“You’re a cold bastard,” I hissed as he rocked me on his hips.
“I am. I never said I wasn’t. I’m the villain, in case you hadn’t figured that out. I am the one who owns you, and I plan to exploit your talents. There’s so much I have planned for you, Elianna. We’re just getting started, you and I. You’re about to learn who I am, and what it means to be my new pet.”
“No, I’m about to teach you why owning exotic pets is a horrible idea, Evander. We’re notoriously bad, and when we bite, it’s often fatal.” His mouth lowered to mine as a wicked smile curved over my mouth. “There’s also the fact that you forgot to account for a few things. Like my entire team waiting outside of this castle who have your men as hostages—and Dominick safe. You may own the dark, but I own the creatures this world abandoned, and we’re ravenous with the need for revenge. The light always outshines the darkness, and I’m burning brightly, Unseelie King. So get your cock out of me, because I’m about to get up and walk out of this room and you’re going to watch me do it. Or I give the order to slit the throats of your men.” I pushed him away, but he lunged, grabbing my throat as his hips moved rapidly against mine. I exploded, smiling as light burst behind my eyes.
“You can run, little girl,” he growled as his body tensed. “But I just filled you with my darkness. You won’t like being my enemy.”
“On the contrary, if it ends like this, I think I’m going to enjoy it immensely. In an hour, I’ll release your men, and we can become enemies. Or, I kill them, and you add me to the list of enemies you want murdered. Tell me, Evander,” I whispered thickly as he pulled out of my body, staring at where my body tightened with the loss of his. “How much do you want to kill me right now?”
“Immensely,” he growled.
I patted his cheek as I sat up, allowing him to see the sharpness of my canines that had grown as he’d ravished my core. “It’s too bad we didn’t work out; you’re amazingly talented in bed. I hope you can wield a sword as well as your impressive cock. I’d love to stay and play, but I’m a little busy right now. I have a witch to hunt down, a war to start, and revenge against every last asshole who used us to line their pockets with coin. Who knows, maybe you and I will end up on the same side of the war in the end.”
“You set this up?”
“I did, but I didn’t expect the King of the Unseelie to come himself,” I laughed huskily, leaning over to brush my lips against his, enjoying the anger that leaked from him. “I needed someone strong enough to bring down the witches who use their magic to hold ours, weakening us. You are the strongest creature of the high fae, which worked out perfectly. I had our whores whisper to Lennox about your traitorous plots to murder him. He, of course, tried to murder you, and you murdered them as I knew you would. You failed me, though, because Kerri got away.”
I stood up with him, watching the anger dancing in his amethyst eyes. “Don’t look at me like that. You and your kind think we’re lesser beings. You left us to be tortured by humans and the monsters they made their deal with. You rape women and leave them pregnant, and they abandon us to monsters that use us as weapons. You have no idea the capabilities we have, or what we can do now that the agency is burning to the ground, which is thanks to you, my generous lover. You may get me, Evander, but we are rising against our oppressors. The thing is, we can either be on the same side, or you can fight me.”
“I think I’m going to enjoy hunting you down and fighting you, Elianna. I hope you’re ready to become my prey, because the moment I catch you, you’re going to regret ever crossing me.” He grabbed my hair, curling his fingers through it as he brought his mouth crushingly against mine. He devoured it until I moaned breathlessly from the heat that rushed through me. “You’re mine, and if anyone touches you before I catch you, they die. I will catch you, little one. You better run, and you better fucking hide, because when I catch you, I’ll show you why the world cowers before me—and when you plead for mercy, I’ll show you how little I have for those who betray me.”
“Sounds kinky as shit, but I’m not going to be easy to catch. I’ve planned the downfall of an empire. I intend to watch it fall. I’m glad that it was you,” I whispered, pulling back to look into his pretty, narrowed eyes. “I’m glad you were my first lover, but I’m not yours. I won’t be owned by anyone ever again. Now get the fuck off of me. I have shit to do, and you’re not on my list anymore.”
