Drowning In The Dark: #4 The Veil Series

by Pippa Dacosta

  “Stop right there.” I massaged my forehead, fending off a headache.

  “You asked for details.”

  “I need you to understand. This is… a business transaction. I’m not doing this because I want to.”

  “I am painfully aware of that fact.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really. I was about to tell you as much before the Institute shot me down in the alley a few nights ago. I’ve wanted this for a very long time, but…” He smiled, revealing blunt human teeth. “...not in this manner. I’d prefer you wanted to share yourself with me in a genuine union.”

  My mouth fell open. Did the gates of hell open and swallow us all? “Holy shit, Akil. Do you hear yourself? Are you feeling alright?”

  “Not particularly, but needs must take priority.”

  “Okay, look. When all of this is over, we can discuss…” I gestured between us, flicking my hand back and forth with a frown. “…this, whatever it is. Until then, quit being soft. It’s freaking me out.” He settled his gaze on me, lips tight, eyes tighter. “Good. I need you to answer one last thing. Are you doing this to control me?”

  “No. Had that been my intention, I could have taken advantage of your naivety long ago and locked you with ease. As I said, I’ve only ever tried to help you. Right now, I’m trying to protect you from yourself. You are—and will be—destruction. You need absolute control, and you need to be all demon if you’re going to survive what is to come.”

  “What is to come?”

  “That, I cannot tell you.” His smiled softened. “To know one’s future is a curse. You would not thank me for it.”

  “So you really do know?” He blinked back at me. “All of it? Everything?”

  “Don’t ask this of me.”

  “Do I survive?”

  His gaze dropped.

  “Does Stefan?” He flinched. “Does he?”

  “Muse, I have only the knowledge which Asmodeus permits, and Stefan isn’t part of that.”

  “Not part of my future, you mean?”

  He lifted his eyes. “That is not what I said.”

  Oh, God. I couldn’t go through this without Stefan. I needed him, the immovable ice to my liquid fire. Just the thought of him not being there crushed my heart inside my chest and strangled the hope right out of my existence.

  “Muse.” Akil said my name with enough force behind it to bring my rapidly deteriorating thoughts to a halt. “We do not have time for you to second-guess a future you cannot change.”

  “Then I suppose we’d better get on with it.” I worried my lip between my teeth and swallowed deeply.

  He stalked forward, fingers flicking open his shirt buttons. The fabric teased open, revealing a glimpse of bronze skin. I bumped back against the wall beside the window, unaware until that moment that I’d been backing up. Irrational panic dumped ice water in my veins. By the time he’d stopped in front of me, head bowed, shirt open, I was having a hard time trying to convince myself not to run.

  He caught my hand—the one clutched on the belt of my robe—and turned it over, peeling open my fingers. Lifting my hand to his lips, he met my wide-eyed gaze and teased the tip of my index finger between his lips. A shudder tumbled through me, not entirely pleasurable—more like fear and terrible anticipation. He turned my hand over and trailed hot kisses over my knuckles. Lifting my wrist, he planted a heavier kiss over my racing pulse. When his flicked his gaze up this time, a golden burn haloed his dark irises. He wanted this, but I—

  “Touch me.”

  I moistened dry lips, uncertainty stalling me. He planted my hand on his chest, and a wave of heat spilled down my arm. His ethereal touch, a trait all demons shared. An extra sense. It was that touch that would need to dive inside me and dig out Damien. I shuddered and stilled when Akil’s lips brushed mine. He teased with his tongue, trying to convince me to open to him. This was going to be more difficult than I could have imagined.

  “Muse…” He sighed, “You must relax.”

  “I don’t think I can.”

  “You must be willing.”

  “It’s just...” I was afraid, not of Akil, but of the horrible memories bubbling below my thoughts, waiting to resurface. I thought I’d dealt with it. I thought I’d moved on. But I hadn’t at all. “It still hurts.” I was afraid of who I was, afraid of what was to come… So terribly afraid of everything.

  “That will pass. Once I have him out of you, you’ll be your own being again.”

