She didn’t want him in her body.
Didn’t want his touch.
The door behind her opened, and she remained in place, watching as the man she’d come to loathe entered. Helmuth wore a designer, tailored suit, and there wasn’t a hair out of place. There never was. He looked like an executive who could perhaps model. If she didn’t know how black his soul was, she’d have thought him a good-looking man.
Very good looking.
“Gale,” he said, calling her by the shortened version of her name. Only her best friend, Paisley, had the right to do that so she didn’t respond.
He took a deep breath. “Fine, Galiena.”
She turned to face him, impetuous in the see-through nightgown he’d left for her to wear. The only articles of clothing he’d had in the room for her were all lingerie or barely there nightgowns. She’d requested something else, dresses even as she preferred them, and sweaters as the room was cool.
“Let me go.”
He slid his jacket off and placed it on the back of the chair near the vanity. “We’ve been over this. Give me what I want and we can discuss additional freedoms.”
The man had been at her to transfer her succubus powers to him; to gift him with the desire that rolled off her kind in waves, the power to make others bend to his sexual whims, all while bringing him to the top of his orgasm game. In addition, her kind could give others greater stamina in bed, as well.
Helmuth wanted it all.
She didn’t know how to give it to him.
“I told you that I don’t know how to transfer my sexual essence to you. I don’t think that’s even possible for one of my kind to do,” she snapped, the need to feed clinging to her. “Let me go. Please.”
He walked over to the chaise lounge and sat, bringing his feet up and crossing one ankle over the other, before putting his hands behind his head. He looked as if he didn’t have a care in the world, and that it was no big deal he was holding a woman against her will.
To him, it more than likely wasn’t an issue.
Galiena wished she was a fighter. That she was able to wield her power as a weapon, rather than just as something to make a person orgasm.
“And I’ve told you that I’ve seen it done,” he said evenly. “Jinx was able to do it.”
She was? That was news to her.
Galiena turned to face him. “And she did it for you?”
He nodded. “Often. What do you think she and I did behind closed doors?”
“I didn’t want to consider it.”
He laughed, but it wasn’t friendly. “She would give me small tastes of the power your kind holds, and it would last me a few weeks. I need more. I want all of what you have. I want you.”
“I’m not as strong as she is.”
“You are.”
She stared at him. “Are you kidding me? I’m nowhere near as powerful a succubus as Jinx.”
“So young,” he hissed.
She lowered her gaze. “Why take me? Why not ask Jinx for a bigger dose of her power? Why resort to this?”
She had to believe Jinx and her friends were looking for her. She wasn’t sure exactly how much time had passed since she’d been abducted, but it had to be enough to raise red flags and for others to be looking for her. Why hadn’t anyone come yet?
Helmuth laughed, the sound grating on her nerves. “You’re in your early twenties, yes?”
Nodding, she met his gaze.
“Jinx has you by centuries.”
Jinx was that old? She didn’t look it, and she certainly didn’t advertise the fact.
“She’ll come looking for me,” said Galiena, lifting her chin in rebellion. “She’ll figure out you have me. People whisper at the club about your fetish for my kind. And they know you try to buy time with me. They’ll figure it out. They’ll come.”
He snorted. “Fetish. I like that word for it.”
She didn’t budge.
He stayed in place, but his expression was cold and deadly. “No one is coming for you. Jinx is long gone. She cleared out of here and closed up shop a month ago.”
“You lie,” she said, all the while sensing the truth of his words.
Jinx and her friends from the club had really left her behind?
What had prompted them to go at all? Jinx loved the club. She wouldn’t leave it willingly.
She took a step back, her emotions brimming. Her darkness chose that moment to surge forward, wanting to be fed. It had been too long since she’d last fully fed it, and resisting Helmuth’s advances was getting harder and harder. For as much as she hated the man, she needed what he was offering.
Sex.
And if she was right, he needed her to be able to perform. Without her consent, her succubus powers would get and keep his dick hard.
She’d seen men like him before. Ones who, while supernatural and often immortal, they couldn’t get it up to save their lives. They often sought out her kind. Succubi naturally gave off sexual energy to a degree that it often overcame issues. But without her consent, her darkness stayed locked down enough that Helmuth wasn’t getting a literal rise from her.
Not unless she approved it.
The problem was, she couldn’t go much longer between full feedings. Already she was tired all the time and had started to lose weight. All signs she wasn’t caring for her succubus side properly. If she pushed too much more, it would push back, and she wouldn’t like the outcome.
It had happened in the past, when she’d first come into her powers. She’d put a young man in the hospital because of her darkness, and letting it get out of hand. She didn’t want to be responsible for harming others again.
Helmuth rubbed his groin through his dress pants. “I can see that you’re hungry, Galiena. We can both get what we need out of this arrangement.”
“Let me go and I’ll help you,” she said, desperate for freedom.
He laughed. “Now who is the liar? You, yourself, said you don’t know how to assist me. That you aren’t powerful enough to do so.”