I smiled as I left the biggest, most notorious monster standing, watching me walk away from him. I’d known the agency was changing, and while Dom was my best friend, he often ended up lost in people’s nightmares. I couldn’t have him giving away the plan, not until I knew it had worked. The witches no longer held control over us, the agency was being dismantled, and the fae who had abandoned us would pay for doing so. They’d called us abominations, unwanted creatures that had no use in their world. We were about to prove them wrong. We were about to bring them to their knees.
* * *
The End for now.
* * *
The Darkest King Coming Late Fall 2020
From the author
One Dark King…
One unwanted thing…
The rules were supposed to be simple. Go in, bring the witches to their knees and leave them decimated and unable to prevent our power from growing. After all, I’m nobody. I am owned by an agency that collects the unwanted and unseemly creatures cast off by the fae.
It should have been a simple thing. I was prepared for all outcomes, except the King of the Unseelie himself showing up to the Witches Court. I’d planned to seduce a lord and then assassinate him to force the king to respond, but it wasn’t a lord that I seduced. I ended up seducing the Unseelie King and then tried to murder him and now he’s pissed. Now he’s after me, and I’m in over my head, out-gunned, but not outwitted.
Copyright © 2020 by K. Loraine
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Chapter One
Joss
Scotland. I’m in fucking Scotland. I grin widely, my glee bubbling up into a giddy laugh. This is the vacation of a lifetime, my first solo trip after finalizing my divorce. I’m ready for an adventure, ready to reclaim my life and start living for me.
Maybe I’ll find a sexy highlander to steal me away for a passionate night between the sheets.
I wander the cobblestone street, the bite of the cool wind on my cheeks a reminder of where I am. Such a change from my landlocked home in Nevada. Maybe I’ll move here permanently, where I can enjoy the rolling brogue of every person I meet, smell the fresh sea air, and see the beautiful green land everywhere I look.
“This is it. This is what I was missing.”
I’d slept the night away in the small room I’d rented for the week, jetlag messing with my body clock. I’m thankful for that, because this misty morning is perfection. Today I’ll hike the hillsides, explore the world around me, and let Scotland seduce me.
“Do ya ken where yer goin’, lass?” An old man with a craggy face and sparkling blue eyes looks up from his paper. He sits outside a cafe, a cup of tea on the small table in front of him.
“I thought I’d explore.”
He chuckles. “Careful the fae don’t steal you away, a lovely lassie like you. Yer just the kind they look for.”
I grin and shrug. “I’ll be sure to stay away from fairy hollows, then.”
His expression goes serious, and he rises, pulling something out of his pocket. “Take this with ye. Just in case. Twenty years ago, a girl went missing from this town, tempted by the fae. If she’d been prepared, that wouldn’t have happened.”
I frown as I inspect the utensil he holds out to me. It’s…a fork. “A fork?”
“Iron. The best defense against the fae folk. It burns
them.”
Pressing my lips together to keep myself from laughing, I nod. “I think I’ll be fine. I have pepper spray.”
He shoves it into my hand and closes my fingers around it. “Please, lass. Just take it. It’ll ease my mind.”
I put the fork in my jacket pocket and zip it closed. “Okay. Thank you.”
“Stay close to the trail. There’s faerie magic everywhere here. The veil between our worlds is thinnest in the Highlands.”
I fight my chuckle, nodding as I start on my way to the trail. My water bottle sloshes in my backpack, the noise strangely soothing in the quiet of the morning. Each step fills the air with the crunch of rough ground under my shoes, and the soft crash of waves in the distance adds a layer of surreal beauty to my surroundings.
