“Please stop playing games.” There had to be a way to reason with him. “It sounds like somebody else ordered you to kidnap me.” If so, who the hell was her stalker? “Was it Raine?”
“Never heard of Raine,” Jon said. “Our techs found you based on a report filed in Dallas that mentioned a probable stalker with a mating marking on his hand.”
“Mating marking?” The only person she knew with a tattoo on his hand was Raine.
“Yeah. I’m sure the nerds caught wind of a marking and traced it back to you.” He leaned in to sniff her. “It hasn’t been transferred yet, so you’re free game. We’ve been collecting enhanced females for a while.”
She didn’t like the idea of being collected. “Stop this. Now. Take off the mask.” Her voice trembled but she faced him directly.
He sighed and leaned toward her. “You take it off.”
Fine. She grabbed his neck and searched for the mask. Nope. Was it a whole body suit? Glaring at him, she pulled on his wig. The hair remained in place, and he winced. That was his real hair? She felt along his hairline for the mask. Nothing.
He smiled again. “See? It’s all me.” Then fangs slowly lowered from his mouth.
She screamed.
* * * *
Raine nearly lost his mind when he reached Mariana’s and discovered she was gone. A quick call to Tabi confirmed that she’d headed out and hadn’t told anybody where. He ran to his brother’s rented car and jumped in. “Let’s go.”
Only Cade would find a new Camaro to rent in the middle of Indiana. He gunned it. “Where are we going?”
Raine pulled his phone out of the bag supplied by the cops when he’d been released. “I put a tracker in her purse. Head to the Interstate and go north.”
Cade laughed and sped up. “Of course you did.”
Raine dug into the computer tracker he’d placed on her phone to see she’d made a reservation at a spa retreat three hours to the north. His shoulders slowly unbound. Okay. If she was at a spa, she was safe. “Just hurry up,” he muttered.
Cade shook his head. “Do you want to explain to me why we’re speeding after your wayward mate?” He took a corner on two wheels and sped up onto the Interstate. “This is like a lot of trouble for a female you have no intention of making yours.”
“She’s in danger,” Raine gritted out.
Cade passed three cars on the right. “It seems as if she has taken precautions to keep herself safe. If you’re not making her yours, perhaps you should leave her alone.”
“No.” Raine checked the app on his phone to see the route she’d taken. She’d stopped at what appeared to be a rest stop, and then she’d taken a detour in the wrong direction of the spa. Was she just being careful or had something gone wrong?
Everything in his gut told him she’d had no intention of going east. He quickly dialed Benny again, putting him on speaker this time.
“What, dude? I’m in the middle of trying to rescue my mate, who doesn’t know she’s my mate, and I need to get kidnapped and have the crap beat out of me each time in order to just find her fucking location. I don’t have the energy to deal with you,” Benny grumbled. “Make this quick.”
There was too much to unpack in that statement. “I’m sorry. Don’t you have a hacker in your merry band of misfits? Somebody who can break into traffic or surveillance cameras?” Raine asked.
“Of course, and she’s right here in the computer room trying to find my next place of being kidnapped. You can borrow her for three seconds. Raine, this is Mercy. She’s a Fae and is just as crazy-assed as rumored to be, so ask her for a favor and then prepare yourself to someday pay up. Mercy? This is my buddy, Raine. He helped Ivar out not too long ago.”
“Yeppers?” A soft female voice came over the line.
“Hi. I need a favor and am happy owing you one,” Raine said.
The woman chuckled. “Any friend of Benny and Ivar’s is somebody who’d I’d like to owe me a favor. What do you need?”
Raine rattled off the time and place of the rest stop. “I need to know what happened to my woman there.” He waited.
His brother glanced at him but wisely didn’t say anything.
“Okie doke.” Rapid typing came over the line. “There is a CCTV camera at the rest stop, and somebody is in the process of wiping it…right now.” Her voice rose, and the speed of the typing came faster. “All right. It’s going quickly. A woman meeting that description was taken by…holy crap it’s a Kurjan in daylight. Well, there’s rain and a storm, but they really can go into daylight now.”
