“She was afraid. It’s not surprising that she feels the safest right now with her father,” Kaden explained. “That doesn’t mean she doesn’t adore you and love you with all her heart, but Christian rescued her and so he’s her safe place right now. She’ll come around. Soon, that smile will be on her face again and she will be back to her little mischievously adorable self. We just have to give her time to heal. Kids are resilient. By tomorrow, she’ll be running around with Caleb again.”
Reysa pressed her lips to his in a gentle kiss that quickly turned passionate. “When did you get to become so smart?”
“I’ve learned a lot from you,” Kaden smiled, pulling her close to kiss her again. “How tired are you?” he asked flashing that grin that could only mean trouble.
“Well, I think I just got my second wind. Are you up for twelve rounds?”
Kaden clutched her hand and placed it on his strained arousal. “Does that answer your question?” He flipped her on her back and quickly shredded her clothes as she returned the favor.
They were both beyond ready so he entered her quickly finally easing the longing that had tormented him for weeks. He wanted to stay buried inside her for eternity. This was home. This was where he belonged.
“Bond with me, Reysa. Be mine now,” he groaned as he continued to thrust inside her. Reysa nodded and Kaden lifted her so that she straddled his legs. He brushed her silken threads to the side exposing her neck. He didn’t need to feed from her as he had drank her essence before, but he wanted tonight to be a fresh start for the both of them. He wanted them to feed as one with their bodies connected, symbolizing the unity of their love.
He sank his fangs into her neck as she drank from him. He welcomed her flavor as he savored taste of the woman that completed his soul and saved him from the darkness and brought him to the light.
He cupped her cheeks in his hands. They needed to say the words. His jade eyes bore into her passionate crimson eyes. She pressed her lips to his and as they pulled apart, they spoke the words that would bind them forever, “Together we shall live forever or together we shall die. Always we shall love. Never shall we part.”
Kaden thrust deeper taking both of them to the heights of ecstasy.
Reysa kissed away the tears that Kaden shed. They were finally one. No more running, no more doubts. They were a family.
Epilogue
It had been a month since Tatiana’s birthday party and the attempted kidnapping. Julian knew that more trouble was on the horizon. Things had been relatively quiet these last few weeks, but Adam and Eve were still out there and so was ELM. Their silence was just a prelude to the inevitable next round of attacks. ELM was not about to give up just because one compound was destroyed. There were others out there, but no one knew where.
The Council was working hard to uncover them, but so far no luck. Julian had spent the last month at Reysa’s house waiting for a lead. Bust most of that time was spent trying to reconcile the complex mess his love life had turned into.
For years, he hadn’t even managed a date. He had been completely focused on his photography and keeping his distance from Kaden, but now he was in the midst of a convoluted entanglement that he wanted to unravel.
After begrudgingly accepting that Reysa was meant for Kaden, he had resigned himself to a life of celibacy. It seemed to be the most logical step for him. All of his relationships had been disastrous. Even before Helena, most of the other women he met were just using him to get to Kaden. Kaden was the bad boy who women chased. Julian was the good one that women used.
Julian had accepted his role as second best. There was no point in denying it. He had always taken a backseat to his brother until Helena. At least he thought she would be the one who put him first, but she turned out to be the worst one of all. That deceptive succubus had wrapped him in her web of lies and seduction and he fell for it. Julian cursed himself daily for that stupid decision. Part of him had known she was trouble, but her affection and attention catered to his need to be chosen. Except she really hadn’t chosen. He was a diversion until she found something better and when Kaden crashed into his life again, Helena chose him and he took her away. Despite that, Kaden ended up with Reysa, the greatest prize of them all while Julian once again was alone.
Well, he wasn’t completely alone, but he still did not have what he wanted. And what he wanted was Yasmine. The sensual witch he felt connected to the moment he saw her in Yanis’ den. With her caramel hair, hazel eyes, and Middle Eastern aura, she was unimaginably splendid. Julian could not have imagined a more divinely exotic creation.
