by Heather Long
“I’m kind of glad that I do,” I admitted, and he tightened his grip on me. That was about as sappy as I was willing to get as we raced away from the others.
Safety was really fucking overrated.
WE EMERGED from the tunnels not far from the town he’d taken me to on the snowmobile. At my glare, he grinned.
“You can’t blame me for wanting to feel you against me for a while, little sváss. Especially when I had to let you go.”
I snorted.
But he didn’t set me down until we reached the edge of the town itself. It was just a little before dawn. How long had we been moving? Granted, he hadn’t run nearly as fast as he had on other occasions, but once we’d gotten moving again, he hadn’t stopped.
The air was still cold, but as long as he kept a hand on me, the chill remained at bay. Threading our fingers together, he led me through the side streets almost a silent wraith, until he reached a bakery. The smell of fresh bread, pastries, and more perfumed the air, even as little clouds of flour escaped through one of the gratings.
Not going inside—even when I pouted—he guided me up the stairs in the back and then into a door that he had a key for.
Because of course he did.
Inside, it was a tidy little apartment. Just three rooms plus a little bathroom, which I made a beeline for because I really had to pee. I hadn’t said a word while we were moving because I didn’t want to create a problem.
I was just checking my bedraggled appearance in the mirror when his voice drifted toward me.
“Two hours. Not a moment longer,” he ordered. The tone was so cold and ridiculously inflexible. It sent a tingle straight up my spine. The woman in the mirror staring back at me had wild curls out of control and tangled together while she wore a shirt that was far too large and made her eyes seem way too big.
There was a smile on her face.
My face.
The call ended. “Are you hungry? We need to stay here but…”
I met his gaze in the bathroom mirror.
“What is it?”
“Are we mated? I mean…I know Maddox and I are. Fin bonded himself to me. And I’m pretty sure Alfred did…or if he didn’t, I’m a little terrified what bonding is going to feel like after that. But are we? You and me?” The surge of panic slid through me like some snake sliding up my spine. It left me shuddering and uneasy. I didn’t even know where it came from.
Rogue stepped right up to me and wrapped a hand around my throat as he tugged me back to him. Not once did he take his gaze from mine, and I didn’t dare look away from him in the mirror, no matter how exposed it made me feel.
“My people always choose their mates. It was an act of the heart and the mind fusing to what the soul desired.” He nipped at my ear. “If I hadn’t chosen you, I would never have been able to knot you.”
The shudder of apprehension turned to one of delight, even as disbelief welled up in me. “You didn’t even like me when you knotted me.”
“What the heart and soul desire is not always impacted by what one likes or dislikes, and it was never you I disliked, little sváss. I acknowledged who you were to me from the beginning…” He kissed the spot just behind my ear, even as his fingers tightened on my throat. No fear threaded through me, he wouldn’t hurt me, and the possessive grip was to illustrate his point.
I swallowed.
“Little beloved,” he whispered. “You destroyed centuries of ice, shattered a millennium of gray, and filled my life with color, even as you woke me from a slumber deeper than any Alfred ever took.”
Tears might have welled in my eyes. It could’ve been the cold, or it could’ve been the depth of the emotion in his voice.
“I said you were ours,” he continued. “And I meant it. Whatever ceremony you need, we can do. But I chose you then. I choose you now. There is nothing I won’t do for you. Even help you escape us.”
And he had.
Finally, I closed my eyes and leaned into him fully. “Thank you.”
He chuckled. “You’re thanking me for loving you?”
“Why not?” I countered. “Before the four of you, only Elias was ever so free with his affection.”
His hand flexed against my throat, and when I peeked, I caught the sharpness in his smile.
“Elias is my friend. You don’t get to hurt him because you think he might be competition. He loves me like a sister, not a lover.”
Rogue grunted, but then he turned me around and we were out of the bathroom and on the bed. He made short work of my clothes, and I laughed as he cupped my breasts, then gasped as he closed his mouth over one nipple, even as he pinched the other.