It was a new development for their species and one Raine didn’t have time to ruminate on right now. “Was she hurt?” he growled.
Mercy stopped typing. “The video is gone. It looked like he drugged her and carried her off. I can’t see where they went, but I can start looking for traffic cameras.”
“No you can’t,” Benny argued in the background. “You’re working on my project.”
“It’s okay,” Raine said. “I have a tracker on her and they obviously took her purse with them. I’ve got a bead on her.”
Benny sighed loudly. Very loudly. “Do you need backup? I could fly there.”
“No. My brother is with me,” Raine said. “Good luck on your next mission, and Mercy, I owe you one.”
“Yes, you do.” The female ended the call.
Raine flipped back to the app. “Mariana is stationary at a small and private airport.” Then he looked at the raging storm outside. “Hopefully they won’t try to fly in this.”
Cade passed two logging trucks, and they were just a blur. “How did the Kurjans find her?”
Raine’s chest ached with a fire that burned beyond his body. “I have no idea. Hurry up. We’re running out of time.”
Chapter 12
Mariana couldn’t breathe. Was she drugged? She had to be on drugs. There’s no way that guy’s face was real. Kurjans, vampires, and shifters? Also demons? This was too weird. What was that about the marking on Raine’s hand that they’d been talking about? None of it was making sense. This had to be a cult, and she had to be seriously drugged right now. “What did you give me?”
Jon shook his head. “You should be okay now. Take a deep breath.”
A monster was telling her to go Zen? This was ridiculous. The only explanation besides a drugging was that he’d had his face surgically changed. Her legs started to tremble. It was a good thing she was sitting. “All right. Say I believe you, and I’m not sure I do, what’s the plan here? Why have you kidnapped me?”
“Smart question,” Jon said, his eyes more amethyst than reddish-purple now. “I was starting to doubt your intelligence. I’ll explain this to you as if you didn’t know any of it, which is often possible, except you’ve brought out an immortal’s mating mark, so I think you might be playing a game.” He didn’t sound too put out by the idea, though.
She shook her head. If the guys at the door would go back outside, she could kick Jon in the face and run for it. Oh, chances were slim that she’d make it, but it was her only chance. Wait a minute. “Where’s my purse?” Her gun was in it.
Jon tilted his head toward a few bags in the corner of the hangar. “It’s over there with my equipment, and your weapon is still inside your bag. I’ll need to confiscate it, though. Sorry.”
“Right.” Should she go for the gun or the door? Probably the gun. “You were saying?”
He stood and stretched his back. Man, he was tall. So were the guys at the door. “There are different species in the world besides humans, but some human females are enhanced with otherworld abilities like physic powers, empathic powers, telekinesis…there are many.”
Mariana moved to the edge of her seat. “You’re saying I’m psychic?” She wasn’t. Not at all.
“No. I’m saying you have an ability beyond human. The most common is empathic powers, and since you’re a psychologist, perhaps you felt that deep down in choosing your career.” He shrugged as if it didn’t matter
much.
Yeah, she’d always felt empathic to a small degree but had just figured she was sensitive to others. “So this ability makes me…enhanced?”
“Yes, and enhanced human females can mate an immortal,” Jon said casually.
“Mate?” She jumped to her feet. “No. Absolutely not. Not a chance. I am not mating anybody.” She sidled away from him.
He pivoted and put his body between her and the corner. “Your agreement isn’t necessary but I’m sure would be appreciated. We have a war coming, another one, and we’re gathering as many enhanced females as we can before the well is depleted, so to speak. You have a new future. Life is easier if you just embrace it.”
Oh, she was going to embrace his face with a bullet. Was he actually believing this stuff?
“We found you because of the ‘tattoo’ the police in Dallas ran through a database. It’s actually a mating mark. We traced it back to you, and here you are.”
