Raziel tucked his arms under his body, pushed up, and rolled to dislodge Ky. The two men rolled in opposite directions, each coming to their feet in a fighting stance.
Ky circled his opponent, looking for an opportunity to strike. Movement from the corner of his eyes drew his attention. She’s still here! The realization twisted his gut. “Get out of here, Lyn.”
The warrior’s gaze darted to his mate. His momentary distraction presented his opponent with an opening. Raziel lunged, and came at Ky with his fists. The first punch landed squarely on Ky’s jaw, snapping his head to the side. The second punch landed on Ky’s neck to close his throat.
Ky staggered, his body gulping for air. He spun a thick thigh for a round house kick. It connected with the rogue’s stomach. Raziel wrapped an arm around his middle, and bent at the waist, heaving and gasping for breath. Ky threw an uppercut, connecting with the debauchee’s chin. The hit drove Raziel’s head backwards and his body had no choice but to follow. When the rogue straightened from the force of the punch, Ky kicked out. He struck the vampire hard; driving him down into the ground with such force his body tore up the soil in a fifteen-foot strip.
Chapter Seven
Lyn watched her attacker land with a sickening thud amidst the thick tangle of Banyan trunks. She heard the bark crack from the impact and watched Ky leap into the air, landing in front of the downed man. She gasped at the sight. Ky covered at least twenty feet in one mighty bound. No one could do that!
The two men fighting before her could not be human, but she didn’t think they were demon either. So, what were they? She didn’t have long to ponder the question.
They spun around the park like a tornado, moving so fast her eyes could not register their kicks and punches as their bodies flew apart, then back together. However, she heard every blow when it connected, the sounds of bones crunching and the slap of skin clearly audible to her ears with each blow. Lyn found it impossible to tell the two apart with both men wearing black, only hair color differentiated them.
The world exploded around them when their blurred masses neared one of the trees or the scrub palms giving evidence of the fierceness of their battle. Lyn watched the palm fronds fly through the air, their shredded branches fluttering as they floated to the ground in surreal contrast to the fast and furious movements of the fighting men.
Daelyn screamed, and jumped sideways to avoid a body flying toward her. Someone hit her foot when she leapt, tossing her off balance. She landed on her knees, the hard ground biting into her flesh. With pain radiating in both legs, Lyn pushed to her feet. Her injured knees threatened to give out. The world tilted. The pain and dizzying brawl made her unsteady. Unable to run, she staggered backward to sit once more on the base of the statue to watch the terrifying battle.
****
Ky slammed the vampire into the ground sending detritus flying into the air around them. He pulled a knife from the sheath attached to the waistband of his cargo pants. His breath sawed from his lungs as he dropped to his knees and aimed the blade over the vampire’s heart, looking for the opportunity of a clean, quick kill.
Raziel’s hand clamped around Ky’s wrist in a fierce grip, to keep the knife from finding purchase in his chest. The bones in his wrist flexed as their arms shook from the struggle. Raziel raised the arm with the cuffs, his hand landing on Ky’s forearm to pin the free cuff between his hand and Ky’s arm. Pain coursed through the agent’s body to widen his eyes, and the smell of his burnt flesh accosted his nose.
Raziel placed a bent leg between their bodies as he pulled Ky toward him. The debauchee pushed his leg out at the same instant he raised his arms and flipped Ky over his body. Raziel followed through, never releasing his grip so they came to rest with Raziel in the dominant position straddling Ky’s body. His hand pinned one arm above Ky’s head, the other, posed above Ky’s chest, held the blade turned downward. He leaned his body weight down to force the blade closer to Ky’s heart.
“Oh how the tables have turned,” The debauchee’s voice carried a menacing timbre.
The blade sank closer to Ky’s sternum. “This isn’t over yet.”
Ky gritted his teeth and summoned his strength to pull his arm free from Raziel’s hold. With a mighty thrust, he forced his hand into the chest of Lyn’s attacker. Ky’s fingers pushed through the muscle and sinew, seeking the beating organ within.
