Darkest Temptation

by Rachel Van Dyken

  Armaros stumbled back and shook his dark hair; pieces of red lit up the tips. “That is impossible, you’re a…” He made a disgusted face like I was beneath him. “…a vampire.”

  “Thank you, I wasn’t aware,” I said sarcastically.

  “No,” Armaros whispered, “you don’t understand. What you are saying is… it is impossible!” He knelt by Mason and then offered him a hand. Each of the men were huge, from their black and red hair, to the worn jeans and shirts that looked way too small on them. Jackets covered their muscles, and tattoos lined their arms.

  The tattoos that peeked out from Armaros’ arms were angelic markings in an ancient tongue few understood or dared speak aloud for fear they would be struck dead.

  “I love her,” Mason’s gruff voice sounded. “She is my mate. She is the reason this happened to me!” He gripped his hair and looked down at his massive body as if it wasn’t incredible. A gift from The Creator for sure.

  He had been beautiful before; his eyes had always held a certain fierceness, a deep-rooted sadness.

  But now? Now he looked glorious.

  “Angels do not mate with humans or immortals,” Armaros said in a deadpan voice. “What you have done will get you killed.”

  A sudden chill filled the air as Stephanie stepped through the giant men and winked. “Maybe tell that to Cassius then.”

  And like a bomb hitting the ground, Cassius landed between them in perfect movie-star fashion, his purple wings spread wide, nearly taking out a few of the men before he tucked them back and stood.

  “Cassius,” Armaros spat.

  “Saved your ass.” Stephanie said through clenched teeth. “Or is your memory that crappy? If it hadn’t been for us, all of you would still be chained to a damn wall getting bled to death by your brother!”

  “Do you think this is any better!” Armaros shouted. “We have no purpose! We wander the earth as prisoners still! There may not be a wall, but, my friend, I am still very much chained!”

  Cassius sighed and shared a look with Mason before addressing Armaros. “The balance between creation and the humans must be restored. Every second of the day you choose to wander instead of returning to the planes you guarded is another day of chaos! Earthquakes, hurricanes, death, destruction. The universe is not balanced!” Cassius’ voice shook the house. “And that is on you!”

  “We,” Armaros sneered, “do not report to The Creator anymore, or have you forgotten? The way that He has?”

  “He never forgets,” Cassius whispers. “It’s how He forces us to learn.”

  “For thousands of years?”

  “Not my fault you’re stubborn.” Cassius grinned.

  Armaros looked ready to kill him.

  “You could try,” Cassius said through clenched teeth.

  “What promise can you give us that The Creator will return us to our rightful place?” he asked calmly.

  “I can’t.” Cassius shrugged. “It’s called faith.”

  Armaros moved like he’d been struck while the rest of the brothers began whispering amongst themselves.

  “By all means, take your time,” Cassius said under his breath.

  Armaros shared a look with Mason that looked skeptical. It held… a challenge.

  “The wolf has Gadreel’s body. He has his memories. He does not have his personality.”

  “Thank you,” Mason grumbled.

  “I wasn’t complimenting you.” Armaros lifted a shoulder while Mason looked ready to rip his head off. “It has been since the beginning of time that the angels have united with immortals without war, without evil.”

  “Yes,” Cassius agreed, his eyes searching Armaros, “you’re correct.”

  “A truce… between all of us.” He looked to Mason. “But I want a link to the wolves.”

  Mason’s eyes widened as if he’d just asked for his head. “But that’s—”

  Cassius held up his hand. “You want the connection to the Heavens they provide?”

  A single nod. “I want the music. I want the taste of the words on my tongue. Link us to the wolves, and we’ll return to our planes.”

  Cassius sighed and looked straight at Mason. “You’ll have to ask their rightful king.”

  And then Cassius did the strangest thing I’d ever see an angel do. He took a knee right in front of Mason and held his hands high.

  Mason jerked back against me, as if he wasn’t ready.

  Words like undeserving.

