No lesser member created her. Dar had. He was the only pure fairy left. The Huntsmen had captured all the other Unseelies, and the chances any of Dar’s other half-breed children having lived to maturity were slim. The taint Dar had infected them with would have turned them into beacons in the night, drawing redcaps and sluaghs to them.
Without a way to defend themselves, the immature half-breeds would’ve become no more than food sources. Besides, the strength resonating from Harley hinted at how very powerful she’d be if she embraced her heritage. She’d rival her father.
“Dar, their leader, sired you.” Calan would bet his life on it.
“Condemned me, you mean.”
Calan shrugged, the only response he could manage. He didn’t want to speak of what her future would entail if he didn’t bind himself to her.
She glided to the wall, the sway of her hips a wonderful sight, and slipped the torch she carried into the empty holder. “Why?”
The question could’ve meant a number of things. His fate rested on his ability to convince her to willingly pick up the key from the pillow on his bed and unlock him. He couldn’t risk alienating her by answering incorrectly. Many of his responses wouldn’t please her.
“What do you mean?”
“If you were created to hunt the fairies”—she peered over her shoulder—“why are you here? In chains?”
“Because during the fight that should’ve wiped the last fairy from the earth, I was led into a trap. Dar imprisoned all the Huntsmen that night.”
“There are more Hunters like you?”
“Yes, my flower, and once I capture Dar, he will join his brethren in Hell, and my siblings can be released.”
Harley hugged herself. “Don’t call me that.”
“Why? It’s a pleasant nickname.”
“It makes me feel beautiful.” Harley dropped her hands, balling her fists at her sides. “I feel the taint festering in my body. Every day it grows. Soon I’ll be as monstrous as Dar.” She advanced on Calan. A few feet away, she stopped and scrunched her nose. “Am I right?”
He reached for her. His fingers fell short of her chest, and she didn’t close the scant distance. He let his hand drop. “You’re still pure.” Mostly.
“But not for long.” She groaned, the agonized sound cutting at his heart, and took one more step closer. “Am. I. Right?”
Calan grasped her arm and tugged her struggling body against his. She shoved at his chest, but he wouldn’t allow her to slip free. He slid his hand down the length of her spine to her rounded bottom and pressed her against his straining cock. She stilled.
“Keep embracing that rage, and you’ll spiral into the darkness you’re fighting.”
Her chest heaved. Each exhale pressed her breasts into his hardened muscles. After a moment, she fisted his shirt and clung to him. “I don’t want to be like them.”
He lifted her with a hand on her bottom. Harley gasped but grabbed his shoulders to steady herself. He held her gaze and asked the one question that had bothered him for years. “Then why didn’t you return to me? I promised to save you.”
Harley turned her head. He nudged her with his chin until she focused on him. She sighed. “I was afraid.”
“Of me.”
“Of everything. My family had just been attacked by monsters, and you show up as a disembodied pair of eyes. Then…” She shook her head. “I wasn’t about to believe a ghost.”
“Do you still think I’m a ghost?”
“You’re changing the subject.”
Yes, but the lust darkening her eyes suggested it wasn’t an unwanted diversion. With the conversation steered in a different direction, he wanted to explore it. “And you’re avoiding my question.”
She skimmed her hands over the rough material of his shirt to the leather twining at his neck. With trembling fingers, she undid the binding. The fabric parted, revealing his upper chest. She traced the contours of his exposed muscles and settled her palm over his heart. Warmth spread from where she touched him and made him very aware of the female he held, a woman he’d wanted from the first moment he’d looked into her eyes.
“Not a ghost. You’re real. I’m glad too.” She leaned closer. “I’ve fantasized about you for years, and this…” She ran her fingertips over his cheek. “This face is more captivating than any I could’ve imagined.”
The rightness he’d experienced nine years ago returned, stronger than before. He wanted Harley’s lips on his. Needed it. “Kiss me.”
She shook her head.
