Embraced (Eternal Balance)

by Jus Accardo

  Sam shook her head. “Jax…”

  I grabbed her arms and pinned them behind her. Control. The desire to dominate. She needed to know that she was mine. “You belong to me,” I whispered fiercely, working my way down her neck. I wasn’t gentle. Taking small sections of skin between my teeth, I nipped and twisted. Not hard enough to be painful, but with enough force to make her gasp. To drive my point home. “You belong to me. Mine,” I said, pulling away.

  Any reservations she might have had after my sickening confession seemed to melt into nothingness. She pushed forward. I felt her eagerness. To taste me again. To feel me pressed against her. Inside her. But I held her back. At arm’s length, my hands still knotted in her hair, I kept her secure.

  “You understand me, right?” My fingers twitched, tightening, and a flash of that same dark female figure almost brought me to my knees.

  Sam nodded, slowly, then jerked forward. I let go of her hair, surprised, as she grabbed either side of my neck, her nails digging into the skin. Stopping a fraction of an inch from my lips, she said, her voice low and hypnotic, “Understand that it works both ways.”

  Fuck…

  She bit at my bottom lip, then wriggled her hands up beneath my shirt, dragging her nails hard across the skin. The pain drove Azi wild. It just about got me off, too. My hands fell to my zipper.

  My entire body ached to be inside her, and the image of that female, still too fresh in my mind, needed to be scrubbed away. This would be the thing to do it—replacing that scene with one of my making. One of my choosing. I leaned in again, determined to do this despite Heckle’s warnings, but…

  Something crashed outside the room.

  Chapter Four

  Sam

  Jax was at the door in an instant. “Stay here,” he barked over his shoulder. I opened my mouth to argue, but he slipped from the room, dismissing me.

  Oh, hell no.

  I yanked open the door and followed.

  A few steps ahead of me, he rounded the corner and rushed into the hallway between the living room and kitchen, where it sounded like the noise had come from. When I caught up to him he was in the doorway. The glass above the door on the other side of the kitchen was shattered—a million tiny pieces lay on the floor. “What happened?”

  Jax whirled around, eyes narrow. “I told you to—”

  Something flew at us from the right. We were knocked apart like bowling pins, but somehow I managed to stay upright. Not Jax, though. He went down hard with a grunt, taking the brunt of the blow and toppling beneath a large mass—a man. The intruder turned my way, eyes the color of midnight ink. Not a man. A demon.

  Forearm braced behind Jax’s neck to keep him down, it delivered a series of harsh blows. “Take her outside,” the demon snarled.

  I spun to see that a second demon had appeared and stepped between Jax and me. Its eyes—narrow, soulless black orbs—traveled over my body, from tip to toe, hungry and assessing. “Submit, or spend an eternity in agony,” it said.

  I had no idea what the hell it was talking about and didn’t care. I ducked as it made a swipe in my direction, then spun away, losing my bearings for a moment. I’d managed to avoid it, but the demon wasn’t giving up. Another attempt and its hands wrapped like a vise around my arm and dragged me close. Putrid breath wafted around me.

  “Sammy!” Jax yelled. He pushed off the floor, throwing the other demon off balance. But it recovered quickly, and just as he got to his feet, it charged. They both went down again.

  “He will not stop us from taking you,” growled the demon attached to my arm. Its grip bit into my skin, bringing involuntary tears to my eyes. If it squeezed much harder, my arm was likely to pop off.

  “News for you, asshole.” I struggled—in vain—and it tightened its grip. “You’re not taking me anyplace.” I had no clue why I was suddenly catnip to these things, but I had no intention of submitting to a damn thing.

  “I killed a Son of Cain a hundred years ago.” The thing faced me and with a wicked sneer. “They break as easily as humans. You have no choice.”

  Anger welled up inside me, and even though I knew it was pointless, I lashed out with my free hand, punching and clawing at whatever I could hit. One of my flailing blows caught it in the eye. The demon cursed and stumbled back, releasing my arm, and I tore across the room.