Raziel threw his head back, and roared in pain. He glared down at Ky’s arm protruding from his chest. Raziel’s eyes went wide, his face contorted in either shock or pain. Ky expected the vampire to recoil, try to escape, but instead of pulling away his opponent leaned his weigh forward, pushing the blade into Ky’s flesh.
The slide of the blade burned through his skin, and pain lanced his body. He saw the hilt of the dagger sticking from between his ribs. Although not a killing blow, the wound would weaken him. He needed to end this now. Luckily his opponent’s move had also brought his hand deeper within the chest, and he wrapped his fingers around Raziel’s beating heart.
Determination helped Ky to push aside the pain and focus. He gathered power to him, pulling it from nature’s energy around them. He fostered it, helping it to build until it threatened to consume them both. The massive pulse of power rolled from his body, the wave so strong it became visible as it rippled out from his center. He willed it toward the vampire, sending his form flying backwards though the air. The movement pulled Ky’s hand from the chest, the vampire’s heart held in his closed fist.
Knowing the fatal strike had killed Raziel, Ky’s thoughts turned to Lyn. He sat up, still holding the heart in his hand to find his mate. She seemed unharmed physically. However, he could not be so sure she’d survived mentally. He could only imagine what went through her mind when her gaze landed on her attacker. He followed her line of vision, watching Raziel’s blood soak his shirt and pool beneath his crumpled body.
A fresh wave of pain lanced through Ky’s body, pushing a groan from between his clenched teeth. His eyes locked with his heartmate’s. Wrapping his free hand around the hilt of his knife, he pulled the blade from his chest with a quick yank. The warrior’s face contorted with pain as the dagger slid back through his sinew and skin.
Daelyn’s gaze shifted from his gory blade to the bloody heart still in his hand. Her breath left her lungs in a huff. She grabbed her stomach, and doubled over to heave its contents.
Ky scowled, watching his mate lose her dinner. He wanted to comfort her, bely her fears. Try to explain what she’d witnessed.
After tossing the heart aside, he rolled onto his hands and knees. Pain tore through his body. His muscles protested each movement, but the warrior struck the pain down, forcing his body to obey, so he could press off the ground. Unable to rise to his full height due to his wounds, he stood hunched, taking heavy breaths from his exertion and the pain. With practiced ease, he stuffed the blade back into its sheath, unconcerned with the blood that flowed from the wound in his chest.
Lyn’s spine straightened as Ky made his way to her on staggering feet. Noting her gaze rested on his torso, his eyes dropped to the wound on his chest. His shirt hung in ruins, strips of the material dripping blood. The wound in his chest had already closed perceptibly.
Ky sensed her panic rise. She looked confused, afraid. He approached her but she took a step back, her gaze still on his wound. She brought her hand to her mouth and swallowed several times before finding her voice.
“What…” Her eyes locked with his. “What are you?” she asked in a small voice.
Ky held out his hand, and winced when he realized blood painted his flesh. His? The vampire’s? He lowered his hand, wiping it on the side of his leg, watching as his mate took another step away from him. “Lyn, wait. I can explain.”
She narrowed her eyes in disbelief. “No, you can’t.”
“I can. Please give me a chance to explain.” He took another step forward.
She retreated another step, clutching her purse to her chest. Tears welle
d in her eyes, tearing his heart in two. “Please don’t hurt me.”
Ky stopped his advance. She feared him. And he couldn’t blame her. He’d wanted her to leave the minute he’d arrived at the park as much for her safety as to keep her from seeing the battle. Of course, she had not done what he asked. He should have known she would want to remain behind, to help him if needed. He should have told her what her attacker was then maybe she would have left like any reasonable being. Now, she not only knew her attacker was something other than human, but that he was too. He’d really made a mess of this.
“Lyn, sit down. We need to talk.”
She shook her head violently back and forth, sending tears spilling down her cheeks. “What are you?” she repeated in a whisper.