  The Creator will not communicate with me.

  I can’t do this.

  Lost my mate.

  Lost everything.

  Lost everything. Can’t lose her too.

  I gripped his hand and squeezed.

  And slowly, one by one, the Watchers bent a knee in the same way.

  “Why are they bowing?” I whispered.

  Mason sighed. “Because the only way for them to honor The Creator without the link to the Heavens is to do it through the one who was created by the palm of His hands.”

  MASON

  The Watchers.

  My brothers.

  Gadreel’s brothers — they all left.

  I watched the fire crackle and spit while Serenity made me another batch of cookies. I could feel her anxiety through that invisible thread that mating created. She needed to do something.

  And she understood nothing.

  Vampires weren’t often told about the werewolves’ origin. It wasn’t their typical bedtime story. If it had been they’d feel inferior, and wolves always kept to themselves.

  Every immortal had a purpose.

  We were capable of supernatural healing as a gift from The Creator; it came directly from him, the power.

  The smell of cookies filled the living room until my mouth watered, and when she brought me a plate, I couldn’t take it fast enough.

  I was mid-bite, when Serenity spoke. “What did they mean when they said it was impossible for us to mate?”

  I finished the cookie and swallowed the last of it then turned to her. “Mortal enemies?”

  “That’s not even true, and you know it.” At least she smiled.

  I pulled her into my lap just as Cassius swept into the room and sat.

  I gave him a glare that would have sent anyone packing.

  It only seemed to amuse him more as he stole one of my cookies, popped it in his mouth, and reached for another. I growled. He still took it.

  He was lucky I liked him and didn’t bite his head off.

  “So…” Cassius leaned forward. “…I assume all the puzzle pieces fit now?”

  Serenity blushed bright.

  I clenched my teeth.

  “Oh, not those. I knew those would, er… fit.” He moved in his seat as if he were uncomfortable then smiled. “I meant your need for blood, your need to feed, to taste, to fill.”

  “Vampires…” I said the word softly. “gave me blood, and because it would never stay within my body and keep me healthy, they used angelic blood to bond it into my body, enough blood to kill Gadreel, to give me his essence.”

  “More or less.” Cassius shrugged. “Which is why we were so concerned when Bannick was trying to do this again with his brothers, and yet every host kept dying… every human, every immortal. Alex would have been strong enough, but he was nothing compared to you.” Cassius face turned grave. “You were but a child, a bairn in your mother’s arms.”

  I smiled at his use of bairn.

  “He should have died?” Serenity asked.

  “Adult immortals would have suffered greatly, but the vampire blood mixed with werewolf blood…” He shrugged. “Why do you think it is frowned upon for immortals to mate?”

  Serenity rolled her eyes. “Immortals would die off if they tried mating with one another. There are never children.”

  Cassius stood and gave us a funny look. “Oh, but there was one.”

  “What?” Mason slid the plate away from Cassius. “Who?”

  Cassius looked between myself and Serenity
and whispered. “Guess.”

  SERENITY

  I jumped to my feet. “No. That’s impossible! I’m young! I’ve only been alive three hundred years or so!”

  Cassius stared.

  Mason gripped my hand.

  “No.” I shook my head. “My father was an immortal. He found my human mother…” Her voice trailed as Cassius’ eyes grew sad.

  He approached, his wings spread. They quivered and then started to drip with tears. “Are you ready for your truth?”

  Fear slammed into my chest. I rubbed it away with my hand. “No.”

  Cassius grabbed my hand. “You were created for evil.”

  Mason growled low in his throat.

  “But what was meant for evil… turned out for good.” He released her hand and walked toward the fire. “You’ll see your truth in the flames, Serenity. When you’re ready.”

  He disappeared.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  Mason wrapped a blanket around me then pulled me up onto the couch. “Movie or flames?”

  “Movie,” I said immediately.

  He turned on The Lion King, not my first choice.