She took a step back and clenched her fists, fighting against her darkness. Tears welled, and she hated the weakness she was showing in front of him. He was the type of man who respected strength, only understood that trait.
He stood rapidly and came close, stopping just shy of her. He stared down at her from an imposing height. “Stop fighting it. Give me what I want.”
“You’re not a good man,” she blurted, before thinking better of it.
He snorted. “What does my being a good man have to do with you giving me what I desire? You’re a whore. I could take what I want from you.”
Whore.
She had always despised the word.
“You can’t and you know it,” she said, finding her backbone at the worst possible moment. She was already pushing the limits of his patience. She’d seen him attack men who worked for him, just outside the door to the room she was being held in. He’d been brutal and lacked anything close to mercy. He’d beaten one of the men to death, and then had looked up at Galiena and smiled.
He was evil.
And if she was right, he’d aligned himself with men even worse than him.
“I have ways of making you give me what I need,” he said tranquilly. “Don’t make me use them, Gale.”
She stiffened. “Why are you like this? When I first met you, you weren’t this way. At least I don’t think you were.”
“Maybe I’ve always been this way, but you were too naïve to notice,” he returned, lifting his hand and running the backs of his knuckles over her cheek.
“Walter?” she asked, using his first name, hoping to break through his hard exterior.
He eyed her. “My heart is stone, Gale. Like the rest of me soon enough. But I will admit it is less so in regards to you. Don’t push me. Submit fully and don’t force my hand.”
She wasn’t sure what he meant by his comment about stone, and she didn’t care. She just wanted to be let go. The tears returned. �
�I don’t know how to give you my powers. If I did, I would.”
“I believe you,” he said, still touching her. “Until we figure out how to make you a stronger succubus, give me something else. Give me what you need, too.”
Sex.
She stiffened.
He pressed his knuckles to her cheek harder. “I could take what I want. You have given it to how many other men? Why not me?”
“You taste like darkness,” she said with all honesty. “And that side of me doesn’t crave darkness.”
“I can make it crave any fucking thing I want,” he said, stepping back from her, his expression hardening swiftly. “Remember, you picked this.”
“I didn’t ask to be taken.”
He licked his lower lip. “Had you simply accepted my advances long ago, it would not have come to this.”
Galiena shook her head. “You can’t just keep people against their will. There are laws—even for supernaturals.”
“I’m above the law. You have to have figured that out by now. No one is coming to help you. They think you’re dead. That’s the word we spread and trust me when I say, we left convincing evidence.”
Before she could respond, he was out the door, slamming and locking it behind him. The thud echoed through the room, reminding her that this was her new reality. This was more than likely the room she’d die in.
She sank to her knees, the plush area rug cushioning her as she did, feeling defeated. Tears flowed freely, and she bent her head, her shoulders heaving as she cried.
After only a few minutes, the door opened again.
Thinking it was Helmuth, coming to give her another chance to change her mind, Galiena didn’t bother to wipe her tears. When she looked up and spotted a man in a lab coat with an old-fashioned doctor’s bag, she tensed. Four guards came in behind him, each grinning as if they knew a secret she didn’t.
The man in the lab coat was old, but there was something about him that said he was far older than he even appeared to be. There was also something disconcerting about him. The urge to keep distance between them was great. He had an air about him that said he was capable of incredible cruelty, and he derived great pleasure from it.
When he spoke, hints of a German accent were evident. “Ms. Korsakov, let us see all the greatness you have hidden within you, shall we?”
She tried to scramble away from his reach, but the guards apprehended her. They yanked her off the floor and held her suspended in the air as if she were nothing more than a rag doll.
“Let go of me!” she shouted, but it fell on deaf ears.
“Where do you want her, Dr. Krauss?” asked one, glee in his voice, as if he hoped she would put up more of a fight.
Krauss, the man in the lab coat, motioned to the bed. “Hold her down there and bare her arm for me. It’s time for the succubus to take her medicine.”
The guards shared a laugh at her expense as they did as the man commanded. Galiena bounced up and off the bed from the force the men used. She came down hard on the floor and winced as something deep within felt as if it snapped. The men grabbed her, lifting her partially off the floor, holding her there, suspended as Krauss plunged a needle into her upper arm, injecting her with something that burned. She could feel it as it moved through her body, heating her insides to the point she thought she might burst into flames.
Krauss laughed as she writhed in pain. The men released her and she fell limp to the floor. Krauss then bent and moved her long hair from her face, touching her cheek tenderly. “Look at how you’ve grown.”
She lay there, staring up at him with moisture-filled eyes, her body in so much pain she couldn’t speak or move.
The crazed man continued to touch her face. “You know, I created you.”
What?
The question must have showed on her face as he touched between her brows. “You are one of my children. One of my creations. I helped to make so many of you. All special, all gifted, all miracles.”
She gasped. The sick old man was her biological father?
