.”
This time my order scorched the air between us, raising goosebumps and hardening her nipples. “Let me check your temperature and help you cure that mood.”
She knew what I meant when I said I wanted to check her temperature. I could damn near count down her period’s approach with my tongue. She gasped and slammed a hand between her legs. When impatience made me stand so I could toss her onto the sleeping bags, she held up a hand.
“Jesse. I—”
We both straightened as several howls sounded with bone-chilling clarity. My spines prickled, not with arousal now, but with fear.
Someone was coming, and they weren’t friendly.
40
I swept Evie out of the tent by her waist and propelled her in the direction of the coven just as Stark, in wolfman form, shot toward us like three hundred pounds of muscular bullet.
This was a signal shit had just hit the fan and several enemies were in the woods looking for us.
“Where’s Vaughn?” I roared when I didn’t seem him close behind.
“Vampires.” The hybrid muzzle made Stark’s voice so low and gravely I could barely make out the words. “Ten killers. They fight. We run!”
“Jesse!” Evie screamed, tugging at my hand when I didn’t immediately turn to join the wolf and my mate.
My father’s men had come for us.
I pulled Evie to me and kissed her, hasty and deep, leaving the taste of my blood in her mouth, instead of the goodbye I feared I had to say, the goodbye I couldn’t wrap the words around. “Get her to the coven, now.”
“No! I can help you!” She tried to pull out of Stark’s hands.
I ignored her, and grabbed a handful of fur atop the wolf’s head, shaking him to make sure he got how serious I was. “Listen to me, wolfman. You don’t fight and risk dying. You take Evie and you get to the coven if she can get in, or underground if she can’t. Don’t come out of hiding until I send word, you hear me?”
“Yes,” the beast snarled with a toss of his head.
“No!” Evie roared, kicking and screaming in frustration at Stark’s unbreakable hold. “I’m not leaving. Fucking let me go, Josh!”
If I live we’ll find each other again. I promise.
I didn’t dare promise her aloud. I didn’t dare tempt fate.
I kissed her in apology, said, “I love you,” and kissed her one more time. To Stark I bellowed, “Go!”
The wolf whirled, a blur of fangs and fur. He hauled my mate, kicking and screaming toward the coven several miles to the west. I spun, the air whipping in my ears as I picked up speed to cut off enemies approaching us from the south. But I couldn’t cut off her last words to me. What I prayed wouldn’t be her last words.
“No, Josh, let go! Let go! Jesse! Jesse! Don’t go! Jesse, please!”
I gritted my teeth and pushed my legs as fast as my lungs would allow, tunnel vision and my need to protect her, to save Vaughn and the guide who stood ground for us, pushing me beyond my top speed. Beyond my sanity. My fangs extended. My vision widened and sharpened. The killer came out to play.
I would have every one of their spines in my hands, in my teeth, under foot.
They’ll never get to her. Ever!
She tried to connect to me then, but I couldn’t fight with her in my head begging me to come back. I put my walls down, blocked her from my mind, so her influence wouldn’t pull me away from the fight. Not for the first time, I feared just how much I wanted to be with her, how she could undo my resolve if I let her all the way in.
The world sizzled by, green and brown and gold where the sun broke through the pines. Nothing penetrated my vision, but the sounds of the fight, and the smell of blood and wolf, directed me to the fight. My world narrowed. The enemy Stark, Vaughn, and the other wolfman had distracted for the benefit of my mate and me came into focus.
Still too far away. Push, Jesse! Push!
In the blink of a vampire’s eye, two separate battles raged as I sprinted to join.
To the left of me a wolfman fought three assailants. Two lay dead, their heads severed from their bodies by sharp-clawed hands. Knife wounds covered the wolf’s body and he fell to one knee, only to recover and swing one assailant into another like a bowling pin.
To my right, Vaughn took on two men dressed in camouflage and face paint. He dodged their knives, a series of swift parries and blocks, a blur bouncing from one attack to the other. He took a slash to the back and nearly fell to his knees, but jumped into the man’s guard, gaining momentum with a hop step. He threw out a kick behind him that shoved his attacker into a tree several feet away. The bark splintered with the impact as the killer tumbled, unconscious, to the ground.