  As I neared him, Jax was climbing to his feet again. He ducked, missing what looked like a powerful blow by inches, and pivoted, bringing both fists upward. The motion connected with the underside of the enemy’s jaw.

  He readied, probably expecting it to come at him again, but it didn’t. It recovered and charged me instead. Jax bolted forward, but the demon was closer.

  Everything went silent and the entire room slowed. A single blow. I felt the impact, felt my feet actually leaving the floor, then my body shot sideways and hit the wall with brutal force. Everything grew hazy. A sound split the air, a horrible noise that could have scared the devil. It shook the walls and rattled the fixtures, and when my vision cleared, I got chills when I spied the source.

  It’d come from Jax.

  He was on the demon that threw me in an instant. Everything was tearing flesh and splatters of gore. Eerie sounds of destruction followed on the heels of that agonized howl. The thing put up a fight, but was no match for his unadulterated rage. When he was done there was nothing left. The demon was a pile of unrecognizable pulp.

  Satisfied, Jax whirled on the next one. It watched me with a hungry gleam and an excited shiver. I scooted backward as the demon lunged, and Jax charged. They crashed to the ground, narrowly missing me as I stumbled up and dove behind the couch for cover.

  But the demon wasn’t interested in Jax. It wanted me. Badly. Bucking Jax off, it made another attempt to grab me, launching itself over the couch and latching on to a handful of my hair. It jerked back hard, and I couldn’t help it. I screamed.

  “It belongs to us,” the thing said with a growl, giving another, brutal yank. I had no choice other than to follow the momentum, rising to my feet as tears stung my eyes.

  “She belongs to me,” Jax roared. There was a rush of air, and a half second later the pressure at my temple disappeared. He grasped the demon’s head on either side and twisted. One good snap and its hands fell slack as it crumpled to the floor. Jax opened his mouth, but something charged between us, knocking us apart.

  “Death belongs to you, traitor.” A new demon barreled into the fray, snarling at Jax. Jesus. These things just kept coming.

  It traded blows with him halfway across the room. Jax threw his whole body forward, forehead crashing into the demon’s with a resounding crack. It stumbled back, and he followed through with a blow to the side of its head, then another one, even more brutal than the first, to its throat. But just as Jax was about to deliver the deathblow, something exploded through the large picture window in the dining room.

  A blur streaked across the room. I cried out a warning—it was headed for Jax—but it moved too fast. It collided with him and the other demon and knocked them apart. The newcomer pivoted and turned on Jax’s attacker. “We are not here to harm our Lord,” it growled.

  The first one made a sound deep in its throat but backed away. Seemingly satisfied, the newcomer stood, glaring at Jax, then turned to me.

  “Don’t even think about it,” Jax warned.

  Its gaze lingered on me for a moment longer, lips twisted and teeth bared, before it relaxed and switched its focus to Jax. “Fear not, Lord Azirak. We have dispatched the enemy and mean you no harm.”

  “Could have fooled me,” I mumbled. The place was a mess. Broken furniture and spattered gore decorated a large part of the room. And the smell? It was like a thousand piles of roadkill.

  The demon’s gaze swiveled back to me. “We understand now why Lord Azirak keeps you, but…” It growled and came another step closer. “Maintain your distance. Malphi will not tolerate your stink on him.”

  “Malphi…” Jax tensed. “Is t
hat who sent you? Those two—”

  “Were of Zenak’s clan. I apologize for not arriving sooner.” The demon’s eyebrows disappeared beneath shaggy bangs. Wearing a Yankee’s cap and worn blue jeans, he looked like a college kid ready for the weekend. “As for Malphi…do you remember, my lord?”

  I didn’t need the link to know Jax was two steps away from ramming his fist down the demon’s throat. All that my lord crap.

  Wait…

  My lord crap? Only members of Azi’s clan referred to Jax that way. But it’d mentioned Malphi. Oh my God… Malphi was part of Azi’s clan?

  “I know the name. That’s all,” Jax said, deceptively calm. I had no clue how he held it together. His rage simmered just beneath the surface. I could taste it through the link, a potent, coppery tang that coated the back of my throat.