  I nodded, not trusting my voice. Akil’s gaze searched mine, but what he saw there didn’t please him. He clenched his teeth, twitching a muscle in his cheek, and then pushed off me, strode to the nearest framed anti-elemental symbol, tore it off its hook, and threw it to the floor. The sound of glass breaking accompanied the blast of heat from my demon as she came roaring out of the dark. I opened my mouth to cry out, only to find Akil’s heat against mine. His kiss was a savage invasion. To call it a kiss belittled the attack. His lips burned, his tongue licked and teased, and I fell into him, starved for him. Concerns and fears were shoved aside. I needed this. Fire bloomed inside me. My element unfurled, opening, embracing. Yes, I’d wanted this for years—to take all of him into me, drink him down until he filled me up. The demon in me, the fire, the lust, the hunger, shoved my humanity aside.

  His ethereal touch, a quiver of electric power in the rush of heat, filtered through my flesh and dove inside. Human worries bobbed to the surface of my thoughts, but Akil’s hands speared into my hair and pulled me so close I forgot it all. Lust ran through me like wildfire. I sunk my hands over his behind and yanked him hard against me, swallowing his groan inside our raging kiss. Pleasure spiraled higher, like a hawk caught in the updraft. I rode the madness, snarling when he pulled back, demanding more when he tore open my robe and brushed his thumbs over my nipples. When his mouth scalded those peaks, I arched back, hissing. Energies danced in the air between us. Need throbbed. Demon wants filled my head. I fumbled at his zipper, but it snagged, and with a frustrated groan, I diverted my hands to the hard ridge of his arousal, grinning as a powerful shudder tumbled through him. He growled out my name and knocked my hand aside, hissing into my cheek, “not yet.” The distinct touch of his ethereal power swirled around us, circling like a storm. At its eye, Akil pushed inside.

  The dark buried within me twitched, awakening. Lust ravaged my thoughts and owned my control. Akil became all I’d ever know, all I ever wanted to know. His warm spiciness sizzled on my tongue. The devastating heat of him crawled over me, and inside, he smothered the dark with liquid fire. I lost all sense of the moment. Time slowed or hastened. I didn’t know which and didn’t care.

  “Reach into me…” His words sailed through the storm and found me in the madness. I responded like a newborn flame, eager and hungry, and drove my element into him, reaching for the light. Power sizzled between us, shivering across my fevered skin, igniting beneath the deft play of his fingers and the tease of his lips. Freefalling, I reached for him, needing him close, so close. I wanted to crawl inside him. My body ached with desire, my mind flooded with lust, and inside, the parasite that was Damien snarled. He lashed out, a slippery tendril of darkness striking viper-fast, but Akil’s burning light slipped around it and squeezed. The sound of my own screams distantly echoed. Akil’s ragged breaths sawed against my cheek. His body rocked against mine in a primal rhythm, but we weren’t joined, not sexually. This wasn’t physical but gloriously dreamlike and entirely demon. He whispered dark words, foreign words that sounded devilish on his lips. His incorporeal touch wove through me, around me, needling the pulsing, hideous dark, and plucking its claws from my soul, finally freeing me.

  I clung to him, both with my mind and body. I held him so damn tight my muscles burned. His fire inside me swirled and danced. It devoured the dark, destroying every part of my hideous owner. Akil fell against me, trapping my body back against the wall, and words weighted with power tumbled over and over, coming hard and fast, burying me
while at the same time lifting me up. I mirrored the words, hardly realizing I was speaking. We spoke as one—matched in breaths, in tone—and my power flowed into him. I heard the rapid beat of his heart, felt him trembling, and listened to the strain in his voice. When the dark finally released, a jolt of pain fired through me. Akil pinned me still and smothered my scream with his mouth, kissing me with consuming passion. The dark dissipated, fizzling away to nothing, replaced by dazzling shards of heat, light, lust, and something brighter, something carnal, basic, primal: Akil. His raw, unrefined wildness simmered like a potent drug. I forgot myself, forgot my brother, the demon threat, Stefan, Dawn… I forgot it all. And for a few wonderful timeless moments, I was a thing of pure fire and exquisitely demon.