“Harley.” He waited until she met his gaze. “Kiss me.”
Hesitantly, she pressed her mouth to his. He nudged at the seam of her lips with his tongue. She parted them, and he slipped inside. Her flavor hit him. She tasted of candy, a delectable treat he could easily become addicted to. He moaned and kissed her harder. After a long moment where he led her into passion, she dragged her fingers through his hair, grabbing sections of the short strands and tugging him closer.
On a whimper, Harley linked her legs around his waist. Her heat pressed against his stomach. He automatically arched his back to line up his erection with her sex. Her small stature and his tight bonds prevented him from experiencing her tempting warmth along the length of his shaft. It didn’t dim the lust consuming him. The scent of her arousal and her squirming body intensified it.
He took control of the kiss, needing her wild. He wouldn’t settle for anything else. Quicker, deeper, he stroked his tongue with hers. She tightened her grip on his hair and returned his passion. Their teeth banged as the melding of their mouths grew wicked, and her blood flavored the kiss. Blood that held the tang of pure chaos. It was her taint, a curse from her father and the reason she was turning into a monster.
He turned his head, breaking the kiss. The evidence of the chaos working its way through her body and soul, infecting her slowly and steadily, dimmed his runaway desire.
Harley eased back. The weight of her stare forced his lids open. Tears welled in her eyes, yet her expression remained neutral. “You can taste it, can’t you? It’s not just me.”
“It acts as a disease. Dar became infected when he turned his back on the strict laws of the Seelie Court and opened himself up to the chaos. It gave him strength, power, everything only the highest-level gods could achieve, but he was never meant to harness the uncontained raw force. It corrupted him.”
She swallowed hard. “And he passed his infection to me.”
Unable to lie to her, he met her gaze and let her see the truth in his eyes. A single tear trailed down her flawless cheek. She shoved away from him and fell back on her rear. More tears dripped from her eyelashes, while anger contorted her face. She trembled, visibly fighting her emotions.
“Be calm, Harley.” He reached out to her with his mind as he’d done earlier in the day.
She shoved him out, slamming a proverbial wall between them. “Don’t try to pacify me.”
“I’m not. I’m trying to help you.” At her narrowed eyes, he sighed. “Giving in to anger will quicken your transformation into an Unseelie fairy.”
Harley dropped into a crouch, rocking on the balls of her feet, then stood as tall as her petite body would allow. She raised her chin. “I’ll kill myself first. I will never become like them.”
“You’ve matured. It’s too la—” He snapped his mouth closed, not soon enough. Her eyes widened. She took a backward step.
The thought of her leaving him sped his pulse. He strained against his bonds and stretched his arm toward her.
“Don’t leave me.” Harley froze at his words. “Don’t condemn me to suffer here when I could be hunting Dar. You do want me to stop him before he rapes another woman and gets her with child, don’t you?”
Her eyes turned to saucers. He hated seeing the despair and sadness in them, but he couldn’t allow her to abandon him.
He inhaled slowly and forced his muscles to relax. “That’s right. While I hang here, unable to carry out my vow to protect humanity, Dar
is creating more babes who will suffer the fate you’ve been handed. Your sisters and brothers are dying as we speak.”
“They’re going to die anyway!” She strode closer but stopped just out of reach. “Once I release you, you’ll carry out your purpose. You’ll kill Dar, then sweep the world and pick off each of his tainted creatures, including his children…including me. Won’t you?”
He reached out a metaphysical hand and cupped her mound. She squeaked and tumbled forward, exactly the response he wanted. He caught her with his free hand and yanked her against his body. Harley fought him, pushing and squirming against his iron grip. He reached around her rear and pressed his hand between her legs. She stilled and stared at him, shock and desire simmering in her dilated eyes.
