Rising Ashes

by Annie Anderson

  Aidan looks down at me, and reaches in his back pocket for the clean handkerchief he keeps there, placing it on my open wound.

  This day just sucks all around.

  Mena was able to patch me up a bit, and Ian fixed me up the rest of the way after they identified and put twenty souls to rest.

  Evangeline was right. There was no bright side.

  Doing everything they could think of, Aurelia and Mena still couldn’t find Nicola or Devereux. Anthony and Sebastian promised to put out every feeler and call in every favor to help find them, and since Claire had no clue her brother was even alive, so she was no help. I’m not sure how much I believe that, but Claire had been through enough without us badgering her. She didn’t need more.

  Devereux needs to be taken down – that wasn’t the question, but Nicola… Her situation was sticky at best and fucking lethal at worst. The horrible question in everyone’s mind was what to do when we found her. We didn’t know what happened for certain, and without the knowing, there wasn’t much we could do.

  Kyle left us as soon as he was able. Evangeline didn’t want him to go, but she couldn’t blame him for wanting to search for his mate.

  We all just hoped he didn’t regret what he found.

  18

  Wanting

  EVAN – ONE WEEK LATER

  I hate waiting. I feel like I have been waiting for something or another my whole life. But most of my time has been waiting for West to get his head out of his ass.

  Unfortunately, I’m still waiting.

  It’s been a week – a whole goddamn week – and I haven’t gotten more than a one-word answer or a grunt in response to any fucking question I’ve asked. He’s lucky he’s finally healed up, or I’d pop another staple just to get a reaction from him.

  I know why he’s pissed.

  Well, I should say I know his reason, but not why. Who gives a shit if I saw what Walter did to him? I mean, it isn’t like I didn’t discover him in that damn chamber. It isn’t like I didn’t have his blood all over me as I prayed to the Fates not to take him too.

  It’s not like I didn’t see.

  But I did. I saw every cut and strike and slice. I saw everything he went through at Walter’s hands. I saw what he made Devereux do to him too. Every bad thing, every murder, every single time he beat his children, every time he raped his wife, every underhanded deal and every soul he deported to hell without reason or cause.

  And people wonder why I don’t consume. Because I don’t want to see this shit.

  But now he’s all kinds of butt hurt about what I saw. Does this make him feel vulnerable? Does he think I think less of him? Who fucking knows what is going on in his head. It’s not me; that’s for fucking sure. It pisses me off to have him so close when he feels miles away. I feel alone. Again. Even after he said he wouldn’t leave, he’s done it all the same.

  I’m sitting at the dining room table in the high rise condo I purchased a month ago, picking at an omelet Cam shoved in front of me. I couldn’t go back to the cliff house where my parents died, and I couldn’t even pretend I wanted to go back to Grand Lake. It felt wrong there without them, and I couldn’t bring myself to stay there when every wall held my mother’s laughter and every single room was missing my father’s presence.

  Aidan and Cam have made it their mission to make sure I eat and consume. I’d venture a guess this is West’s doing, but I can’t be sure. Either way, the two of them have taken their Guardian duties to new levels.

  Cam scrapes a dining chair back over the slate tiles, eliciting a lovely nails-on-a-chalkboard screech from the wrought iron legs on the stone. Sweet mother, I need a rug underneath this table.

  “You going to eat or what?” Cam grumbles.

  Appropriately scolded, I use my fork to slice into the fluffy concoction of eggs, bacon, red onion and green bell pepper. It smells wonderful and tastes even better. Who knew Cam could cook?

  I inhale the eggs, and I realize I was more than hungry. Especially when I start looking around for more food. Cam rolls his eyes before getting up to warm up a whole slew of leftovers. Creamy sausage-potato-kale soup from Aurelia with crusty French bread, beef medallions topped with seared scallops, roasted asparagus and a mushroom risotto that makes my eyes roll back in my head. I eat enough for four people, and I’m not sorry.