  Cool, slippery ice hovered at the edges of the inferno. Akil must have felt it too because he froze. I fixed my gaze on his. A corona of fire burned fiercely in his eyes. The reflection of my own gaze blazed. A familiar, comforting sensation warmed me through, like coming home to a blazing fire in the hearth. He moistened his lips and bowed his head. Both of us breathed hard and trembled with residual power.

  “If you kill me, Prince of Wrath, Muse will never be free.”

  I frowned at his unexpected words, their meaning far beyond the reach of my addled mind. Akil gave me a look almost like an apology and peeled himself away. I slumped against the wall, legs barely able to hold me up, and saw the reason for Akil’s words standing in my apartment doorway.

  “Stefan?” His long leather coat glinted with ice while his eyes blazed a glacial blue. Oh no… I shrugged my robe back over my shoulders and knotted it closed, not that it would do me any good. He’d seen enough.

  Akil stood demon-still on one side of my living room, equidistant between Stefan and me. He looked ridden hard, breathless, and exhausted. His hair was a mess, and his clothes hung askew. We hadn’t technically had sex, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. But the devil was in the details. Power fizzled in the air like an electrical charge: mine, his, and Stefan’s.

  Stefan didn’t acknowledge Akil. He only had eyes for me and made sure to pour all of his princely power into that bitter gaze. I cringed, ashamed, “The soul-lock—”

  He turned and was gone. I glanced at Akil, the pain showing on my face, but he simply arched a brow. What did I expect from a demon? Sympathy? Empathy?

  “I have to go after him.” I wobbled a few steps and stumbled against the couch. I wasn’t going anywhere, not until my body recovered.

  “I’d suggest some clothes.”

  I gripped the couch back and battled panic. “Is Damien gone?” I ground out the words, fearing the reply, but needed to hear it. I’d waited so long for this. I’d dreamed of it. “Is he dead?”

  “Yes.”

  “No coming back? No loophole?”

  “He is no more.”

  “Get out.” Akil moved closer, and I threw all of my own shame into my stare. “You can’t be here right now. You’re like Christmas morning, freakin’ temptation personified.” Lust sparked through me, almost wrenching my strength right out from under me. I wanted his hands on me, his lips burning against my skin, every part of him inside me. “I need some distance.”

  “Distance from me is something you can’t have.”

  Oh, I knew that. I felt him burning bright and wild inside me. It felt wonderful, but I wasn’t going to let it rule me. “I told you, Akil. This was a business transaction. Our transaction is complete.”

  He straightened, and the fire in his eyes died. “When will you admit what we both already know?”

  Standing straight, I tried to look formidable in my bathrobe and lust-drenched body. “Thank you for helping me, but it’s time for you to leave.”

  He moved too quickly for me to track, gathered me in powerful arms, and pinned me back against the kitchen counter, all in the space of a gasp. The touch of his lips on mine was all it took to spark the fire alive again. I clenched his shirt in my hands, intent on pushing him off, but froze. I should have realized it wouldn’t be easy to deny the effect he had on me. I’d had trouble resisting him before. Now he was inside me—under my skin.

  He splayed a hand on my face, holding me still as his other hand tore at my robe. “Stop lying to yourself,” he snarled. His teeth had sharpened, fangs lengthening. “I know exactly what you want.” His hand plunged lower. Using a knee to nudge my legs apart, his hot touch found the wetness between my legs. “Your words are fragments, scattered by the truth I feel right here.” A cry, something between a groan and a gasp, belied my attempts at denying him. He smiled into the curve of my neck, and plunged his fingers deep into my core. “We are joined.”

  I thought of Stefan, of the ice-cold expression on his face. I’d betrayed him. It didn’t matter that it had been necessary to free me of Damien. If I did this, now, with Akil, I couldn’t go back.

  “Akil…” I cleared my throat and tried again, this time with a growl. “Akil, get the fuck out of my apartment right now!” He snarled, pulled away, and vanished in a cloud of static, leaving me alone, sexually ablaze, and emotionally distraught. I reached down and finished what he’d started, touching myself hard and fast, until the pleasure crested, and I came with a wrought and frustrated cry.