A mating mark? “Wait a minute. You’re saying that Raine’s tattoo led you to me? That he’s a Kurjan, too?” Was Raine involved with these weirdoes?
“Did he look like a Kurjan? No.” Jon’s red lips turned down. “Since he has a mating mark, which arose on his skin when he met you, he has demon blood in him somewhere. Oh, he may be mainly another species like witch or vampire, but anybody with demon blood gets the brand. It’s supposed to transfer to you during the mating process.”
She swallowed. This was insane. “Do you have a mating mark?”
“No. There’s no demon blood in me.” He grimaced as if the mere thought was distasteful. “When you mate a Kurjan, it’ll happen with a bite and sexual relations. No branding. So that should make you happy.”
“None of this makes me happy.” She turned as if to retake her seat and instead leaped around him and ran as fast as she could toward the corner and her purse.
He snatched her out of the air by her hair, whipping her up. Pain raced along her scalp, and she screamed.
The door burst open, and two male bodies barreled in.
“Mariana!” Raine bellowed.
Relief caught her a second before she plowed her fist as hard as she could into Jon’s eye. He yelped and dropped her. She landed on one knee, and pain ricocheted up her leg.
Raine ran toward Jon as the guy at the door started fighting with the two guards.
Jon punched Raine in the face, and Raine punched him back, moving so quickly he was only a blur.
Mariana swung around and pushed to her feet, running for her purse. The sounds of punches, kicks, and grunts filled the space behind her, but she yanked her weapon free and turned around to aim.
Raine took Jon down to the cement floor, whipped a knife out of his boot, and plunged the blade into Jon’s neck.
Mariana faltered. Her stomach lurched.
One of the guards tackled Raine from behind and sent them both sprawling across the vacant hangar. They punched and grappled on the cement, fighting for purchase.
The two at the door battled furiously.
Mariana tightened her grip on the gun and tried to point it at one of the Kurjans, but everyone was moving so quickly.
Jon gurgled and reached for the protruding knife handle to yank it out of his neck.
Mariana stepped back. How had he done that? He’d bleed to death now. Yet he sat up, fury dropping those fangs to his lips.
She retreated a yard.
He stood and turned toward her, looking nothing like a human. Slowly, the wound on his neck healed.
She gasped and then stopped breathing. How had he done that? He stepped toward her, and she lifted the gun automatically, firing several times. She hit him dead center in his chest, and he winced but kept moving toward her. She fired again.
Nothing. He didn’t even wince this time. The four bullets popped out of his chest and fell onto the cement floor, pinging loudly. “That’s impossible,” she whispered.
He reached for her, and Raine manacled him around the waist, the momentum propelling them into the solid block wall. The cement crackled from the impact and shards rained down.
Mariana turned to see the Kurjan soldier Raine had fought down on the ground with his head cut off. She gagged. Panic seized her, and she ran toward the door, skirting the battling men and yanking it open. Rain slashed her as she ran outside, desperately looking around the quiet airport.
There were several hangars and one long landing strip all surrounded by forest land. She rushed toward a Camaro parked near the SUV that she’d been kidnapped in and jumped inside, searching wildly for keys. They had to have left the keys. No.
Damn it. She hurried out and ran toward the SUV when the door banged open.
Raine stood there with blood on his face and rips through his dark shirt. His eyes were an unreal green—definitely not human.
It was true. Somehow, it was all true. She took a step back.
He moved toward her with his friend behind him. “We have to go. Now.” His voice was grittier than she’d ever heard it.
She shook her head wildly as the rain poured over her face.
He grasped her arm and pushed her into the back of the Camaro before taking the driver’s seat and shutting the door. It was only a two-door. She couldn’t get out. Just as she scooted to the other side, the passenger door opened, and the other guy got inside. He shut the door.