He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly between his clenched teeth. The warrior scrubbed a tired hand down his face, his body weak from the loss of blood combined with the amount of energy he exerted during the fight. Exhaustion made his limbs heavy, and he still had so much left to do to be sure no evidence of the battle would be found come morning. He swayed on unsteady legs that threatened to no longer support his weight.
Lyn deserved an answer. He needed to tell her the truth about himself. And what that meant for her. As his mate, she would have to convert, become like him in order for them to have eternity together. The alternative would be to love her for the rest of her years, watch as she grew old, then die. And that grim alternative made bile push into the back of his throat. He could see no other way. He had to tell her.
“I am a vampire,” Ky admitted in a soft voice.
Chapter Eight
One day later
The harsh sound of heavy metal music screamed in her ear. Lyn threw her arm out blindly to the side, her hand smacking at the offending noise.
“Ouch,” she cried, hitting the clock radio on her nightstand. She sent the blasted thing careening to the floor.
She cuddled her left hand to her chest, and rubbed her injured wrist. Perfect. Just perfect! Now she could add a bruised wrist to her injures. She sat up and pulled the sheet away from her legs, looking at her knees. Both had turned a nice shade of purplish-blue from where she’d fallen on them the night before. Her gaze moved to her swollen ankle, wincing when she moved her foot.
Memories of the previous night came crashing in on her, making it hard to breathe. Her lungs fought for air as her panic rose. She looked to her window to see if the sun had finally risen.
All night she’d been awakened with terrible nightmares. Each time she checked the window for sunlight and wiped perspiration from her brow. Despite Lyn’s exhaustion, her mind refused to rest, instead she relived the terrible events of the past week whether awake or asleep.
Vampires!
A week ago, she would have found Ky’s explanation laughable. Now? Well now, it was maddening. Her world had turned on its head overnight.
She ran away after Ky told her he was a vampire, flying down the boardwalk as fast as her shaky legs could carry her. When she got to the parking lot she noticed his car. Lyn pulled his keys from her purse and had just sat inside when she realized that if she took the car he would have to come get it. And that meant she would have to see him, meet him—she never wanted to see him again.
Leaving the keys in the ignition, she jumped out of the car and ran down the road. After about a mile, tears clouded her vision and she tripped over something. The pain in her ankle kept her from caring about what had tripped her as she hopped to the side of the road. Knowing she wouldn’t make it much further on foot, she’d pulled her phone from her purse to discover her cell had just enough charge to make two calls; one to information to get a number for a cab company and the other to arrange for a taxi to come pick her up.
On the drive home, the events of the previous week played like a movie reel in her mind. She’d sought to rationalize the events.
The attack…“Random,” Lyn answered herself aloud.
The fact that Ky didn’t take her to a hospital…“Unnecessary.”
Ky sleeping all day and up all night…”I thought he worked the overnight shift at the precinct.”
All perfectly reasonable explanations. Lyn gave an inelegant snort of contention.
All lies.
She knew the truth now and it stunk like a rotting corpse. A putrid, vampire corpse. Ky worked the overnight shift because he had too. The damned man could not go out in the sun. He hadn’t taken her to a hospital because he did not want any questions about the attack. She fingered the stitches on her neck. This wound had been caused by Juan…or Raziel—whatever his freakin’ name was—biting her. The thought caused her stomach to churn. Ky was every bit as awful as her attacker. And a liar. A traitor.
A vampire for Goddess’ sake!
His first concern had been keeping vampires a secret. He did not care about her at all. She had thought she was falling in love with Ky. Thought he was a good guy. She couldn’t have been more wrong. Thank goodness, they hadn’t slept together!
“Mierda. How could my life go so wrong in a matter of hours?”
Her anger flared and she crossed her legs, forgetting about her swollen ankle until it made contact with the opposite leg. Lyn folded her legs anyway, welcoming the pain as a physical manifestation of her inner turmoil. She sat with her elbows on her butterflied knees, face buried in her upturned palms.
