I started helping the women as they loaded onto a blacked-out bus as shots sounded behind me. I turned, noting the small female who had frozen in place at the noise of gunfire and groaned as I moved to grab her, only to hear more shots exploding from closer to us. Something burned my chest. I looked down, watching as the blood spread over the front of the nightgown I wore. My eyes lifted as Cian and his men exited the building, locking stares with him as I dropped to my knees as my air refused to leave my lungs. His eyes widened as he rushed forward, catching sight of the lone gunmen who aimed his gun again. Cian moved so quickly that it took me a moment to relocate him next to the pieces of the shooter before he moved again, catching me as I started to fall to the floor. He hefted me up and loaded us into one of the SUVs, shouting orders before the doors slammed closed and the car jumped forward.
“Nae, nae, Isa, stay with me. Stay with me,” he demanded. The car that drove us towards the hive squealed its tires as Cian ripped his wrist open and forced it against my mouth. I shook my head, but he held it to my mouth, forcing the blood into my body as he cradled me to him. “Get us there, now!” he shouted to the men in the front seats, holding me to him as he continually worked my jaw, forcing the blood into my throat. “Ye will nae leave me, Isa. Ye hear me? Ye are mine, ye can nae die now, me wee brave girl.”
Chapter 17
I stared at Cian from across the room with his blood pulsing through me. Everything inside of me was alert, heightened, even his scent that oozed from me. I’d healed, but that had taken more days than I’d wanted it to. I sat in a room, full of half-breed children they had saved. There were children of every breed, even siren, all looking terrified and unhealthy. I knew exactly how they felt, alone among strangers that would never be their family.
I stood up, noting that Cian’s gaze followed me as I moved to the three little siren girls who held hands. All three had silver hair that reached down their backs; skinny, half-starved faces turned to watch me as I approached them. Emerald-green eyes watched me warily as I sat beside them, noting they scooted closer to me, as if drawn by my bloodline. My mother, wherever she had ended up, or if she had died in that place of hell, had created them.
“He stares at you, mistress,” one announced off-handedly.
“Does he?” I asked as I lifted my eyes to find him doing just as she had said. In the days I’d spent in the infirmary under the doctor’s care, he had remained out of reach, and yet I’d felt him close to me. As if he was giving me room to breathe after what I’d endured. I’d told him and his father every detail, knowing that they were trying to guess at what Adelaide had been put through, but I hadn’t included the ugliness of the rape she may have endured. That was her story to tell if she chose to. “My name is Isadora, what is yours?”
“I’m one, she is two, and she is three,” she said proudly as my mouth opened and closed and I frowned.
“Those are not names,” I winced when they turned sad eyes to me. “How about Katharine, Katrina, and Katarina?”
“Who is who?” she asked with a wicked smile on her lips.
“You choose,” I whispered. “Your last name should be MacPherson, like me. I feel you, which means we are sisters. My last name is MacPherson, I am Isadora Katherine MacPherson, and I’m your…um, family.” My throat tightened as I felt the prickling of tears at my eyes.
“What is family?” she asked.
“It’s the people you choose to be beside you. It isn’t always blood that decides that, because blood can abandon you. Family is who comes and sits beside you and says ‘I’m here, I am not going anywhere.’”
“Are you going anywhere?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I think we should wait and see what happens. There’s a lot of you little ones who have no home, and you need one. You deserve the best one, and I’m a little lost, like you right now.”
“Because you were a hunter, like them,” she said softly as she placed her tiny hand on mine. “We can be lost together, because we are family. I’m here, we’re here, and we want to stay with you.”
I smiled as I tilted my head, studying her. “For now, you should go get some food before it vanishes. The boys seem to be endless pits that cease to stop shoveling food into their bellies.”
“Stupid boys,” she giggled as she stood, nodding to the two others who had remained silent as we spoke. Once they’d moved away, I studied them before I felt my heart increasing in speed; turning, I found Cian standing inches away from me as he gazed down on me.