  After I finish my buffet of awesomeness, I shuffle off to my bed. I stop by my bathroom to do the whole face washing, teeth brushing, pajama donning deal and flop onto my bed with the last vestiges of my strength, promptly passing out.

  Full bellies must be equivalent to tranquilizer darts, is my last thought before I’m dead to the world.

  I wake up on my left side and warm for the first time in a week – since the last time I was in West’s arms. He’s in my bed with me now with his delicious heat at my back, his breath and the whiskers of his beard tickling the sensitive skin of my neck – when all week he’s been sleeping in one of the eight guest rooms in the two-floor penthouse. But this morning is different.

  I am warm and content and so happy to have him next to me that it is a brutal slap to have reality seep into my brain. He’s practically ignored me for a week – as if I did something wrong, as if I’m to blame somehow – and it pisses me off. So, despite the warmth, and strength of his massive arm curled around my body and the rough possessive hand he has inside my camisole over my left breast… and the thumb he has rolling over my nipple… and the hard, thick, naked cock against my backside… mmm… maybe I’m not as mad as I was before.

  I roll my hips against him, and the growl I get back sends a shiver down my spine. Okay, I’ll be mad at him later. Tomorrow maybe, if he keeps playing with my nipple like that. His fangs graze the skin of my neck, and I freeze.

  In all the time we have been together, West has never phased while we were making love. He has always held himself back, always in control. Always.

  Because he never wanted me to hope. He never wanted to take the chance of losing control. This is huge. This is the equivalent of a man getting on one knee and showing a woman the rock. My heart swells so big, I want to cry. I’m holding on by a very thin thread as I turn in his arms to look at him.

  “You sure? You can’t take this back,” I whisper, my voice trembling. This – him – is what I’ve wanted since the beginning, but I’m torn between pissed off that he dragged his feet, took his sweet ass time to get here, and so blindingly happy that I’m practically vibrating in his arms.

  His gaze bores into me - reaches to the very depths of my soul. I don’t need to ask again, and I don’t need an answer. His face is his reply, and I feel it like a caress against my skin. His eyes bleed from black back to jade, his fangs retracting back into his jaw and he takes that moment to run lips across my forehead, the softness of lips followed by the gentle scratch of his beard over my cheekbones and down my neck. His hands make quick work of my camisole and sleep shorts, but he doesn’t move to do anything else. He just holds my naked body against his, burying his head against my chest as he wraps me up in his arms. I sift my fingers through his shoulder-length black hair, missing this closeness we had so long ago.

  But the heat of his skin makes me restless, and the throbbing ache between my legs makes me shift and squirm in his arms. My body flashes hot all over and it as if my blood is answering his call. The quick, hot lash of his tongue on my nipple pulls a moan from me and a growl from him which only gets louder once he pulls my nipple into his mouth and starts torturing me with his blunted teeth.

  He rolls us, so I’m on my back with his massive body in between my legs. His lips are on mine then, and his kiss is a promise, a vow. He won’t leave me. He won’t abandon me. And if one of us leaves this earth, the other will be following close behind. His fingers tangle in my hair, and he gives a soft tug to get my attention. He has it, he so has it.

  “I love you, Evangeline. Will you be mine?” his gruff, raspy voice asks.

  I’ve been waiting for those words for a centu
ry. I’ve been waiting so long for them, I can’t even speak. I can’t do anything but nod, happy tears spilling from the corners of my eyes as I watch his emotions pass like an open book across his face. I see his love, his trust in his expression and I can’t fathom how I could have thought he didn’t. Then, his lips are on mine again, his tongue sliding into my mouth, and I want him so much. I want him inside of me. I want his cock. I want my blood inside his mouth, my essence in his heart. I want it all.

  He gives me everything I want – everything I need – but he makes me wait, he makes me beg. His lips trail down my body, little nips and sucking kisses at my breasts, the luscious heat of his breaths against the skin of my abdomen, the smoldering whip of his tongue against my center, the rasp of his whiskers against my tender flesh. I squirm, my body moving of its own volition. His rough hands hold my hips still as he devours me, licking, kissing, nibbling, and when he thrusts a single finger inside me, I go off.