  And I could have sworn he thought he was an actual lion. When he saw antelope, he’d move his head like he was getting ready to strike. I didn’t miss the few times his claws came out, and he pawed the air like he was ready for attack.

  I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing and lost it when he started to purr; the gravely sound felt like home. I pressed my head to his chest and giggled more when the vibrations tickled my ear. “Still wolf.”

  “Still wolf,” he said softly. “I’ll always be a wolf even if I do have Gadreel’s memories and apparently, his knowledge of creation.”

  “Do you think you have his power?”

  “I’m afraid to see,” he said simply. “But I feel something buzzing beneath my skin, though it could be because my arm fell asleep around a half hour ago from you lying on it.”

  I jerked away.

  He smiled and then tugged me closer.

  I gripped his dark hair with my hands and pulled his mouth down to mine. I kissed his lips, tasting the chocolate still there from all two dozen cookies he’d devoured in one sitting. With a moan, he flipped me onto my back and spread his hand wide across my chest, nuzzling my neck with his nose before sucking my bottom lip, his fangs grazing my skin with such tenderness I wanted to cry.

  He’d driven me crazy with his aggression, and now he was driving me wild with his slow burning passion. The way he tilted my head at the perfect angle so he could suck my lips and press kisses to my eyelids like they needed attention just as much as my mouth.

  There wasn’t one inch of space that he didn’t claim. Every kiss was given with tenderness, with care, with this deep-rooted love that I’d never felt before. I thought I’d known love with my parents.

  Then why did I finally feel whole with him?

  With this man who’d taken a stranger into his arms and healed her without question?

  I choked back tears as he nipped at my neck, a slight sting, and then I felt him suck. I groaned as he moaned against my vein, as if it was his favorite place to be. As if I was the home he’d never had until now.

  His hands gripped my jeans once more, tugging them away until they fell to the floor, and as more clothes joined them in a pile, my body burned for his, so hot for his touch that I couldn’t catch my breath.

  “You’re so beautiful.” He cupped my face. “It was my very first thought when I saw you.”

  “You mean underneath all the scratches and dirt?” I joked.

  He didn’t smile. “Scratches and dirt can’t hide true beauty, Serenity.”

  My heart squeezed as he dragged his mouth down my collarbone and pressed a kiss to my chest as he cupped my breasts and bit again.

  I’d never felt such an erotic bite in my entire life. The soft flesh pierced with his fangs. His head moved across my breast. The vision was perfect. He was perfect.

  He looked up. “I want to watch you this time.”

  “Watch me?” I frowned.

  “I want to take you.” His shirt ripped as he tried to pull it over his head.

  I laughed at his irritated expression then stopped laughing altogether when his hips rocked against me, his length pressing close enough that I could feel its heat pulsing, waiting for me. “This way, where I can see your eyes.”

  “Is that not normal?”

  “Not for wolves.”

  “Well, good thing it is for vampires.” I laughed as I tugged his mouth down and kissed him with all the desperation I felt in my soul whenever he looked at me like I was the only one who existed in the universe.

  He pulled back and pierced my lip with a fang. “Good thing I’m both.”

  “Yeah, good thing.” I winked as he descended again, this time pressing into my core so deliberately slow that my body shook with the feel of it.

  Long, even movements he watched, his gaze intense on my response, on my form, as he moved his hand between our bodies. I let out a gasp as he pushed me farther toward the edge, using my expressions to change his speed, his angle, driving me crazy with the way he was able to read my eyes and my body’s response to his.

  I ran a hand down his chest. My gums ached to taste him.

  He moved his hand across my lips, knocking my fangs on his skin. I sucked in his sweet and smoky blood, my eyes locking on him while he moved inside me, while he claimed me as his again and again.

  His teeth clenched. And then he was glowing again, his eyes so light blue, and then an icy white like the rest of the Watchers I’d seen that day.

  For one brief second, I saw heaven in his arms.

  I felt the way his soul longed for it.