“There are some files we found, some that I think ye should look at,” he said as he pushed his hands into his pockets and watched me closely.
I nodded and stood, glancing one more time at the trio of sirens whose blood sang to me. I wasn’t sure where our mother had ended up, or if she was even alive, but I had no idea what to do for them. It seemed hopeless; the fifty children we’d saved were either from rape or from harvested eggs, and none of their mothers wanted anything to do with them.
“What happens to them, Cian?” I asked.
“We find them parents,” he said firmly as he rubbed his neck. “There’s a lot o’ immortals who doona have the ability tae create life, so it shouldn’t be hard tae find some fer them. Come, Isa,” he said, holding out his hand.
I stared at it a moment before I placed mine into his, listening as our hearts connected as one. I could feel his emotions, which I figured was from consuming so much of his blood. My body ached with the slightest touch of our flesh, yet when we touched like this, my insides twisted, and everything seemed to settle into place. It confused me and terrified me that I wanted him as much as I did.
I walked silently beside him, fully aware of the eyes that watched us. It didn’t bother me that people stared, it bothered me that their stares were locked onto me, as if at any moment, they thought I would slaughter them all, and worse, I didn’t blame them.
In the last few days, I’d noticed them. I saw the way they raised their children together, teaching them to respect humans because, without them, they would cease to be alive. The feeders here were cherished, decked out in designer clothes and diamonds larger than I’d ever seen on even the upper class of Scotland. They laughed, told cheesy jokes, and there was a camaraderie among them that the hunters had never had, which made it hard for me to be around them some days.
We turned into a room, and I narrowed my eyes on his as he smirked. “It’s a lot of files, and there’s a film,” he said with a shrug. “You might as well be comfortable while you go through them with me.”
“In your bedroom?” I laughed. “Smooth, Cian,” I whispered as I scrunched up my nose as he moved to the side bar and poured us drinks. “And drinks, are you trying to get me drunk to take advantage of me?”
His eyes heated as one side of his mouth lifted. “If I was, would ye run from me?”
“I don’t run from anything,” I returned huskily.
“Careful, siren,” he said as he picked up the glasses with one hand and the remote with the other, handing me one glass as he proceeded to recline on the bed in a lazy pose.
“When did you get a television in here?” I asked as I moved around to the other side of the bed, setting the glass on the stand as I crawled onto it and leaned against the same headboard I’d been chained to not too long ago.
“When I was trying tae figure oot how tae lure ye into my bed,” he muttered as I smiled and crinkled my nose. “This is more horror than romance I fear, so if ye need me tae, I can hold ye, wee Isa.”
“I do hate horror movies after living in one,” I admitted as I scooted closer, smiling as I sucked my lips between my teeth to hide it. His arm brushed against mine, and as I turned and looked at him, he did the same. “Are you going to turn it on, or were we just going to stare at each other all night, Cian?”
“I wouldn’t mind staring at ye all night,” he said thickly as he turned,
clicking on the television as he deftly maneuvered the remote that had more buttons than I could count on it. I watched him, noting the way the muscle in his jaw clenched as his nostrils flared as my body reacted to his nearness. Men speaking on the television pulled my gaze to it, as I watched Drake holding a tiny, screaming infant. On an operating table sat my mother, her eyes catatonic as she was being sewn up. “That’s you,” he said as he pushed his hair out of his face. “From what we can tell, they took you from her womb after murdering yer father tae get tae her. He fought them tae protect her in her weakened state o’ pregnancy. It is the only time a siren is weak and exposed, and yet they still created ye, Isa. She had tae have loved him, which tae the lore is impossible. Sirens do nae love, they seek tae destroy men. This gives me hope fer us.”
“For us?” I asked as I tore my gaze away from the monster that had torn me from my mother to raise me as an experimental weapon. “Why would my parents have anything to do with us, Cian?” I asked as I turned, hiding the fear that filled me at his words as I grabbed the alcohol and downed it in a solid swig.