When a cry slipped from my throat, he moved his hand over my mouth. “You have to be quiet, beloved. Can you do that?”
I stared at him. Was he serious?
A slow grin creased his lips. A smile that beckoned me to play with him. But the others… He bit down just below my nipple, and his teeth sinking in sent a bolt of heat straight to my cunt. I fought the groan, even as he kept his hand locked over my lips. I couldn’t move because of the weight of him pinning me down, and he licked and sucked at the wound briefly before returning to suck at the nipple.
Back and forth he went between them, like he had all the time in the world, and I half-thought he was determined to make me come just from playing with my nipples. I dug my fingers into his shoulders and his hair. He wasn’t even naked. A sound of protest escaped me, but the slickness between my thighs belied any real objection.
When he finally lifted his head, my nipples throbbed they ached so much, and just the act of his blowing a kiss of icy air against them sent a wave of heat crashing through my system. Everything coiled taut, and then unleashed. I swore my vision whited out, and by the time I surfaced, he’d flipped me over and lifted my hips. With one hand on my throat and the other on my hip, he drilled into me.
The first thrust of his cock sent sparks through my whole system, and I was already spasming around him as he drove into me over and over. There was no time to catch my breath or to do anything but hold on. I fisted the covers as we rocked together.
His breath was hot in my ear as he whispered in time with his thrusts. “I love you, little beloved. I choose you.”
Over and over again until my earlier tears returned, and I sobbed as he triggered another orgasm. I needed him. I needed all of them. And he seemed determined to prove to me that he wanted and needed me.
That he chose me.
Hot tears escaped as he locked his hand over my mouth, smothering my screams as they escaped, and everything went up in flames inside of me as he slammed home once more and then began to swell. His knot stretched me and sent aftershock after aftershock through my system. He moved his hand so that his wrist was there, and I bit down, lapping at the blood he offered, and I swore I could feel his smile against my damp cheek as he nuzzled my face.
Almost as soon as his knot inflated, it released though. Exhaustion swarmed me as I lapped the wound on his skin closed. When I stole a look up at him, the wonder on his face made me smile. The tired fled, and I twisted, pulling free and flipping him so that I could lean over him. He stroked the damp hair away from my face, even as I closed the distance to kiss him.
We still had some time to kill…
CHAPTER 8
“You may kill me, but no one can make me go back.” - Anonymous
I t wasn’t even an hour after we arrived at the little apartment that our madcap escape took on a different intensity. Being assaulted by the twin forces of sweetness from the bakery below and Rogue’s scent all over my skin might have left me a little drunk—also hungry—but it was Rogue’s brief vanishing act and returning with clothes in my size that left me almost schoolgirl giddy.
No lie. I used to mock girls in romance movies. The stupid little smiles. The happy little giggles. Blech. Who did that? Love—that four-letter word was not a factor in my existence. Not really. No, my four-letter word was L-U-S-T, and that was al
ways about survival. Or had been. Not that lust was a problem with them, but that wasn’t—
I sat down abruptly on the edge of the bed, Maddox’s sweatshirt in hand. I hadn’t consumed lust in a while. Not the same way at all.
I hadn’t needed it. Had I?
“Little sváss,” Rogue said, his quiet voice carrying, or maybe I just heard him better. “We need to go.”
I stood and dragged the sweatshirt on, but an odd sound had me pivoting toward the windows. They overlooked an alley behind the little bakery, which also happened to be where their grates were located and tormenting me with all their sweetness.
The glass shattered, and I retreated to the door, narrowly avoiding the flying shards as a woman landed in the center of the destruction. Blazing eyes filled with—I would have said hate, but seriously, she looked more like one of those crazy ass shoppers who are determined to get the last item in a Black Friday instant sale—way too much insanity, the new arrival hissed. Legit fucking hissed.