  “The name…” the demon repeated. If I didn’t know better, I would have said it looked disappointed. There was the slightest twitch of its lip and a subtle slump of the shoulders. “No matter. Malphi knows you—and has asked me to deliver a message.”

  “What kind of message?”

  It turned to me, eerie black eyes boring straight into mine. “Agree to be claimed, or be destroyed.”

  Jax snorted. The spark of fury still lingered in his eyes, but there was also excitement. “You first.” He grabbed the demon’s head between his hands and twisted hard. Apparently the fact that it’d been one of Azi’s demons wasn’t an issue. It fell to the floor in a lifeless heap. With a nod to the last remaining demon, he jabbed a finger at me and said, “Report back to Malphi. Whatever it is you want with Sam, forget it. It’s never going to happen.”

  With one final snap of its teeth, the demon slipped through the broken window.

  “You okay?”

  The cuff on my wrist tightened, and a feeling of dread bubbled deep in the pit of my stomach. In the basement back at the Viking, the guy had insisted I submit. The demon said the same thing a few minutes ago. What the hell was going on? “Claimed? What was he talking about?”

  “I dunno, Sammy. But I bet Heckle has a clue.” Jax watched me with an odd expression. Almost as if he expected me to crack. “We have to find him.”

  “Agreed,” I responded. “But first we should clean up.”

  He was covered in blood. Everything was covered in blood, actually. Rick’s previously beige striped couch was coated in carnage, as were the curtains and carpet. The coffee table was smashed to pieces and scattered around the room. It was pure destruction…which I was becoming strangely used to. Six months ago something like this would have freaked me out. Now it was just another day. There was a strange sense of familiarity in it all and that scared the crap out of me.

  As I shook my arm, Jax looked from the cuff to me. The doorbell rang and he threw up his hands. “I call bullshit here… It’s like two in the morning—who the hell could be out there?”

  “Well, at least we know it’s not a demon. They’re far too rude to ring the bell.”

  He snorted. “Never know.”

  “There really is no such thing as a break, is there?” I said, crossing the room to the door. I had the urge to rub the inside of my wrist but resisted, figuring it would only make him antsier. When I pulled back the curtains, I groaned. There on the step was the worst possible visitor. A demon might have actually been preferable. It was our next door neighbor—my Aunt Kelly. “Our messy living room and my spanking new demon jewelry isn’t our only problem…”

  Chapter Five

  Jax

  “Not good…” Sam yanked the curtains back into place and spun around. The link between us surged to life, a fresh wave of panic flooding through it.

  I frowned. The last thing we needed with a house full of corpses was an uninvited visitor. “There was a lot of noise. Did someone call the cops?”

  “It’s Kelly!” she said, stomping her foot. “Kelly is standing on the front porch.”

  Perfect fucking timing, as usual. I scanned the living room. The place looked like the set of a high budget slasher flick, blood and bodies strewn all over. “Get rid of her,” I snapped. We didn’t need Sam’s nosey aunt poking around right now. Or ever. She didn’t know about me and I intended to keep it that way.

  Sam took a deep breath and opened the door a crack. “Kelly,” she said, voice ringing with forced cheerfulness. Kelly should have been able to see through it. She’d raised Sam, after all. But she was as clueless now as she had been when we were young. “It’s after midnight. Are you okay?”

  “I heard loud noises.” The elder Merrick tried to push into the house, but Sam blocked her.

  “Noises? What kind of noises?” When Kelly found out Sam moved from her apartment and in with me, her head exploded. There was yelling and screaming and large amounts of dramatic bullshit. She’d never been a fan, always pushing Sam toward my brother Chase who, ironically, was the real bad seed. Usually I never missed an opportunity to rub our living situation in her face, but I kept quiet now. “I haven’t heard any noises.”

  Kelly tried to push past her again. “Don’t play games with me, Samantha. I know what I heard. Things falling and breaking. Clanking and clattering. It sounded like a war over here.”

  “Clanking and clattering,” Sam repeated, nodding her head.

  “Is he manipulating you?” Kelly dropped her voice. I couldn’t see around Sam, but I’d bet she was squinting. The damn woman loved to squint. “Making you pay your rent in the form of favors?”