He tried everything to secure a place in her heart, but she rejected him. He couldn’t blame it on Kaden this time. Yasmine just didn’t want him.
He had approached her a few days before Tatiana’s party and had asked her to dinner. A simple date, at least it should have been, but she flatly turned him down without a shred of remorse or regret. Julian should have been used to the rejection, but this one stung like no other.
He went to The Lore to drink himself into frenzy. Acting like a drunken boar worked for Kaden. Maybe it was time he tried the bad boy routine. Doing the right thing had never yielded anything good for him.
After two hours of steadily drinking himself to an obnoxious buzz, he ran into Anastasia, the siren that just oozed sex appeal from every pore of her skin. She was gorgeous, curvaceous and to Julian’s surprise, very interested in him. They danced for hours before going back to his room at Reysa’s where they spent the night in each other’s arms. A night that was so pleasurable that all others paled in comparison. Julian had never imagined such ecstasy was possible. Anastasia was a heavenly hell.
Julian woke the next evening feeling guilty for taking Anastasia to bed while wanting Yasmine. He told Anastasia the truth and apologized for using her. She laughed at him before she pleasured him again. To say he was perplexed by her response was an understatement, but he reveled in the delight of her tongue as she awakened sensations in him that Julian thought would remain undiscovered. He nearly passed out from pleasure, but he stayed conscious long enough to hear her say that it didn’t matter who he wanted. He was hers for now and she wasn’t ready to let him go. And Julian wasn’t ready for her to let go. He wanted her as well. Like the old adage, “if you can’t have the one you want, love the one you’re with.” He repeated those words to himself over the last month as he enjoyed Anastasia’s body, but craved Yasmine’s heart.
He felt like a lecher using Anastasia to sate his desire while wanting another, but he never lied to her or made promises he knew he could not keep. Still, the guilt was wearing on him. Being in the same house with both these women was too much. Every day featured the icy looks from Yasmine when he flirted with Anastasia, and every time he stared back at her, Anastasia would seduce him back to focusing his attention on her. It was a mess. Anastasia wanted him. He wanted Yasmine and Yasmine acted like she cared for him but refused to admit it. It was becoming a torturous love triangle that Julian needed to escape which is why he ended up at the airport, headed on flight to Phuket, Thailand. He would come back in time to help if there were any developments with ELM, but for now, he had to flee. He had to figure out the convoluted mess that was his heart before he ended up hurting two women that meant so much to him.
It had been so long since he had any time to himself. His whole life was about being a supporting actor in his brother’s life story. This time, he was doing something for himself. He was putting his needs first. He didn’t say goodbye to Yasmine or Anastasia. He left Anastasia a note, a cowardly move he knew, but a necessary one as she would not have let him leave without her. Taking her along would have been a disaster. A sexually pleasurable disaster, but a disaster nonetheless.
In one more hour, he would be onboard the plane and at least for a little while, free. Best laid plans, he moaned as he smelled the familiar scent of Kaden. Even now, he was still his brother’s prisoner. Kaden couldn’t even give him the courtesy of letting him l
eave in peace. He told him a month ago that they were through. Fortunately, Kaden had been so distracted with Reysa that Julian had finally felt free of him, but here he was again turning up just in time to ruin Julian’s peace.
“You couldn’t even give me this, brother,” Julian spoke, his voice low and cold. “I ask so little of you and yet you can’t even grant me this one wish.”
Kaden sat beside him on the bench. “I didn’t come here to ruin your trip. I just came to say goodbye, Jules. I couldn’t let you walk away without a goodbye.” Kaden had learned of Julian’s planned departure through his mother. Part of him thought to stay away, but he couldn’t. A lot had changed for him this past month but the one painful constant was this persistent rift between him and his younger brother. Kaden could not deny the depth of hurt it caused him every day and knowing that it was his fault.
“Then goodbye Kaden,” Julian said as he stood up and walked away.