Without bothering to look behind him, Vaughn shoulder rolled into the second man stomping toward my brother like a living tank. Vaughn threw a fist full of grit in the assassin’s face and used the distraction to shove his shoulder into the man’s stomach. Reeling from the impact as he hit the ground didn’t stop the assassin from gaining his bearings. He moved to stab Vaughn in the side. My brother dropped his fist into the assassin’s face with one hand, and halted the knife with the other.
They wrestled, jockeying for position, straining for the knife. I intercepted the man who’d shaken off the hit from crashing into the tree. He jumped into a crouch and sprinted for Vaughn’s back, as my brother topped his opponent.
I used the momentum of my sprint to spin myself around the assassin’s body like a vine. He stumbled to the side as I spiraled up his body. I secured my legs around his waist, got a form hold on the top of his skull and chin with both hands.
The sharp snap of his neck made me roar with satisfaction. The man in Vaughn’s clutches screamed in jerky stops and starts. Gargles told me Vaughn had stabbed him in the throat. As my opponent descended, I dropped to a straddle over his unconscious body. The back of his neck buckled under my teeth. My fangs dug in deep, shuddered against bone and flesh. Jaws snapped shut, I pulled his spinal cord through his camouflaged neck with a triumphant crack.
The blood of my own kind splashed my face with victory. Gore, bone, marrow and spinal fluid painted my tongue. I spit the flavors of death out and looked up, just in time to receive a kick to the face.
I rolled backward, over my shoulder and into a crouch. The barrel of a gun waited for me, aimed at the center of my skull.
The wolfman collapsed in a heap beyond the legs of my new opponent. Our ally had killed the last two men, but hadn’t been able to take on two more who surrounded him. I hoped he hadn’t died.
Vaughn!
I turned my head frantically to search for Vaughn. My swift movement was met with a pistol whip to the temple that felled me, kicking up winter earth and dead leaves.
“If I were you, Oldman, I’d stay put. We have orders to take you in alive. But, we don’t have to take you in unharmed.”
Vaughn’s growl helped me home in on him. From the corner of my eye, I spied my brother, surrounded by three men with guns aimed. He spun in a circle like a caged animal, his bloodied torso healing slower than his recent feeding should’ve allowed.
They didn’t s
hoot. Maybe they didn’t want to draw undue attention. Wolves occupied these woods and this group had suffered plenty of casualties at their massive hands.
“Don’t kill them,” I barked. I put my hands up and rose to a sitting position. The twitching, crawling motions of the wolfman told me he still lived, though barely. His body trembled, as if cold and struggling to recapture the healing heat of his kind, in wolf form.
“Hands behind your head, Oldman.” The man holding me at gunpoint gestured upward with his weapon. I raised my gaze to his. The bloodlust in my stare made him amend his command. “Slowly.”
“They’re just doing what I told them to do. They have no business with my father. If you let them live, I’ll come peacefully and quickly.”
I had to get them away from Evie and Stark. I didn’t know if she’d make entrance into the coven this close to the full moon. I needed these fuckers dead, or off her trail.
The man didn’t scoff. He’d said he had orders to take me alive and he’d seen me fight, however briefly. We don’t rip each other’s spines out with our teeth every day. Viciousness and fear made a caged animal dangerous.
Vaughn’s growl weakened some. From the corner of my eye, I spied him waver in his crouch. But, they didn’t attack him again.
“You poisoned the knives.” My accusation came through a mouthful of bloody, gritted teeth. Panic prickled under my skin. Despair and panic. “What kind of coward kills with poisoned knives?”
“Witch blades,” the man corrected. Under his camo watchcap, and through his grease paint I spied angled eyes, narrow and black under the sharp slash of his brows. His rounded cheeks rose in a smile, turning his vampire gaze to dark slivers. “Very rare and used for special occasions in our territory. Seems you’ve lost the art here.”
My brow furrowed. What territory? If my dad had sent someone for me he’d have used his own men.
My heart sped and a crash drew my gaze to Vaughn. He lay on his side on the ground. The wolfman, who’d fought and killed so many at my brother’s side, finally stilled.
“Relax. They’re not dead. As you said, the ruler of Mongolia has better things to do than quarrel with your errand boys, Oldman. If you come with us quietly, we won’t sedate you with our blades.”
My eyes widened. I slicked my lips and kept eye contact so he knew I only spat out blood instead of tensed for an attack.
“My father didn’t send you.”