  Sam nearly choked, and I snorted. “Is he…favors? Are you insane? Where do you come up with this shit?”

  A gasp. “Language, Samantha!” She paused, then let go of an overly dramatic sigh. “I told you he was trouble. I warned you—”

  “Sex!” Sam blurted out. “We were having sex. Wild, crazy, animal-like sex.”

  I would have given both nuts to see Kelly’s face.

  “Yep,” Sam continued, running with it. She shifted her body to block the possibility of even a pinhole view. “It got a little intense. He’s into some kinky stuff. You should see his—”

  Kelly gasped again, and a moment later I heard her footsteps as she power-walked away.

  “Thank God,” Sam said, closing the door. She turned back to me, cringing at the mess. “So what now?”

  I folded my arms and leaned back against a clean spot on the wall. “You didn’t finish your conversation with Kelly. See my what, exactly?”

  “Your ego,” Sam fired back. “So damn big it barely fits in the door.” She wiggled her hand. “Can we focus here?”

  “Okay,” I said, giving up and stepping away from the wall. The ease with which she was taking all this worried me. Sam was a tough cookie, but she seemed unfazed by the carnage. Strangely detached. “We need to find out what the hell that thing is on your wrist. I don’t love the idea, but if Heckle can’t remove it, we might have to hunt this Malphi down…”

  “Agreed.” She nodded and stuffed both hands into her pockets, avoiding my gaze. “But, mess first. Let’s focus on that. Okay? We can’t risk someone finding bloody corpses in your living room.”

  I studied her. The colors dancing above her head were a strange mix, a swirl of conflicting hues. Sam was usually fairly even. Mad, sad, happy. Her emotions were always clear. Now though, she seemed muddled, all over the radar, despite her eerily calm demeanor. “Are you okay?”

  Her eyes darted from me to her wrist, then back again. She smiled, but it was forced. “Totally okay.”

  I nodded. What else could I do? She’d just lied to me.

  I tried again to get hold of Heckle, but he was still conveniently unreachable. Since we lived in a semi-rural, developed area, carting corpses out to the car wouldn’t go unnoticed—especially since Kelly was probably camped out at her bedroom window with binoculars glued to her face.

  We only had one choice.

  “Knock, knock,” a sultry voice said from the back door.

  Sadie Gray was a witch Heckle had referred us to a few months a
go, but our connection was complicated. Hell, all my relationships were complicated. She limped through the door, and when she entered the room, Sam gasped. I understood why. Sadie looked almost as bad as the living room. Bruises covered her face, and a nasty gash—one that started at the right corner of her lip and disappeared behind her ear—seeped blood.

  She noticed us staring and waggled her fingers in my direction. “Oh, this? I’d assumed you pissed someone off, or possibly took up cage fighting as a hobby.”

  Despite my contempt for the witch, a ripple of guilt washed over me. I’d forgotten about the effects of our link. “Shit.”

  In order to help thwart the control Chase had over Sam, Sadie offered me a special stone that had allowed Sam enough leeway for her to get away. But not without the witch demanding something in return. For reasons we still hadn’t figured out, she’d forced me to link us. Unfortunately, unlike the one Sam forged, a demonic link was mainly beneficial to the demon. If I was harmed, Sadie was the one who took most of the damage. I’d warned her, but she hadn’t cared.

  “Aww,” Sadie said, winking. “Don’t go worrying about little ol’ me.”

  “I wasn’t,” I said. “Just surprised. You asked for this, Sadie. Don’t expect me to feel sorry for you.”

  She shrugged, not the least put off—which only made the whole thing more suspicious. Sadie had her reasons for wanting the link. I hadn’t trusted her then, and I sure as hell didn’t trust her now, but what was done was done. “Wouldn’t dream of it, handsome. So, why the summons?”

  Sam shifted from foot to foot in the doorway. The look of disdain in her eyes was unmistakable—not that I blamed her. Sadie had made her desire for something more from our relationship crystal clear, and even though Sam knew I had zero interest, she still hated the witch.