Raine accepted the keys from the guy and ignited the engine, quickly turning around and driving away from the hangar. “It’s still storming, but we have to hurry out of here before their reinforcements arrive.” The rain hadn’t washed all the blood off his face, and he looked deadly in the rear-view mirror. “Put on your seatbelt, Mariana.”
She did so immediately, her mind almost blanking. It was too much. All of it.
The other guy turned. “Hi. I’m Cade.” He had light blue eyes, a rugged jaw, and dark hair. The resemblance to Raine was unmistakable. “I’m Raine’s much younger brother.” His smile would’ve been charming had he not had a healing hole in his neck and lower jaw.
She shrank back.
Cade sighed. “You really should’ve told her about us.”
Raine kept silent and punched the gas, whipping onto the main road by the small airport. “I had no idea she’d be kidnapped by Kurjans. How the hell had they found her?”
“I’m right here,” she snapped, forgetting her terror for a minute. “I told my friend in Dallas about your tattoo and drew it for her. In trying to find my stalker, she conducted a search on the Internet, and—”
Cade groaned. “The Kurjans are monitoring for mating marks. That actually makes sense.” He turned and looked at her again. “You’re not supposed to share that kind of information, Mariana.”
She gaped at him. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Cade turned to his brother and grinned. “I like her. Lots of spunk. Mom will love her.”
Raine zipped onto the Interstate. “Would you just shut up?” He flipped a switch and increased the speed on the windshield wipers. The rain and wind increased in force.
Mariana kicked the back of his chair. “Are you a demon?” She could not even believe she asked that question.
Raine sighed. “Let’s talk about it when we get to your place. You’re going to need to pack. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to move again.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she burst out. “Start talking now.”
“No.” Raine flicked on the lights to battle the storm.
She barely kept from kicking him again. “You are the most stubborn bastard I have ever met.”
Cade nodded. “Yep. We all say that.”
Mariana turned to him. “Are you a demon?”
Cade grinned. “It sounds like the Kurjans educated you a little bit.”
“A lot,” she countered. “Although I didn’t believe them until Jon pulled the knife out of his neck and healed himself. So it’s all true?”
Cade nodded. “It’s all true, and we Maxwells do have some demon blood but are mainly
vampires. Immortal species usually take on one aspect of their heritage.”
Vampires. Oh God. “You’re going to kill me and drain my blood.” She could feel it draining from her face and head right now.
Cade burst out laughing, and Raine gave her a look in the mirror.
“What?” she asked.
Raine shook his head. “We don’t need your blood, we’re not going to kill you, and you can’t be a vampire. We’re just another species, and we’re absolutely fine in the sun. We also eat normal food and only take blood during battle or sex.”
Battle or sex. Her abdomen did a silly jumpy move it only did around him. Oh, no way. Never again. She crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re kidnappers now.”
Cade turned toward her and winced. “About that. I should apologize for kidnapping you the other night and taking you to the barn. My twin and I thought that if you and Raine spent some time together that he’d come to his senses. He didn’t.”
None of this made sense and she didn’t care. Wait a minute. “You kidnapped me?”
“Yes. Sorry,” Cade said.
It was too much. She kicked the back of Raine’s chair again. “I want out of this car.”
“No,” Raine said.
She growled this time. Actually growled.
Cade laughed out loud again.
Until Raine punched him in the face.
Chapter 13
Raine watched his brother drive off from Mariana’s porch while she packed up her belongings. He sent healing cells to his ribs, which he’d ignored since the fight. The sight of the Kurjan soldier grabbing Mariana would haunt him until the end of days. He turned and headed back inside to help her pack.
She sat on the sofa with a glass of red wine and a very set jaw. A stubborn, delicate, firm jaw.
He paused. “I told you to pack.”
“I don’t give two figs what you told me to do.” She took a healthy drink of the dark red brew.
Ah. He rolled his neck to keep his impatience at bay. The woman had been hit with a lot in one day, and she was probably out of sorts. He could be patient. “Listen, Mariana. You’ve been found by the Kurjans, which means you need to leave here.”
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