  And then the strangest thing happened. When he looked down at me, his feelings intensified as if his soul recognized that maybe heaven wasn’t in the sky.

  But in his arms.

  “You…” He held my shaking body. “…you’re my heaven. A gift from The Creator.”

  I nodded through my tears. “Yours. I want to be yours. Forever.”

  He sealed my vow with a kiss.

  And I forgot all about Cassius’ words as I fell asleep in his arms, my body facing the fire, the warmth hot on my face as his arms wrapped me up from behind.

  I forgot about the flames.

  I forgot about it all.

  SERENITY

  Darkness.

  There was only darkness when I opened my eyes. I pulled myself from Mason’s body as a chill shook through me. It wasn’t normal for me to feel such extreme temperatures. I frowned and looked down at the table, where a thin area of frost lay. I dipped my fingertip in it and squished the ice between my fingertips.

  It melted against my skin immediately.

  When I turned around, Mason was still sleeping. A smile crossed his perfect lips as he turned away from me and into the couch.

  I shivered again and realized I’d need to light a fire if I had any chance of getting the chill out of my bones. Besides, I didn’t want Mason waking up cold.

  Did immortals like him, ones with mixed blood, even get cold?

  So many questions still bounced around in my head. Mainly, I wondered if he would take his place as king, as the Alpha.

  And the other part.

  Where I was involved.

  My parents.

  All of it.

  I tried to think of my earliest memory, but it had always been my mother’s face as she wept with joy over her new baby.

  I’d felt such elation that I’d caused her so much happiness that all I felt was contentment in her arms.

  I quickly shook the thought away and added a few stacks of dry firewood, some newspaper, and then lit.

  The flare erupted in my face. I jumped back as one flame narrowly missed my cheek and then swirled in front of me again like a whip, out to lash my body with its rage.

  I scooted back farther.

  The flame only followed.
<
br />   Until my back was against the couch.

  The fire stretched to my face and touched my cheek with a fiery singe. I couldn’t look away as the flames danced before me; they shifted into wolves around a campfire, howling at the moon in celebration. Tears stung my eyes as a tall hooded figure approached followed by another and another.

  Twelve stood tall with the wolves.

  The wolves stared right back in their true form, their eyes piercing through the darkness as the hooded figures lowered.

  I gasped at their jet-black hair and clear blue eyes. They were beautiful, too beautiful to be real. I blinked again as they held their heads high, watching, waiting.

  “This…” One of the wolves stepped forward and transformed back into a naked man. “…this is not your realm.”

  “No…” The voice was musical, yet strong. “…it is not.”

  The wolf glared. “Then why are you here?”

  “What will you do, protector? Kick us out?”

  He fisted his hands and waited, his jaw tightening as the wind blew some of his hair across his dirty forehead. He was massive, at least seven feet tall, not someone I would want to fight.

  “No. We do not kick out friends, no matter how unwelcome they may be at midnight.”

  The man’s lips twitched.

  The wolf sighed. “Well, get on with it Danu. What is it that you need?”

  The woman at the man’s side stepped forward. “We come to give a warning.”

  “Lovely.” The wolf hung his head. “And what would that be?”

  Danu hung her head. “I was bribed. His beauty was unlike anything—”

  “That is enough, sister!” the man yelled. “Tell them what you have done.”

  She lifted her head. “I have birthed a babe.”

  The wolf let out a gruff howl. “The Creator will punish you.”

  “The Creator,” Danu spat, “already has.” She shook her head. “The babe will not stay with me. She will spend her time here, on this realm. One day her blood will run in your kin’s veins. I ask only this. Protect her. Protect her from the one who might steal her away. A favor is still owed. He will ask it of you.”

  The wolf hesitated then spoke. “Who has the babe?”

  “She’s being shielded under the vampire king’s watch. He is to keep her safe in this life. And your son…” She choked out the words. “…your son will do the rest. She knows nothing of her power, of her abilities. She knows nothing of our world, and because of my sin, she will know only loneliness in yours… until him.”