“And what about the humans who die to sustain his redcaps or the unfortunate humans who are turned into sluaghs?” He narrowed his eyes, letting her see the seriousness in his pointed questions, hoping she’d understand. “And don’t forget the humans that his creatures torture and rape for fun. What about them? Only the Huntsmen can mete out justice, but we can’t because my siblings struggle under the curse they were never meant to carry.”
She flinched.
He hated having caused her discomfort, but the situation was too important. Harley needed to understand that he couldn’t allow any corrupted fairy to live, even if it meant killing her siblings.
“Dar wants to free the rest of his Court from Hell and rule over the human world. Only my siblings’ endurance in upholding the barrier to Hell has stopped him.”
He considered telling her how his siblings upheld the barrier—by offering their pain and suffering to feed the living magic that makes it up. The myriad of emotions flashing across Harley’s face stopped him. He couldn’t risk pushing her over the edge and sending her running if she knew what awaited her should she turn Unseelie. Because Calan had no choice but to condemn Dar and his followers to the same fate Calan’s siblings endured. Besides, upholding the barrier was the Unseelie Court’s punishment in the first place.
“I promised you I’d live, but now you’re telling me it was all for nothing. I’m fighting the inevitable.” Harley stood on her tiptoes, bringing those turbulent eyes closer to his. “I would’ve given up years ago if it hadn’t been for you. You lied to me. I have nothing to live for except this, releasing you. I’ve watched friends and family suffer and die so I could live long enough for this moment. Am I right?”
The full impact of what she’d endured hit him with her confession. She’d fought the darkness and won…for him. He’d seen with his own eyes how quickly the fairies fell once they became infected. The chaos acted as a drug, and the euphoric high it gave lured even the most noble to give in to the temptation.
The woman before him had experienced the effects of the chaos—had gloried in causing other people pain. Although still mainly Seelie, there were pockets of damage on her aura. She’d tasted the power being Unseelie could give yet had turned her back on it. He’d been right. She was his salvation, his heaven.
The decision he’d made nine years ago was the right one.
Harley was his.
“No, my precious flower, you’ve lived long enough for us to save each other.” He stroked his thumb over the opening of her cloth-covered sex. “Kiss me. Open yourself up and let me inside.”
Chapter Six
Harley’s entire focus centered on the man lazily rubbing her cleft. The look in his eyes stripped her bare, left her aroused and wary. She didn’t understand what he asked of her, but she sensed it would change her for all time.
She leaned back to take in the full force of the powerful man and try to get a clue as to his motives. Wavy brown hair with a multitude of highlights from blond to chestnut hung in choppy sections around his rough face. His pale blue eyes stood out against his tanned skin. She suspected they could appear as cold as ice at times. Not today. No, in this moment, lust heated them.
He wasn’t gorgeous, despite what she’d claimed, not in the same sense as the singers and movie stars she’d had crushes on growing up. Calan’s striking features gave off a commanding tone that appealed to her.
She wanted to kiss him, ride him, and love him with everything she had. The yearning she’d carried for him had grown over the years. No other man had been able to break her fascination, despite her limited view of him. His eyes, the same ones that watched her with hot, uncontrolled hunger, had ruined her for any other lover.
If it was sex he wanted, she’d give it to him. The possessive edge to the way he focused on her warned he wanted more, which didn’t match what she suspected would eventually happen between them. That he would kill her.
Harley shook her head. “No, I—”
He stilled the back-and-forth motion of his finger and pressed the pad of his thumb to her clit. The damp cotton of her pants separated them, but the promise of what one flick could do hovered within reach.
“Wrap your legs around my waist and kiss me.”
The command slammed into her just like the one he’d given her all those years ago. She thought about resisting. It’d be better if they talked, but desire to feel his powerful cock between her thighs wasn’t a temptation she wanted to pass up. She settled over his thick length and dropped her head back on a groan.
He shifted his hand to her ass as he’d done earlier and caressed each butt cheek. The reverent way he touched her made her feel as beautiful as a flower. She’d been told countless times she was, had even been offered modeling and acting jobs, but never had she felt worthy of people’s attention.
