I absently tugged on my jeans, shirt, and boots, heading for the steep incline.
I would finish this job, then disappear. My family couldn’t save me anymore. The hollowness inside was too dark.
I was too far gone.
Each step up the face of the dune was like dragging my feet through glue. I reached the first resting spot almost halfway up, when my head automatically glanced back, needing to see her grave one last time before I walked away forever. My chest froze, causing me to stumble.
A spot in the ocean glowed, illuminating the surface. I whipped around, my ears catching a beautiful chant, flourishing from the spot. Voices so beautiful I wanted to fall to my knees. My gaze caught eight dots circling around the light. It took me a moment to realize they were heads. Of people.
Sirens.
The women sang, their music requiring I go out to them, my boots smacking the earth, taking me back to the beach at a run, dropping the spear at the base of the cliff. Was this a funeral? A way sirens said goodbye to one of their own? I couldn’t do anything but watch, lost in the beauty of their voices, of their movements around the glow. It felt like a dream.
Then I saw Morweena. She moved to me, rising higher in the water the closer she got. She got waist deep and stopped, my boots splashing back into the sea.
“My daughter may think I never loved her, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. I was not a good mother. I know that, but there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for her.” She started to descend. “Tell her that. Tell her I love her very much. I wish her the best.” Morweena sank below the surface.
The area where the water glowed shot into the sky, magic crashing against me so hard I went flying back on my ass. It went silent. The light, the sirens, everything gone. I sat, gazing around in confusion, trying to understand what happened. My heart thumped in my chest counting off the seconds like a clock. A minute passed when I felt another barrage of magic slap my skin.
Then, like Aphrodite, a woman rose up, walking from the water, wearing only a bra and panties. My whole world stopped.
“Rez?” My knees lurched deeper into the water, my breath clipped, not believing yet what I saw.
She smiled, her skin flawless. No cuts or gashes. “Yes, Mr. Moseley?”
A guttural cry broke from my heart. There were no words. I ran to her, picked her up in my arms, and crushed her into my chest. Her arms curled around my neck, holding me just as tight. We stayed this way for a long time, my need to feel she was really in my arms kept her pressed to me firmly.
She was the first to tip her head back to look at me, her hands going to my face, running her fingers over it like she was trying to memorize me.
“How…?” I looked into her face.
“The sea brought me back. Returned life into me.” Her eyes were bright, energy rolling off her. “It can only be done if someone is still holding on to life. Guess I wasn’t quite ready to go.” Her gaze met mine.
“Your mother was here.” Words came from my mouth, but my brain was still grasping she was in my arms. Alive.
“My mother? Did she say something to you?”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “She said there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do for you. That she loves you. Wishes you the best.”
I lowered her to her feet, but my arms wouldn’t let her a breath away from me, my hands roaming every inch of her skin.
“She’s never told me she loved me before.” Rez glanced over her shoulder. “Even when she almost lost me, she still had to tell someone else. Not me.”
“I’m sorry.” My lips grazed her forehead.
“Don’t be.” Rez turned back to me, her gaze going to my mouth. “At least I know she is capable of saying it, even if she can’t say it to me directly.”
Was I any better? The words wanted to come out, but instead of saying them I brought her mouth to mine. “You scared the shit out of me,” I mumbled against her lips. “Don’t ever do that again.”
“I don’t have it scheduled any time soon.” Her mouth grew more demanding, excess energy quivered her muscles and pulsed into me, blurring my brain.
There remained no more thoughts about staying away from her. Losing her had made me understand I would never again. Whatever was in front of us, I didn’t care. Tonight it was only us, and I was going to take advantage of every moment. I needed to see her smile, to hear her voice cry out my name, laugh…everything. Be so deep inside her I no longer could find my way out.
Our mouths were frantic, my need for her bursting out of me. Every part of me never wanted to stop touching, kissing, or fucking her. But Rez’s body shivered against the harsh breeze, the sky lightening even more along the horizon.
“Let’s get back to the cottage.” I kissed her softly, wrapping my arm around her, carrying her to where her clothes laid. “I need to be inside you, like, now.”
Rez sucked in a breath, her gaze meeting mine with the same intensity. Rez got dressed, the tank and wetsuit victims of the battle. After collecting the spear, we headed back to the cottage, running most of the way home.
Every step it became harder to ignore the intensity of my need to get her home and fuck the ever-loving daylights out of her. It was feral and raw. My beast needed to claim again, understand she was really here.
“I saw you change.” Rez hustled next to me, the cottage in the distance. “The spear gave you the power.”
“Yes.” I peered down at it, still in shock I was actually carrying one of the treasures of Tuatha Dé Danann.
“I’m not surprised. It’s an exceptionally powerful weapon.” She looked at it in my hands. I kept it wrapped in my jacket since touching it brought out the beast in me. Literally. I longed to change again, but right now I needed to stay in human form more.
“What if you kept it?”
“Don’t.” I shook my head. “Don’t even think it. It’s not an option. Lars said if I fulfilled my deal, he would help me out. Maybe he can figure something out. But it’s being handed over to him.” I wouldn’t screw that up too. I already was screwing his woman.