“No, though, he did send word just before his imprisonment for crimes against a foreign territory. Your name. For one of our prized, and now dead, queens.”
I swallowed deep and blinked.
Altani. I knew there’d be consequences suffered for her death, but—
Cai must not have everything under control. Or he lied.
“You’re keeping me alive because you want justice.”
The man nodded. “And information. Stand up. We have a helicopter waiting.”
They didn’t ask about Evie. Small blessing. The smallest, cruelest blessing.
I stood, cautiously, with my hands behind my head. My captor motioned me in front of him, marching me past Vaughn.
Vaughn, my brother. Still conscious and trying to fight. He met my gaze. I shook my head, trying to command him with my eyes to lie down.
He wouldn’t give up. He crawled on his belly, fingertips dripping blood onto the hem of my jeans as I stalked past.
He’d live, they said. I had to believe he’d live.
I swung the door of my mind open, seeking out my mate. If she’d been ushered through the gate by now, the tug of our bond would reach her, but thanks to the wards, fuzzy static would interrupt any shared thought.
Images assaulted me. Evie screamed for me, her mind drenched in panic, regret, and love.
It’s going to be okay. I tried to calm her, hoping she could hear me. They didn’t come for you, they aren’t with my father. They’re here for justice. For Altani. You’ll be safe, baby, I promise. That’s all I want. Don’t look for me.
I didn’t know if she could hear me, the connection already fogging around the edges. Her thoughts stabbed me one after another, a wave of yearning and anguish.
Please come back, please come back to me! Don’t go!
I felt sorrow and I felt fear. An impending birthday I would miss, a bond that tugged at me and sang with the words, I love you, I love you, too. I didn’t say it. I didn’t get to say it back!
And then as the sound of her began to fade, as the world tore us apart and the coven walls closed in.
An image of us, lying together. Her hands in my hair and my lips on her belly.
I didn’t get to tell you. Our child. Come back to me. Come back for me. For us… Jesse….
Tears streaked down my face and I fell to my knees, the air sucked out of my body.
Evie!
I howled in my mind, trying to say I loved her again, trying to reach out to her.
The door slammed shut. I could only hear the frantic buzz of my mate on the other side. Caught behind the coven’s wards. Both of us calling, but unable to answer.
A child.
Our child.
“Get up, Oldman!” A sharp kick to my spine shoved me into the dirt.
My landing kicked up earth. Good, solid earth. Not far from here, this earth was consecrated. I smiled, choking off a sob as men dragged me to my feet and away from Evie. She hadn’t cried because I’d planned to give her a house. She’d cried because I’d given her a child. I’d given her everything I had to give, a future I thought we’d share. But, if I couldn’t give her that, at least I could give her and our child a chance.
I can keep my family safe.
That’s what a true father would do.
I’m a father.
I hoped thoughts could linger, that she’d know somehow, when she finally came out of the coven’s walls that I’d been happy over the news. If we’d had that future I would’ve kissed her belly. I would’ve tried to be tender. I would’ve loved her and our child the way I used to love the kill.
I love you, Evie.
I chanted the words inside as I marched toward death. I cried. But I smiled because I’d kept her safe.
That’s what a true father would do.
The End
COMING SOON
When Dying Is Done
(Shivers and Sins Volume 3)
OTHER BOOKS BY KAIA BENNETT
SHIVERS AND SINS SERIES
Die By the Drop (Volume 1)
Doing It To Death (Volume 2)
LOOSE ENDS SERIES
#1 Crush (Book 1)
Closer (Book 2)
Mind Over Matter (Book 3)
Sunday (standalone)
The Fifth Day (novella)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kaia Bennett is a New Jersey native, U.S. Army veteran, and martial artist who holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Rowan University and is working on her Master of Fine Arts at Fairleigh Dickinson University. When she’s not geeking out over music, movies, astrology, tattoos, or art, she can be found in front of her laptop, reminding herself not to bite her nails while she agonizes over a turn of phrase.
Kaia is a lover of all genres, a voracious reader, and a great believer that the journey is just as important as the destination. She’s an erotic author who aims to write stories with diversity, depth, realism, and viscerally hot encounters, revealing the taboo and tender sides of her characters and readers alike.
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Kaia can be reached at:
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kaia.bennett
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[email protected]
Table of Contents
Copyright
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
C
hapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Coming Soon
Other Books By Kaia Bennett
About the Author