“Give me yer hand,” he instructed as he waited for me to set the glass back down. His hand captured mine and held it against his rapidly beating heart that mirrored mine. “Do ye feel that?” he asked as he pushed my other hand against my chest as he faced me, staring into my eyes. “The matching beats that mirror one another? The need tae feel me when I am nae near. My scent is like a drug tae ye, as yours is tae me. The first time I tasted ye, I felt it. The mating pull that said ye were created tae be my other half.”
I didn’t say anything because he wasn’t wrong. I was addicted to the smell of him, and when I was sexually aroused, it was him I’d wanted to scratch the itch. I felt his heart beating with mine, the need to be close to him, but it terrified me. I’d never needed another person to want me, or crave me. If he walked away, I’d be broken more than I would know how to fix myself, and giving another creature that much power was terrifying.
“Do ye feel me?” he asked, and as I looked up, staring into his eyes, I saw it. He was terrified too; his fear of rejection was there, and I didn’t see it so much as I felt it.
“I feel you deeply,” I admitted. “Cian, I don’t know if I can do this. You scare me.”
“Ye scare me tae, wee one. I have never wanted a mate, ever. I always figured it would be something I could just walk away from and nae look back. But ye are nae easy tae do that with. I could nae tell ye before, because ye were my prisoner, then it changed. I could nae stop what was happening tae get Adelaide back. I am still nae the laird o’ the MacCamerons. I had tae stand aside and let it play oot, as I was ordered tae do. Now, now yer free and there’s nothing stopping me from saying this, Isa. Yer my mate and I want ye. I want tae watch ye hold my wee bairn in yer arms. I want tae be the one who says ‘I’m here, and I’m nae going anywhere’ fer ye like ye did fer those girls ye hardly even know.”
I shook my head as I tried to process his words, and when he opened his mouth, I panicked and kissed him. He laughed darkly as he pulled away from me, ripping his shirt over his head as he watched me doing the same. My heart ached with how hard it hurt, pounding against my ribs as I bared my flesh to him and waited for him to finish stripping.
The moment he backed off the bed, I growled in hunger as the siren within demanded he get his dick back in the bed and give it to me. Still, there was a nervousness that made me tremble at the idea of him being my mate, and us doing this. Rumors stated that if we were blooded, and we sealed the deal, we might as well throw some rings on it because it was the final cherry on the top to the bonding process.
He moved back onto the bed and pushed me down, watching me through hooded eyes that sparkled obsidian and gold as he gazed down on me. His mouth lowered to my belly, kissing his way down to my thigh as he kissed the speeding pulse there. His tongue pushed through my folds, and my hands dug into the blankets so that I didn’t end up floating on the ceiling in pure bliss.
He devoured me, lapping and nicking my flesh with his fangs as he took me to heaven and watched as I floated back down. His fangs pushed into my needy flesh, and I cried out, wrapping my legs around his neck as my hands slid to his silken hair, holding him to me as my entire body trembled as I exploded against his devilish tongue and fangs. His dark laughter made me open my eyes as I realized I’d squeezed them shut. I watched as he untangled my legs, climbing my body until his mouth tasted mine, covered in my arousal and blood as he growled as I rubbed my needy core against him.
“Are ye sure, Isa?” he asked as I stared up at him.
“I am sure that I want this, Cian.”
Chapter 18
At my words, it sank in. Everything I’d ever craved was right here with this man. A family I could create and cherish, love that I knew we could obtain together, and this bond that would be unbreakable. It was within my grasp, and I was going to sink my claws into it and hold on for dear life. I lifted my mouth to his, unable to get enough of him as he caged my head between his arms, kissing me back as if I was his air and he would die without it.
He pushed against my opening, and I stalled as my eyes grew wide as he watched me. He pulled back, staring down at me as he watched me starting to panic beneath him.
“Nae, nae, I doona think so, wee one,” he growled as he surged forward, breaking past the proof of my innocence as he growled. “I need this.”
“Jesus, why would you do that?” I uttered as I moved, unable to accommodate him in my body as it clenched against the invasion. “I think it hurt less in my eye!”