We reached the door, and I practically shoved her in.
“Hmmm…starting to think someone is in a hurry.” Her eyebrow quirked up. I grabbed a towel hanging off the bed frame and wrapped the spear, putting it in the heavy safe in the closet.
“To touch you. Yes. But once I’m in you…there’s no hurry to ever leave.”
She sucked in a breath as I seized her, pulling her into me. My lips were quick to part hers, exploring her mouth with my tongue. I picked her up, and she wrapped her legs around me.
I tugged off her jacket as I carried her to the bathroom. Shower and sex. Two birds…one very large cock.
Neither of us cared about all the reasons not to be together, and we let ourselves be in the moment. Stumbling into the demolished bathroom, we tore our clothes off. Under the spray of water, my fingers opened her legs, but she didn’t need any encouragement. I let out a groan, feeling how wet she was.
“Now, West. Foreplay later.”
I didn’t stop exploring her, my finger moving deep in her.
“West.” She panted, her head rolling back.
I picked her up, her back hitting the tiles, and plunged into her, making her gasp. As we moved together, with desperate need for each other, I realized an undeniable truth. I was in love with her.
The fact I could still feel love surprised me. But it came barreling into me like a cannon as we went over together. My sight went black for a moment, her cries matching mine.
I never exited her when we moved together again. This time we were still wild, but we took our time, really tasting, feeling, learning each other. We moved to the bedroom and spent the rest of what was left of the night breaking more furniture and cracking glass with our bellows. When we needed a breather, we talked. We laughed. We raided the last of the cookies I bought. Eating them naked on the floor, we teased and joked with each other until we couldn’t stay away any longer and started again.
>
Finally when the sun was high over the hills, we collapsed in each other’s arms. My lids drifted closed from exhaustion, contentment, and dare I say…happiness?
***
“Oh my pet. Did you think I would leave you so easy?” Aneira swished her elaborate robe, pacing in front of me while she played with the loose, braided belt on her hips. We were back in her chamber. I stood before her naked and vulnerable, as she preferred me. “I hoped pretending to be your little human the other night would have finally brought you to me. But she saved you. From yourself.”
I glanced away, trying to ignore her. She’s not real, West. This is all you. She’s dead.
“She won’t be able to save you forever. She will go back to where she belongs, with whom she belongs… and you, my pet, will come to me.” Her long red hair hung freely to her hips. “I mean, really, you are doing her a favor. Haven’t you already gotten her killed once? You know it will happen again, only a matter of time.”
I stiffened against the sting of her words.
“Think about it, you didn’t even need to shift into the beast to murder the delicate human girl.” Aneira sneered. “You can’t help yourself. It is who you are, what you were born to be. Why ignore the beast inside? Merely because he can’t come out doesn’t mean you’ve stopped being a killer. You love the taste of blood. Fighting it will only repeat history.”
“No.” I flinched against her words. “Cammie’s death was an accident.”
Aneira let out a peal of laughter. “Oh pet, we both know that is a lie.”
She moved to me, her nails raking down my torso. “You loved rolling with me…giving over to your darkest desires.” Her fingers trailed all the way down. “You couldn’t stop abusing me as much as I tortured you. We can have it again. Just come with me. Give yourself over to me.”
“No.” My nostrils flared as she worked her hand over me, my teeth gritting. “I will never give myself over to you again.”
“You already did. You simply need to accept it.” She palmed me tighter. “I am the darkness inside you, the vile secret you have not told anyone, festering deep in your memory. Because even you know no matter what your brothers and sisters have done, what despicable, evil deeds they undertook, they could never forgive this. They could never accept what you did.” Aneira let me go, reaching for my cheek. “You will always be alone, lost and searching. I am the only one who accepts you completely.”
The truth of her words slammed into my chest like a wrecking ball. Aneira laughed as a tortured grunt twisted from me. Breath moved in and out of my lungs in hasty gulps.
“Do you think the siren would love you knowing what you did? How we got off when I tortured my own personal knight?”
The ground gave way. There it was. The recollection I never let enter my mind. The act I pushed so deep I pretended it was a nightmare.
But it wasn’t. It was the lowest of my depravity. My mind was lost by then, reveling in the evil. All my abhorrence for the Light, for fairies, was twisted by one. I watched her torture and become aroused by the same one who had protected my friend. My family. The one who later reached out and pulled me from my twisted obscurity. He was there because of Ember…but I only saw everything I despised.
I saw myself.
Torin was never aware of me. And he never would be. Disgust, rage, and regret filled my veins.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy that?” Aneira’s mouth turned up in a wicked grin. “We could have that all the time. Just you and me.”
“You are not real.” My knuckles popped, my fingers digging into my palms. “You. Are. Dead. Only a figment of my imagination.”
“I’m more than that.” She leaned back into me. “I am part of you. The deep part of your soul you hide from the world where it’s only us. Or if you want, I can change back into your beloved human girl?”
“No.” I shoved her back. “You can no longer use Cammie against me. I will not be crippled by her death. The Cammie I knew, the girl I loved, would never want me to. I will not let you take her from me, twist her into something awful. She was beauty and light. You are merely regret.”