I barely caught a flash of teeth before she lunged at me, only she never connected. Rogue slammed into her from the side, and she crashed through the wall—all the way through it—with an explosion of plaster, snow, and splintering wood.
“We have to go, little sváss.” The words had barely left his lips when our visitor returned, and this time, punted him through a wall.
Liquid fury spilled into my veins. Even with the competing plumes of dust and a swirl of snow riding the icy breeze now whistling through the room, I couldn’t miss the cloying scent rolling off of her like she’d bathed in some floral perfume. It clogged my nose and coated my throat.
“Hey, bitch,” I snarled as I hit her. We flew together out the first hole she’d made when she crashed through the window. I had a fistful of her hair, and she raked my back trying to grab mine. We rolled against the brick building next door, dislodging several and sending them raining down on the alley.
A cat let out a screech as it vacated the warm spot on the grate at our battle. I crashed my forehead into hers, and while that shit looks awesome in movies, fuck me. I swore I saw stars and little dancing forest animals that said, well, that was stupid.
We landed against the ground in the alley. All the air whooshed out of us. I found her glaring at me as we lay there for what felt like endless seconds before she darted forward to seize my jaw in a bruising grip, and then she slammed me back against a wall.
Yeah, I was over that.
I kicked the bitch right in the cunt.
Newsflash, a ball shot hurts guys. Ask Maddox. A cunt shot definitely hurts girls. Especially if you have pointy boots.
Nothing could have prepared me for the shriek or the slap that left my ears ringing.
Bitch.
I narrowly avoided the next hit, and when I punched her, I went right for the boob. Look, was it fair? No. Fighting wasn’t supposed to be fair. Her scream shattered glass, and she tore through walls, and she’d hit Rogue hard enough he hadn’t come back yet.
I managed a second punch, and this one rocked her head back and she spat out blood. Oh, I felt that all the way through my arm. It was like punching a wall. Only I could crack a wall apparently. Rogue landed between us, and he caught her next fist and twisted her arm outward before it snapped audibly, and then he exhaled what looked like pure frost in her face.
“Go, little sváss,” he ordered me. “This is Keeley.” He shot a look toward me. “I’ll hold her, you go…”
“Hell no,” I snarled and pushed off the wall to lunge at her as she raced toward Rogue. I would not let her hurt him. I wouldn’t let any of them be hurt. Not again. Not if I could stop it. The snow continued to fall from the leaden skies into our dark little space littered with bricks and blood. But the light from my fists intensified.
Light.
I had no idea who the hell Keeley was but what I’d done to Dorran flashed through my mind, so instead of hitting the bitch, I seized her by her shirt and slammed my mouth down on hers. The kiss was fury and snarls, teeth and blood, panic and desperation. She raked her fingers down my face, but I didn’t let her go, not even when she tore some hair out.
Bitch.
The light poured out of me and into her, and I fed the light into her like I would have devoured the heat of lust from another. I didn’t know where the idea came from, but it demanded to be unleashed so I let it out. Her blood was sour on my tongue, and I refused to consume it. Her screams grew frantic against me as she tried to pummel and claw and I didn’t let up.
I gave her everything, and the world seemed to brighten like a summer’s day beyond my closed lids, and then all at once, she ripped away and Rogue tugged me backwards. The hard feel of him against my back, the hot and cold combination, steadied me. I opened my eyes in time to meet the bitch’s shocked gaze while her body turned almost blazing white as cracks and fissures split across her skin.
“What did you do?” she shrieked at me. But the spider webbing damage spiraled out, and then she incinerated in a cascade of fire and light.
Gone.
Poof.
Wow.
Silence rushed into the void of her disappearance, but a gasp pulled my attention to the side and I stared at a woman who stared at us. She had a phone in her hand, and her eyes were the size of saucers.
She was also very, very human.
Oh.
Shit.
Um…
I grinned at her and pushed away from Rogue. The lady took a halting step backwards, and I froze. “Sorry,” I told her. “New special effects for that new series coming out next year, so hush hush.”