I pull my phone from my jacket pocket and snap a photo of the rich green landscape that seems to roll on and on before me, then a quick selfie at the crest of a hill. But everything in me pulls tight at the scene below. The sun has broken through the clouds, casting a thick beam of light into the glen. A spiral of low stones curls from the base of the hills surrounding the area, and I swear the sunlight makes the rocks seem to glow. A vibration begins in my chest. It reminds me of the low register of a bass guitar at a concert, thrumming through me with almost no pitch because it is so low.
“What the fuck?” I mutter, hitching my bag higher on my shoulders and walking toward the glen.
The stones are larger than they’d seemed from higher up, about to mid-calf, and each one really is glowing. A warm golden sparkle radiates from them. I’ve never seen anything like this. As I follow their path, the vibration grows more intense, and the breeze turns to stronger wind, pulling strands of hair free from my ponytail. I zip my coat up to my chin and press on. I couldn’t stop now if I wanted to. I have to get to the center.
“Joslynn.” Only the barest whisper on the wind, but, God help me, it’s my name. A man’s voice whispering my name where there is no one present.
I glance around, heart racing, skin tingling with apprehension. “Hello?”
Nothing.
I shake my head to clear my mind. “You’re really off your rocker now. Delirious from the jet lag. And now you’re talking to yourself.”
A wave of energy washes through me, calling my attention to the four stones in the center of the spiral. I’m so close. I need to see where this humming is coming from and I strongly suspect that is the origin point.
“Joslynn.” The voice whispers across my skin, sending the hairs on my nape standing on end.
I spin around, sure I’ll catch whoever it is if I am fast enough. But no one’s there. My chest tightens with apprehension. It had felt like his lips were on my neck.
The stones are right there, so close. Something tells me to touch them. To use them to help me get away from the voice who wants something from me.
The vibration is strong enough my ears thrum with pressure. It’s driving me mad. I have to do something to stop it. Panic creeps in as I remember a story of people who grew conscious of a hum in the atmosphere, something not everyone could hear, but none the less, it was present for these people. They lived every day with the ever-present humming and it slowly drove then nuts. Is this how it starts?
Maybe if I press my hands to the stone I’ll be able to stop it. I’ll give the stone what it wants and end the ceaseless sound.
I reach out with both hands and close my eyes against the intense tickling sensation in my palms as I close the distance.
Quiet.
Stillness.
Peace.
I let out a sigh of relief and lower my palms before opening my eyes. I can’t hear the ocean anymore, no cries of gulls, no wind, and it’s…cold. Bone-deep cold. The kind that speaks to midwinter snowstorms and frozen lakes for ice skating.
I blink my eyes open and know with immediate certainty, I’m no longer in the glen. Everywhere I look is crisp white, covered in snow. The stones are still there, but no longer humming, no longer glowing. Everything else is different. Surrounding the spiral of rocks where hills had been, I now see tall, white-barked trees—willow trees, their vine-like branches hanging low with crystals of ice glittering along them.
“Where the hell am I?”
“You’re in the outskirts of the Shadow Queen’s realm.” My heart lurches at the sound of a man’s voice, strong and low, his accent not the Scottish brogue I’d expected, but English. I turn toward the sound, and my breath catches in my throat. He is beautiful in the way I’d always imagined Oberon would be beautiful when I read A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Long hair, braided at the temples, a face carved from stone, with pointed features that give him a strange ethereal quality. His clothing is odd, leather breeches and knee-high boots, a white tunic and dark vest. Is he some kind of LARPer? Have I walked in on a Lord of the Rings nerdfest?
“My lady, be on your guard!” he shouts as he brandishes a crossbow and fits it with an arrow.
Oh, God, he’s going to kill me. “Wait, please. I’m sorry. I didn’t know I’d get here just by investigating some stones.”
But his focus isn’t on me, it’s on the sky behind me. I look over my shoulder and my mouth falls open in a scream. A fucking dragon is heading for us, full speed ahead. A dragon.
I drop to my knees, but it’s too late. The man shoots his arrow, the dragon roars, and before I can escape, I’m scooped into the dragon’s claws.