  “Oh, God. Please,” the pleading moan erupts from my mouth, and at my plea, West moves up my body. I steal his lips, his breath, but give it back just as quickly as he slides through my wetness and spears into me. The taste of myself on his tongue sends a curl of heat through me. I’m on fire. I’m burning, and I relish in the flames.

  Yes. This is what I wanted. His rough palms burrow underneath me, wrapping me in his arms, caging me in the very best way as he thrusts into me. Rolling my hips, I meet him stroke for furiously delicious stroke, watching his face, watching the way his brow puckers, the way his mouth falls open as the phase comes over me and I rake my fangs up his neck. His eyes flash black again, and his fangs snap down.

  “Yessss,” I hiss, and he gives me one smoldering kiss before he strikes – the sharp sting of the cutting edge of his teeth biting into the meat of my shoulder is everything. It’s everything. It is warmth and strength and love. It is home. I’ve been missing my home for so long, but now, I have it.

  I have it.

  West and I are sitting in my enormous bathtub, and I think it is hilarious that my big, sexy, damn-near-seven-foot-tall mate is taking a bubble bath with me. I can’t quit giggling as he runs his fingertips up and down my legs. I feel light, as if a huge boulder of grief has been lifted off my chest.

  I miss my parents. It hurts me that they missed out on seeing us bonded, but maybe they sent us the shoves we needed to get our collective heads pulled from our asses. I turn in West’s lap, slipping in the suds to face him. I study his face – shoulder-length black hair soaked and dripping tiny rivulets of water down his pecs, strong brow, sexy lumberjack beard over an exceedingly strong jaw. And those eyes – such an indeterminate green, anywhere between jade and emerald with every different shade in between. I love those eyes. I love how expressive they are, how they tell a story without him ever having to say a word. I open my mouth to tell him how happy I am, and although it is probably unnecessary, I do it anyway.

  “I am ridiculously, obnoxiously happy right now,” I whisper. A smile blooms over his face, and the curl of his lips tipping up winds its way around my heart.

  “That’s good, Angel. I’m happy, too,” his gruff murmur vibrates through me, and I can’t help but slide up his body to kiss him. And we were happy. We were so happy.

  For a while.

  19

  Sneak Attack

  WEST – FOUR MONTHS LATER

  That’s the thing about happiness – it blinds you. It makes you think that everything will be okay, that everything won’t eventually go to shit. In my life, I have had very few moments of goodness interspersed with long, dragging years of awful. My few moments of happiness would be the times I’ve been wrapped around the beautiful Angel currently nestled in my arms.

  So, naturally, some asshole has to ruin it.

  The ruination comes in the form of a fist pounding on our bedroom door at three-motherfucking-thirty in the morning. Evangeline is straight up dead to the world, and even though the person knocking might actually be using a battering ram instead of a fist, she isn’t waking up for anything. A surge of masculine pride hits me as I remember all the dirty things I did to her last night, and I can’t help but chuckle as I slide out from underneath her to search for some clothes.

  The last four months with Evangeline have been the best of my entire life. While there has always been a niggle of fear in the back of my mind, it isn’t for her or us. It is the lingering questions we still have, the fear that Nicola still hasn’t been found, and we don’t know what really happened there. There is a tense sort of comradery we have with the Shifters and Warlocks, but the Witches are less than pleased with us.

  And our own kind…

  We have many supporters – the working class and regular folk love us because we are cracking down on all of the bullshit from John’s reign. Shit I had no idea about. Shit that Walter and a few of his cronies were in on. The head families – except for the Garrison’s and Stein’s – have been a headache, but nothing we can’t handle. But there is unrest. A sense that something bigger is out there. Something we aren’t seeing.

  Fuck dropping – the proverbial shoe is about to plant itself in our asses. I just know it.

  I slip my naked ass into a pair of worn jeans that were slung over a dark purple velvet bench sitting at the end of our bed. The room is decorated in every single color of the rainbow, and is probably the girliest fucking room I’ve ever been in, but I don’t really care. I give Angel shit for it, but only because I love it when she gets riled.