  Chapter Twenty One

  I was free of Damien for the first time in decades, and for the first time in months, I had complete control. It was a clean, concise control. Surgical. Powerful. I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt so comfortable in my half-blood skin. With all remnants of Damien finally gone, I was myself as I was meant to be. Sure, I felt Akil close by, so close I could almost taste him, but his element complimented mine. Where madness had clawed at my mind, only clarity remained. A soft, hopeful smile crawled across my lips. The Mother of Destruction was ready to take on the netherworld.

  Smoke spiraled out of the crumbled remains of Stone’s Throw bar. A couple of enforcers guarded the scene while a handful of people filtered through the rubble. With no idea where to find Stefan or what to say to him when I did, I focused on the task ahead and visited the office where Ryder and the militia had been only hours before, but they’d made good on their promises and abandoned their base. The only other place I could think to find someone of use was Stone’s Throw, but there was little left of my favorite haunt. The harsh light of day only served to remind people how soon the night would come again. The demons would return, and this time my brother might be with them. He had enough half bloods at his disposal to make short work of any military response. But not Dawn. He didn’t have her. Adam would know where she was. If I could find Adam...

  “Hey, lil’ firecracker.” Ryder’s boots crunched on debris as he approached from behind and planted a hand on my shoulder, almost triggering my instincts to spin and sock him one. I might have, had he not tugged me into a bear hug. Tensed like a two-by-four, I swallowed and breathed in his familiar gun-oil-and-hot-metal smell. I wasn’t aware we were the sort of friends who hugged, and like a deer in headlights, I had no idea what to do.

  “Hey,” I mumbled against his jacket.

  He relaxed his hold and shrugged away, realigning his coat. He didn’t need to say anything. The strain of the last few hours had etched into his weary face and burned in his too-bright eyes. Avoiding my gaze, he rubbed at his unshaven jaw and surveyed the ruined bar. “What a clusterfuck of a night.” His voice, usually so confident, quivered with dregs of exhaustion.

  I couldn’t find my own voice to agree. I’d always seen Ryder as the formidable enforcer, rough around the edges and ready for anything. The man beside me was just that, a man, one who fought demons twice his size, ten times as mean, and a hundred times tougher to kill. Clearly, he was rattled, and I felt the effects of the night all the more keenly, seeing him there on the verge of tears.

  “How is she?”

  Ryder drew in a short hiss. “Not great. Better. It’s not what he did physically. It’s up here.” He tapped his forehead. “But she’s coherent and pissed. She knows she’
s responsible for this…”

  “Hardly. Jenna was never going to be able to work Val to the Institute’s advantage. She’s too human.” Ryder’s brow arched. “What I mean is, he’s just too strong. You can’t play him. This wasn’t her fault. Adam should never have let her anywhere near Stone’s Throw. He should’ve kept her off the job. This is all on him.”

  He snorted. “He’s got a lot to answer for. The netherworld’s attacking, and he’s missing. I figured him for a lotta things. Now I can add coward to the list.”

  I might have come back with an equally snide comment, but my thoughts were caught on Jenna and her all-too-human response to my brother. “Would she want a chance to get back at Val?”

  “Hell, yeah. In between bouts of guilt, she’s cursing demons with words that make even me blush. What are you thinking?”

  “We could tempt Val back in. Could she summon him?”

  Ryder combed his fingers back through his hair. “Maybe. She’s got balls of brass. But what’s to stop him finishing her off?”

  “Summon him inside the symbols.” I’d summoned my brother once before in much the same trap. He’d tried to skewer me with a sword. Family like him redefined sibling rivalry. “He’ll still be formidable, but if we can keep him contained here, on this side of the veil…” An idea formed. “Those rifles you used on Akil, loaded with P-C-Thirty-Four, do you still have access to those?”

  “Yeah, I got one in my personal stash at home.”

  “Summon him, shoot him, and he’s trapped, virtually human—or better yet, out cold. Can’t do a damn thing. It won’t stop the princes, but it might slow their plans.”

  “Summoning isn’t exactly air-tight though. It’s weak at the best of times. A demon like Valenti, pissed off, might break out in a few seconds.”

  “How long do you need to pull a trigger?”

  A smile touched his lips. “I like your thinking. It’d have to be at Jenna’s place. Anywhere else, and he’ll get spooked before he arrives.”