Her parentage tainted her view of herself. She hated looking in the mirror, knowing what lurked inside her body—the remnants of the monster who’d created her. Calan’s confirmation that it was festering and spreading chilled her soul.
“How can you save me?” Harley cupped his face between her hands. “How, Calan? You told me—”
“Shhh, my flower. Forget what I said and kiss me.”
He ran his finger down the crack of her ass to the spot where his length stretched along the seam of her sex. With his big palm on her bottom, he held her immobile and rocked against her. The bonds locking his body in place prevented him from stimulating her the way she would’ve liked, but the slow grind of his hips skipped electricity over her swollen lower lips to her clit. Pleasure built deep inside her.
She shook her head, trying to clear the lust, but her body wanted what Calan teased her with. All the nights she’d fantasized about him added to the moment. Emotions rose, ones she didn’t know what to do with. Hope, uncertainty, and restraint warred within her.
Calan bent his head and nibbled on her jaw. Her arousal flowed in response to his nipping bites. Licks of his tongue followed, cooling the sharp sting. Each swipe weakened her. She clasped her arms around his neck and matched the gentle thrusts of his hips. It was impossible not to follow his lead.
He was seducing her, but the growing passion between them tempted her beyond anything she’d ever encountered. Knowing it was Calan, her ghost man, who touched her made it better. She’d never been able to let the memory of him go or find any other man who made her feel a tenth of what she’d experienced each time she pictured his eyes. Goodness knew, she’d tried.
“Calan, I want…” Harley stopped herself before she begged him to fuck her. What they were doing was wrong on so many levels, but she needed his smoky taste on her lips one more time. A kiss. Just a kiss. That was all. She sifted her fingers through the strands of his hair and leaned closer until only a hairbreadth separated them. “You. I want you.”
“Harley, my beautiful flower, I want you too.” The words whispered into her head slipped through her in an intimate caress she hadn’t known was possible.
He explored her mouth, stroking and licking every inch as if he loved her taste as much as she enjoyed his. The appreciative moans spilling from his throat revved up her needs. She shifted her hips, grinding against him as if she had every right in the world to take h
er pleasure from his hands.
Harley tried to lead him in a quicker dance, but Calan ignored her demands. He eased back and allowed her to kiss him wildly. The opening to have her way with him would’ve been welcome any other time. At the moment, his passive response tore a whimpered groan from her.
“Please, Calan.”
“Open up. Let me inside. Let me shield you from the chaos your father infected you with.”
“I don’t know how.”
His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Kiss me and let go. I’ll do the rest.”
Harley did as he ordered. She kissed him, allowed him to lead her, and gave herself up to the emotions he stirred. With each stroke, her tension eased, but her needs grew. She wanted to take him into her body and make love to him the same way he worked her mouth—slowly, as if they had eternity to worship each other.
Something soft and silky wrapped around her, filled her up, and completed her. The brush of his fingers along the column of her throat matched the gentle caress she felt deep inside her body. The burn, the constant unsettling reminder of the chaos she carried, calmed.
“Take my hand, Harley.”
She linked her fingers with his. Heat spread where their skin touched, not painful or unwelcome. Calan’s warmth seeped into her and rushed through her body. She breathed a sigh of contentment he eagerly swallowed.
Their kiss turned into a full-body experience. Every particle within her hummed under Calan’s skilled touch. She didn’t care what he did to her as long as she could hold on to the feeling for as long as possible.
“I give myself freely to you, my Harley. I ask nothing of you in return. Take me, treasure me, or walk away, but know I will always be yours.”
Power whipped through her before she could question his words. Pain followed. Her back arched. A scream crawled up her throat. The sound of her anguish never escaped. He blew a stream of heated, smoke-scented air into her lungs. The agony ceased as quickly as it came, and pleasure replaced it. Her core tightened, and waves rolled through her from her womb to her fingers and toes.
Betrayed Page 5