Wonder edged the suspicion in her gaze, and that phone continued to point at me. Telling the whole world about supernatural creatures was just not a good idea. Every single time word of our existence got out into the world, some new series would kick off, from Great Mystery Solvers to Monster Hunters.
Really, just some tacky shit.
“You know Make Magic?” I was totally bullshitting. With a hand, I reached up to wipe the blood off my face. The gouges stung, but nowhere near as much as they had earlier. “See, fake skin. It looks like I tore it open, but nada.”
Lowering her phone slowly, she gave me a trembling nod. “Oh. That’s…” Excitement flared in her eyes. “That’s so wonderful. Are you an effects artist?”
No honey, I’m a master bullshitter and I just fed you a line.
“Actually, she’s our top-secret ringer,” Fin offered as he strolled around the corner, and my heart did a swift squeeze. He was all right. His dazzling smile snared the human’s attention so effectively, she completely pivoted away from me. Wow, even I was impressed, but then I’d rather stare at Fin too. “I’m sure you’ll understand that we just can’t risk that footage getting out.”
Charm rolled off of him in waves, and she handed over her phone with the dreamiest of smiles while I had to bite back a grin.
“Thank you so much,” Fin told her as he went through it and made some adjustments. “Truly. You have no idea how fantastic this is, and because you’re helping us out, I’m going to make sure you get something special. Okay?”
“Oh, that would be lovely, and I won’t tell anyone. They probably wouldn’t believe me anyway.”
Another brilliant smile, and he handed her the phone back. A light touch to her shoulder had her moving away, and she walked kind of dreamily. I ran my tongue over my lower lip until I tasted the blood and grimaced before turning and spitting it out, then swiping a hand over my mouth. Maddox and Alfred stood on either side of Rogue, their gazes locked on me.
“What?”
I glanced down at myself. The outfit was a mess. She’d torn Maddox’s sweatshirt. Ugh, that just aggravated me all over again. Running my fingers through the tangles of my disheveled hair, I winced when I came to the raw patches on my scalp. Yeah, she’d definitely pulled out more than a few strands.
“Hellion,” Alfred said smoothly as he closed the distance. It wasn’t until he caught my hands and
pulled them from my hair that I realized there were charred bits of ash and flesh tucked under my nails.
Gross.
“I was behaving,” I told him. “I was inside. She broke in.” I pointed to the damaged walls above. How the hell were we going to hide that?
Alfred cupped my face and brought my gaze back to him. The lightness in his fingers as he traced over the skin she’d raked reminded me it was still sensitive, but the pain was minimal, if at all.
“We need to go,” Fin said from behind me. “We repelled that force, but there will be more. As soon as word gets out about Keeley, you won’t be able to call off the others.”
Maddox cracked his knuckles and growled a laugh. “Let them come. Losing her is not an option. They should learn it now, then we can settle in peace with them gone.”
Them.
The Seven.
Wait…
But before I could ask, they were all gathered in around me and Fin whisked us away. The magic pulled us along, and I clung to Maddox and Alfred, even as Fin kept a grip on me and I could almost perceive Rogue there. It was the strangest feeling, and my gut dropped as soon as we reappeared. The cold air no longer bit at my cheeks and the sweatshirt—or what was left of it—was almost too warm, but it was damp and there was a fine mist of rain sprinkling down on us.
Tilting my head back, I glanced toward the stone edifice we’d arrived at.
“A castle.”
Fin shot me a grin. “It’s not all that, more a fortress, but much more defensible than the manor house. While they are throwing themselves at the traps on the keep, this will suit our purposes fine…”
He dropped a kiss on my nose.
“I’m going to scan the perimeter.” Then he loped off, whistling.
Rogue grunted, then dropped a kiss on my lips before shooting an enigmatic look at both Maddox and Alfred. “I’ll help him.”
We didn’t linger outside. The interior was far more rustic than the keep. It had apparently been built back when years were three digits instead of four.