He laughed as he lowered his forehead against mine, staring into my gaze with a heavy, lust-filled one of his own before he rocked his hips. He didn’t stop; every thrust was slow and calculated until I was moaning beneath him, rocking with him as he took me over the edge of no return with every move his hips made. His mouth lowered, kissing my throat as he prepared my vein. The moment his fangs slid through my flesh, he started moving in hurried thrusts that left me boneless, helpless to anything other than feel him as he invaded my soul, dominating my pleasure as he took me to the heavens.
My hands lifted to his shoulders, and he captured them, slamming them down against the bed as he withdrew his fangs, licking the wounds before he pulled me up against him, until I was sitting in his lap as he used my hips to control every motion our bodies took together.
“Ye are fucking perfect, and worth the torture it caused my aching cock tae get here,” he uttered hoarsely.
“I think I like fucking,” I whispered as I leaned closer, pulling on his lip as he groaned as my blunt teeth scraped over it.
“Ye ain’t seen nothing yet, lass,” he growled as he lifted me, shoving me down onto the bed as he pushed my legs apart and held them against my shoulders as he lunged forward, enjoying the scream that tore from my lips as he let loose his control, sending me over the edge into the blackness as stars burst into my vision.
“Do you know what it takes to see the stars, Cian?” I asked.
“Nae, Isa,” he growled as he stiffened, holding me locked into the endless orgasm as his fingers pinched my clitoris.
“Fucking darkness, a whole lot of it,” I groaned as I wrapped my legs around him and rolled on top of him.
I stared down at my mate. My forever immortally-bound mate that would never leave me, never hurt me so long as the bond was never broken, and I smiled. I rocked against him, feeling him already growing erect in my core as he watched me bringing him back to readiness.
“Ye are the stars of my darkness, Isa. The light that feeds my soul. If it had nae been ye, I would still be trapped in it. Unable tae find the beauty who tamed my beast. Ye ‘ave him wrapped around yer pretty wee finger,” he said as he reached up, kneading my breasts as I moaned and started moving against him. “Come fer me, show me who owns that pretty wee, tight cunt. Come on, siren. Show me how much ye need it.”
I stare
d down between us where our bodies were joined as he released one breast to rub my clit to a steady beat that matched the heartbeats drumming in my ears, together as one. I opened my mouth, screaming as everything inside of me burned, aching for more, for his release to explode inside of me. I bent down, kissing his lips as he used my hips to find his own release, and I groaned as pain burned against the inside of my upper arm. I calmed my labored breathing as I sat up, uncaring that he watched me as I took in the matching marking that he had in the same exact spot. It was an infinity symbol, with three lines through it. Where mine was delicate, his was thicker, more visible.
“What is that?” I asked.
“It’s my mating mark,” he said thickly as he watched me processing what it meant. “Ye are my wife, Isa. My mate until one o’ us nae longer draws breath,” he uttered as his eyes glowed with pride.
I leaned over, kissing his mark before I rested against him as I felt him growing ready again. “Again?”
“Are ye sore yet?”
“No.”
“Ye are nae leaving this bed until ye are tae sore tae do so, and then even then, I may not let ye up except tae feed ye, wee mate.”
“Promise?” I uttered as I lifted, staring down at him with glowing eyes as everything inside of me released, letting the need I felt out, not wanting to hide what I was any longer. I may have been a monster, but I was his monster, and he was mine.
Chapter 19
Five months later at Clan MacCameron Stronghold, Highlands of Scotland.
The celebration for the mating of the hybrid prince of the MacCameron clan was a sight to behold. I paused in the mirror, taking in my growing belly that seemed to get larger every day. Adelaide stared at it as well. The red dress she’d altered for me, since Cian hadn’t let me out of his bed for weeks, was snug and exposing the growing child that we’d created. I felt the fear of the weakness, which according to all the books of lore, was normal for a pregnant siren.
Forever Immortal Page 11