He laughed again. “I see the wheels spinning, Galiena. While I did not father you, I am the man who perfected the technique that led to your creation. That led to your birth. Myself and my colleagues gathered viable women to carry each of you to term. Though now, we only use women to incubate our young on rare occasions. Or special opportunities, like mating creations.” He glanced away and snorted. “I have no idea why PSI continues to refer to all of you as being part of the Asia Project when its reach was everywhere, not limited to Asia. We had labs in every country, in every corner of the globe. We amassed samples from so many supernaturals that our tests were destined for greatness.”
She was made in a lab by this sick bastard before her?
No.
He couldn’t be telling the truth, could he?
He touched her lips. “You are so special. You took to so many different strands of supernatural DNA, in just the right mixes, to give you extraordinary power. You should have already grown into them all. And your mind didn’t break when you developed succubus gifts, as many of my other children’s did.”
He seemed to go far away in thought for a moment before sighing. “Many were lost to madness or killed themselves. Others had to be put down like rabid animals. But many survived. The Corporation assists in locating them all now, helping me to gather my family once more. I want to make you all even stronger. Even better.”
She cried silently as her body continued to burn from whatever he’d given her.
“If you live through this,” he said, bending more and planting a chaste kiss on her head. “You will be a force to be reckoned with. You will be unstoppable. And you can then help to birth the next generation of super soldiers. You can help us create our army, for a war is coming. Soon, we will take over the world. We won’t live in the shadows anymore. We won’t hide who we are and what we can do. Humans are cattle—and must be treated accordingly.”
She tried to shake her head no, tried to resist.
He didn’t seem to notice or care. “We’re so close to perfecting our hybrids. So close to getting the formula right. We’re losing less during the conversion process now. It used to be one hundred percent. Now, we only lose around seventy-five percent.”
She cried harder. She only had a twenty-five percent chance of surviving what he was doing to her?
“Oh, Galiena, the things I will be able to teach you. Wait until you see everything we’ve been working so hard for. We are the future, and the future is nearly here. We stand on the dawn of a new era.”
Between his accent and his rhetoric, all Galiena could think of was Hitler and what she’d learned in school about Nazi Germany and the man’s quest for a master race. Her stomach tightened and the tears came faster.
She wouldn’t help Krauss with his plan. She’d do whatever it took to be free from him, his plan, and his new dawn.
Chapter Two
Weeks Later…
Bane Antonov stood with his arms crossed over his chest and his gaze pinned on the darkened parking lot before him. While he was motionless, and had a calm exterior, his beast had been restless as of late, as if sensing something was on the horizon. Meditation and reflection had not helped to alleviate the unease. Nothing had quelled the stirring. Already he could hear the blood rushing through his veins, pounding in his ears. His palms itched for a shift, wanting to go to beast form, in preparation for something—but what?
He wasn’t sure.
The smell of the city hit him hard, easing his pending change. With as sensitive as his shifter senses were, he had to take a moment to calm his stomach as the stench of the city washed over him. He was overdue for an extended stay in the Congo. His beast side was in desperate need of its natural habitat, but duty called.
Police sirens pierced the night, their lights splashing across the building nearest him as they sped down the larger street off to his right. Part of him wondered what the police might be responding to, but he’d learned
a lot in his long life, and the biggest lesson he’d taken from it all had been that humans were capable of incredible cruelty.
So were supernaturals.
He knew.
He’d suffered through horrendous acts at the hands of both.
As an immortal, he’d been around enough to see all types of evil. And often, it came from the most unexpected places—sometimes from within.
He stared off in the direction the first responders had gone and thought back to the seventies, when he’d spent a decade working as a detective for the human law enforcement agency as a member of the New York City Police Department. Keeping his true identity hidden had been much easier back then, before the advent of smartphones and the internet. It was still doable. It just took more work.
Throughout his long life, he’d assumed many different occupations and identities. Gravitating toward professions that had ties to his military training seemed to be something he did often. It was where he felt most comfortable. He’d been a damn fine detective and often considered picking the profession up once more. He’d need to put more time between now and then, though. It would be too easy to accidentally bump into someone who had been around the same time he’d had that identity.
A small part of him tugged deep, wanting him to head in the direction the police had gone to investigate what had happened. His current occupation ran more along the lines of mercenary, though he detested the label. Getting paid to use his skillset made him smart, not a bad guy—as so many enjoyed associating with the word. Besides, what he was doing now was important.
Lives were at stake.
A small niggle in the back of his mind started and worry tugged at him. His hand went to his back pocket, where he kept his wallet. In it was a photo he’d been given from the mate of a friend. Paisley had wanted help finding her best friend and former roommate, Gale, so she’d asked her mate, Weston, to look into it. Of course, Weston enlisted the help of his friends. Bane had been part of the group that had searched for the missing young succubus, only to find the trail going cold. The little bit of information they’d gotten suggested Gale was dead, but Paisley refused to believe as much.
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