Chapter Two
Joss
I wake shivering in the dark. The sound of water dripping is my only clue where I’ve been taken. A cave of some sort. It has to be. The rough ground, the walls, ragged with sharp planes of rock, the echo of my breath, and the persistent, drip, drip, dripping. Those are the things that help me ascertain my surroundings, because I sure as hell can’t see.
“Hello?” I whisper the word because I’m not sure if I can handle hearing my own voice calling back to me. My ribs hurt from where the dragon’s claws had held me too tight. I’ll be bruised, but at least I’m still alive.
Getting to my feet, I feel my way along the side of the cave, using careful steps for fear of finding a crevasse and falling to my death. That wouldn’t be good. I really don’t want to die on my vacation, but honestly, I didn’t want to get kidnapped by a dragon either.
Under my feet, the ground shifts, and I find myself falling as a hole opens and I scream. So much for living to tell my tale. But strong arms catch me. They wrap around my waist and pull me to safety, right against a warm chest.
“Careful, lass. It’s not wise to explore a cave in the dark. Not unless you’ve got night vision.” His Scots accent has me wondering if I imagined the whole stones and dragon bit. Did I fall and hit my head? Was everything I’d seen simply an Outlander-fueled hallucination?
He scoops me into his arms, cradling me close as he walks us away from the danger. “Where are we?” I ask.
“Safe. For now.”
My heart hammers in my chest, hard enough I feel it in my veins. “Is…is someone after us?”
“You shouldn’t have been able to come here. Not without an invitation.”
“I didn’t come here. I was on a hike. That’s all.”
“You came, like it or not. You were about to fall into the hands of the wrong sort of fae. I rescued ye.”
The darkness begins to lighten as we get closer to the mouth of the cave. I can see it, the cool brightness of a winter day. Glancing up, I work to make out his features. Strong cheekbones, a stubble-covered jaw, eyes that seem to catch the light and glow a copper color I’ve never seen. I think he might be handsome, but I can’t quite tell because of the shifting shadows. He smells like woodsmoke and some kind of spice I’m not familiar with. I love it. The scent is captivating, and I want to burrow closer to take more of it in.
“I need you to explain a little better. Where I’m from, dragons don’t exist, and stones don’t talk. A least not in reality. Those are things reserved for stories.”
He sets me on m
y feet, and his eyes blaze as he locks gazes with me. “Stories all begin with some spark of truth.”
Frustrated, I push away from him and stride toward the opening that will free me from this cave. But he catches my arm, his hand so hot it’s almost uncomfortable. “No, you cannot go out there, lass. Not until I’m sure the turncoat bastards aren’t out there looking for ye.”
His brogue grows thicker the more agitated he becomes.
“You said, fae. You really mean it? You think that man was a fairy?”
“I know it. As am I. You’re in the realm of faeries now. And I’m not sure you’re ever going to be able to leave.”
My heart sinks to the cold pit that’s become my stomach. “Why?”
“As I said, you need an invitation to come through our gates. You broke through. There’s not a fae alive who’d let you go and live to tell your tale. Especially if there was a risk you’d bring more humans back with you. You won’t get through the gate on your own.”
My stomach twists and turns, nausea creeping up my throat. “Then why didn’t you kill me?”
“You…call to me. Something about you. I feel different around you.”
“So you saved me from that dragon?”
He cocks his head and smirks, and now I’m sure he’s handsome. Devastatingly so. “No, lass. I didn’t save you from the dragon. I am the dragon.”
Chapter Three
Joss
“Excuse me?” Heart in my throat, I back away from him until my shoulders connect with the slightly damp, cold stone of the cave wall.
“You heard me. I am the dragon who saved ye from Percival. He would have raped ye, or worse, kept ye as his human slave. He’s got a whole harem of humans, and the Queen can’t do anything about it because he’s out of her reach here.”
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