  I zip but forego the button because I’m just going to take these damn jeans off as soon as I can get rid of whoever has the death wish beating on our door.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I whisper to Aidan as I open the bedroom door. It takes me a second to realize he’s not alone, and when I see Kyle a cold pit of dread hits me in the stomach.

  “Jesus, man,” I mutter as give him a quick slap on the back in greeting. “What happened?”

  It has been months since I’ve seen Kyle, and by the look of him, those months were not spent happy. He isn’t as gaunt as he was in Walter’s dungeon, but Kyle isn’t as healthy as he used to be. His beard is trimmed, and his hair is tamed, but I can tell he hasn’t been eating or consuming as he should.

  And his eyes…

  His eyes are haunted.

  “We need to wake Evan. I’m not saying this shit twice,” his gruff voice orders, and I resist the urge to punch him in his dumbfuck face because I know he has to be going through some shit. If he were anyone else, his face would be meeting the Carrera marble floor. Yeah, I’m new to this King shit, but still.

  Kyle turns and walks woodenly toward the living area, and I look to Aidan. “You know anything?” I ask.

  “Not a fucking thing, man. He’s been like a ghost trying to find her,” Aidan says as he shakes his head.

  “Go watch him and call in Mena, at least. If he has info on Nicola, she’ll want to know. We can pass on anything pertinent to everyone else.”

  “You know good goddamn well Aurelia will kick my ever-loving ass if she finds out I called her sister and not her. It doesn’t matter if she’s in her third trimester with twins or not.”

  “Whatever, man. I need to wake up my woman. Go do what you need to.”

  I slip back into our room to the closet as I button my jeans. Rifling through the drawers, I find a t-shirt and some socks and grab my boots, and head back to my Angel. She hasn’t moved a millimeter from where I left her. I brush my fingertips down her spine as I sit in the open space at her hip, loving that she squirms in her sleep at my touch. I lean down to kiss her shoulder blade, and as the rasp of my beard against her skin, her eyes flutter open.

  “Mmm… sleepy. You can do naughty things to me later,” she mumbles.

  “Angel, you need to wake up. Kyle is here.”

  Her eyes flash open. “Are you serious?” she asks not waiting for my response before she hauls ass to the closet to get dressed. I have never been more glad that I can see in the dark as I
watch her pert bottom race to get dressed. She comes back moments later hopping as she pulls up a pair of jeans, and I’m treated to the luscious jiggle of her breasts before she shrugs into a bra and tugs a tank top over her head. I follow her into the bathroom where she throws her hair up in a ponytail, and I brush my teeth as she furiously brushes hers.

  “Do you know what’s going on?” she asks around her toothbrush, foam coating her mouth.

  “Nope,” I say after I spit.

  “It’s going to be bad, isn’t it?” she replies grimacing.

  I rinse and spit, and turn to look at her, wiping my mouth with the hand towel.

  “Probably, Angel, but you know what?” I murmur as I walk on my still bare feet across the tile to wrap her up in my arms.

  “What?” she whispers back.

  “We’ll make it through, you and me. No matter what.”

  “Promise?” she murmurs her question as her eyes fix on my lips. When the smile hits my mouth, her lips curl up in response. I give her a hot, wet kiss full of promises I intend on keeping as soon as we’re alone again and tug her out of our room and down the hallway to a living room full of people.

  Curiously, Aurelia is already here and propped up on the couch with every throw pillow at her disposal, ice water in a glass with a straw and every man in the house willing and ready to do her bidding. None of this surprises me. Aurelia has a habit of knowing things long before anyone else, and it is standard operating procedure to cater to a woman with child. Pregnant women – at least in Wraith culture – are considered close to deities. It is so rare for Wraith females to conceive, we as a species are hardwired to accommodate our women. And a woman pregnant with multiples? Forget about it. It doesn’t matter that Aurelia is a Phoenix or that she’s carrying Phoenix babies. She’s more one of us than her own kind anyway.