Her clock radio went off again, screeching in her ears. She must have hit the snooze button. Whatever! It served as a good reminder that she needed to get up and get back to her life.
She had a job she needed to go to. She’d wasted enough of her time on Ky something Robinson. Sheesh, she didn’t even know his full name. She didn’t know a lot about his life. Didn’t want to. She just wanted to put the entire thing behind her and move on.
Pushing gingerly out of the bed, she realized it was time to leave Ky and his crazy world behind.
****
Ky opened his eyes, and instinctively sent his senses throughout his home. They flowed through his room, down the hall, into the guest room to find…nothing. He’d never thought such a mundane word could bring him immeasurable pain.
Daelyn had run from him. Run! She’d been terrified of him, of what he was, and he could not blame her. The fight between him and Raziel had been violent. When he’d cleaned up the mess, he realized how awful it must have looked to her. She no doubt thought him a lunatic. A murderer, though he’d only done what had been necessary to protect her.
He’d followed her to assure her safety. Staying in the shadows, he watched her leave his keys in his car and head off on foot down the road. He had seen her trip over a fallen pine branch in the road. It broke his heart to see her tears fall down her soft cheeks.
He had just taken a step out of the nearby copse of trees, his arm reaching for her, when she pulled her phone from her purse to call for a cab. Knowing help was on the way, he melted back into the shadows, to watch over her until the taxi arrived and he could return to clean up the evidence of the battle.
In his world, danger crept in the shadows of the night. The adrenaline rush had gotten him through in centuries past, but now he had something else to drive him—laughter and love wrapped up in tanned skin and beautiful brown eyes to create desire as he’d never known before.
He would give her a little time to adjust. Surely she would come to realize that he was a decent guy, even if he was a vampire. He would wait a day or two then call her, try to explain.
****
One week later
Lyn sat at her desk, glancing at her watch. Almost time to go. She closed her accounting program and shutdown her computer before pushing her chair under her desk. Doing something so mundane and normal made her smile. In the week since the incident in the park, she had tried very hard to channel her anger into something constructive like throwing herself into her work, and forgetting all about vampires and superpowers.
Getting back to normal.
Her nightmares continued to
plague her. Sometimes Raziel starred in the dreams, other times they focused on Ky. With Raziel, the dreams always contained violence and death. With Ky in the lead role, they usually started with a romantic tryst, but they always ended the same—with Ky attacking something.
Ten minutes later, she stood in the parking lot unlocking her car. A police car blew by, sirens blaring. She paused, turning her head to watch it pass. The sound brought Ky to mind.
He claimed he worked as a cop. She’d been brought up to believe in the integrity of the police. Ky should have had more integrity and truthfulness.
Cops were supposed to be the good guys. Ky was supposed to be a good guy. She hated to admit it, but she missed him. Missed the way he made her laugh, the way he made her feel as if she was the only thing that mattered in his life. She thought she had found the love of her life.
As she opened the door and slid behind the wheel, a second police car screamed by, siren wailing. The sound, louder than the first, hurt her ears.
She gave a snort. Sometimes cops could be the bad guys. They could be dirty. They could lie. Ky had definitely lied.
“He’d probably lied about being a cop,” Lyn muttered to herself.
With a harsh flick of her wrist, she turned the key, and the engine purred to life. After putting it in reverse, she punched down hard on the accelerator. With a screech of the tires, she backed out of her space. Her white-knuckled fingers gripped the wheel in anger at the man who had deceived her and broke her heart.
****
Ky sat at his desk staring at his computer screen with sightless eyes. He had been appointed a new case—a series of missing people in the Keys, all of whom disappeared at night. Concerned a vampire may be responsible, his boss had assigned him to investigate. He was supposed to be going through the vampire database for the area, instead, he found himself thinking about Lyn.
The smell of chamomile came wafting in the air when the latest rookie assigned to him sat down with her tea. “Any luck?” she asked.
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