Kaden followed grabbing Julian’s shoulder and stopping him from leaving. “Okay, I wanted to say more than goodbye.”
“I’ve heard the heartfelt apologies and everything else you had to say. What do you want from me, Kaden? An absolution? I can’t give it to you. Not now. If you care about me at all, then let me go.”
Kaden shook his head in frustration. He didn’t want to let Julian go, but he knew he owed him this if this is what he wanted. “I love you, fratellino. I hope you find whatever it is you are looking for, but take it from me, running doesn’t solve anything because the same problems will be here when you return.”
“Is that your warning that you’ll be waiting for me when I get back?” Julian sniped.
Kaden ignored the dig. “I’ll always be here for you, but I’m not the problem this time. It’s those two women at my house. The one which you can’t keep your hands off and the one you can’t touch. As someone who has made a career of screwing up relationships, I beg you not to make my mistakes. Be honest about what you want and fight for it. Don’t settle for less. Otherwise, you will end up hurting the one you love.”
“You would know all about that, but I’m not you. Don’t compare me to you, ever. I’m not using anyone or lying or deceiving. I’ve been honest with Anastasia from day one. She knows the score.”
“Her brain might, but her heart may not. Just because she is a siren, that doesn’t mean it’s just sex for her,” Kaden warned. “I don’t think it’s just sex for you either.”
Julian knew he was right, but he would not concede that small victory to Kaden. “Point well taken. Now it’s time to go.” Kaden released Julian who started to walk away.
Julian paused as he sensed the presence of something dark and lethal. He turned to Kaden who gave him a puzzled expression. Everything around them became frozen in time as if the world had completely stopped except for them.
“What is this?” Kaden asked as he surveyed the humans trapped in time.
Julian motioned to the right where the side paneling of the wall began to shake. They watched as a horned being emerged holding a small pistol directed towards Kaden.
“Remember me?” the being asked Kaden, its glittering black eyes focusing intently on him.
Kaden stared at the demon trying to recall where he had seen this pale frail looking horned creature. Then he remembered. The Lore. He had seen the demon there over a month ago. “I remember. I stole your beer and you ran away like a coward.”
The demon laughed. “I’m not running this time although maybe you should,” the demon goaded positioning the gun so that it pointed at Kaden’s heart.
“You’re going to shoot me because I took your drink?” Kaden frowned. “Look dude, I’ll buy you a keg if you like.”
The demons black eyes darkened further until they were the color of a starless night. “I’m going to kill you not because you took my drink, but because you and your kind have taken everything from me, from my people. You have beaten, raped, tortured, pillaged, and destroyed us for centuries. I am going to kill you because all of you leeches deserve to die. You deserve to suffer just as you have made us suffer for centuries, for millenniums. I am going to kill you, all of you.”
“Who are you?” Kaden demanded although he knew the answer. This demon reeked of ELM.
“My friends call me Adam, but you can all me your angel of death.”
The demon fired a bullet from the revolver aimed at Kaden’s heart. Julian shoved Kaden out the way and tried to freeze the bullet before it could penetrate, but the bullet was too fast and tore into his heart latching on to his life force.
Julian collapsed in his brother’s arms. Kaden could tell that it wasn’t a silver bullet as Julian would not have survived the shot to the heart, but Kaden had the dreaded feeling that it was just as deadly. Julian knew it as well.
“It’s poisonous,” Julian moaned, as his face paled to an ashen deathly shade.
A panicked Kaden faced the gloating demon who smiled in delight at the sight of Kaden sitting in a pool of his brother’s blood. As he faded back into the wall, he warned, “we shall rise and one by one you bloodsuckers and beasts will fall.”
About the Author
J.E. Hopkins is a practicing attorney in New York and an avid fiction writer. Hopkins holds a Juris Doctor from St. John's University and a Bachelor of Arts from New York University.
J.E. Hopkins published her first novel, The Broken, in 2007. For more information about this author and upcoming works, please visit www.jehopkinsauthor.com.
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