“Ouch.” Aneira’s lower lip stuck out in false hurt. “I don’t think it would be the little human I should be portraying anyway. I think this is much more what you want.”
Aneira’s façade dissolved, reshaping into Rez’s features. I could hardly swallow.
“Yes. This is exactly what you want. What your beast wants. The precise thing you can’t truly have.” Aneira pulled on her loosely tied belt around her queenly robe, letting it fall away. Rez stood before me. Naked. Her expression wanton. Long hair covered her breasts but nothing else as she walked to me. Her fingers trailed down my arm.
“Not real. You’re not Rez,” I chanted to myself, but my body couldn’t help but respond to the doppelgänger.
“Yes, this is what you want.” Aneira nipped at my lip. “You want her so badly you’re willing to die for her.” She kissed me again.
Pull away, West, this is not Rez. But my body wouldn’t move.
“How noble of you. Not you at all. You are a beast. You do not sacrifice for others. You sacrifice them. And you will end up butchering her in your selfishness to have her. You did it before and you are doing it again.”
“Shut up!” I bellowed. I reached for her throat and began to squeeze. Rez’s image faded back into Aneira’s, her beautiful, cruel face grinning at me like she had won. “You are dead! Leave me in peace.”
“The only peace you will have is when you surrender to me. Do it! Strangle the life from me. Don’t fight it. It will only bring you closer to me.”
I couldn’t stop, fury and hate controlling my actions. My hands squeezed, throttling Aneira’s neck. I just wanted it to end. The pain to be over. Her eyes widened, but the smug smile still curled over her red lips. “I fucking hate you. Die!” I did loathe her, but really the words were meant for me. I compressed down, the softness of her neck bending under my fingers.
A strangled gasp came from her, her eyes widening. This only gave me a sick pleasure. Rage shook my body and drove adrenaline in my muscles.
“We—st.” My name came out in a choked cry, a tear leaking down her face.
“Yes,” I seethed. “Die. Give in to me!”
The beast hit at the cage, throwing itself against my ribs. Clawing. Roaring. It took me a moment to realize it wasn’t because it was excited, wanting this kill…
It was panic. Fear.
***
I blinked. Aneira’s creamy white skin and flaming red hair grew darker. Her violet eyes became a rich shade of coffee.
Every muscle locked up, dread paralyzing me. Oh gods, no. I dropped my hands and backed away so fast I crashed into the wall and knocked down a framed painting, which shattered into pieces.
My eyes widened with complete horror, staring at the woman through the shadows, the curtains only letting in a slice of late-afternoon sun. Rez bent over, rubbing at her neck, coughing, trying to recover from what I did to her. Oxygen couldn’t get into my lungs fast enough, disgust at myself blocked it from reaching. Acid burned up my throat, and I felt the vomit dancing in my stomach.
I would have killed her. If it wasn’t for the beast, Rez would be dead. By my hands.
“You are a killer. Fighting it will only repeat history. And you will end up butchering her in your selfishness to have her. You did it before and you are doing it again.”
Rez straightened, her fingers still at her throat, her gaze meeting mine. She looked so beautiful and vulnerable. Her hair draped over her front like it had in my dream.
There were no words I could say that could take it away. No apology good enough. Staring at Rez made me wish I had let Aneira take me. Give myself over. End it. Save everyone from me.
“West.” The sound of her rough voice broke me from my torment for a moment.
Liquid tickled the back of my lids, and I looked away. I needed to run. To get far away from the cottage. From Rez
.
“Look at me,” she demanded, taking a step toward me.
I stirred against the wall, ready to bolt.
“Look. At. Me.”
A pathetic whimper caught in my throat. I could not refuse her, but gazing upon her might destroy me. I turned my chin to face her. She stood far enough away but instinctively blocked my exit to the door.
No fear showed in her irises, only concern, which forced more repulsion through me.
“I know you would never hurt me.”
A crazed laugh ascended from my throat. “I just did.”
“You were not here. Not with me.” She shook her head. “You were with her.”
My head jerked, my torso puffing in defense.
“She’s taking you away from me.” Rez approached me slowly. “I will not allow that.”
I scoffed, but it was heavy with agony.
“She can’t have you.” Rez stopped in front of me, her naked body eclipsed by mine. “Aneira’s ghost can’t have you anymore.”
I sucked in like someone punched me in the gut.
“And I certainly won’t lose you to yourself. Whatever you are fighting, whatever horrors you went through, tell me. Let me help you.” She reached up for my face.
“No.” I grunted, pulling away. “No one can help.”
“You’re letting them win.” The tenderness dropped from her voice. “I thought you were stronger than that.”
Anger bristled up my spine.
“You think you’re being so strong by protecting us from the truth? From sharing your pain?” She snapped at me, her hands going to her waist. “You are being a coward. Hiding behind your ghosts. You’re letting your fears rule you instead of letting them out.”
“You have no idea what monsters I hide inside.” I leaned into her face, baring my teeth. I was trying to scare her. I needed her to back off. “If you knew half the things I’ve done you’d be running back to your demon lover.”
West (A Darkness Series Novel) Page 27
