He barely felt the small needle that rose to the surface prick his index finger when he pushed on the stone. Kysen licked it to heal the tiny hole as the needle sank beneath the stone, taking a drop of his blood with it. A second later, the door unlocked.
It didn’t surprise him that the four mates came out of the kitchen as he neared it. With the amount of blood staining his clothes, their sensitive sense of smell would have picked up the scent as soon as he walked into the headquarters.
Blythe reached him first. She tugged the side of his jacket away from his wound. “What happened?”
“I had a small run-in with one of Mot’s new undead warriors.”
“Come into the kitchen and we’ll clean you up.” Blythe then turned to Desiree. “Can you run to my quarters and get the rubbing alcohol and bandages from the bathroom?” After Desiree nodded and left, Blythe said to him, “You have to get something on it until you can get into the sun.”
Kysen silently followed Blythe, Jordan and Nyx into the kitchen and pulled out one of the chairs at the table before he sat. Desiree returned then with the supplies. Painfully, he took off his jacket. Nyx took it from him and hung it on the back of one of the other chairs. He didn’t bother even trying to pull his t-shirt over his head. Instead, he took hold of the collar, ripped it down the middle and shrugged out of it. The amount of blood on the white t-shirt made it not worth saving.
Jordan handed Blythe a wet tea towel and she carefully washed the blood away from his wound. He sucked in a breath when she reached the raw edge of the slice in his skin.
“Sorry,” she said. “You said one of the new undead warriors did this? Are you sure it was one of the new ones and not the first type that he and Sek created?”
He let out a snort. “I’m pretty sure it was one of the newer undead warriors. About as tall and strong as me along with being an expert at handling a sword to the point where I came pretty damn close to losing, yeah, he wasn’t one of the original ones.”
“Did he have a snake inside him?” Jordan asked with a tremor in her voice.
Kysen look at her. He saw leftover fear from when Akori had been in Apep’s thrall lingering in her eyes. He nodded. “Yes, he did. His eyes were black, same with the thick substance that dripped from his fangs. It would seem Mot has recovered enough from his latest defeat to try once again to get one of us under the demon god’s control.” He winced when Blythe hit a particularly sensitive spot. “But what is even scarier is the fact the bastard attacked me inside the men’s room at the bar I was at.”
“You were inside a bar after night fell?” Nyx asked. “What were you doing there? I thought you got tied up with something and that was what held you up.”
Shit. He hadn’t thought before he opened his mouth. Now he’d have to do some fancy explaining. “It doesn’t matter why I was at the bar. The important thing to focus on is that an undead warrior had been there, around mortals, and didn’t attack anyone but me. It was almost as if he had hunted me down and waited until I’d become cornered. Luckily we were alone in the washroom and I flashed us into the back parking lot.”
“Oh god,” Jordan said. “What if there are more of them out there—all with snakes inside them—and they are hunting the others right now? Hunting Akori. I don’t think I can survive watching him go through that again, even if we could manage to get him back in the first place.”
Nyx put her arm around Jordan’s shoulders and said, “Kysen can warn the others. Nothing is going to happen to Akori.”
Kysen looked between Jordan and Blythe. Both their mates, Mehen and Akori, had been under Apep’s thrall. Mehen had actually had one of Apep’s golden snakes put inside him instead of only being bitten. After they’d gotten them out of Apep’s demon’s clutches, the cure had been torture to watch. Only Ra’s rays got rid of Apep’s taint. The warriors’ bodies had smoked until the darkness had been burned from their systems, which wasn’t exactly a pain-free procedure.
“I’ll talk to Mehen right now,” he reassured the women.
Ra had given his warriors the ability to communicate with each other telepathically. Calling on that gift, Kysen said, Mehen, I need to talk to you.
Mehen quickly responded. What’s the matter, Kysen?
I was attacked by one of Mot’s new undead warriors. One that if he’d bitten me, would have had me under Apep’s thrall.
Where are you now?
I’m at the headquarters. Blythe is bandaging my wound until I can get in the sunlight. The women, especially Jordan, are worried there might be more of those undead warriors out tonight. He paused. And Mehen, the undead attacked me inside a public place with mortals all around us. I think he was hunting me.
Fuck. All right, I’ll warn the others. We’ll meet up at the headquarters after we finish hunting for the night. You stay with the women. Ra’s shielding protects them from Mot, or any of the undead from finding the headquarters, but I don’t want to take any chances.
Will do. You might want to tell Akori that cutting his night of hunting a little shorter would be a good thing. Jordan’s spooked.
I’ll tell him. Now that you’ve warned us, we’ll be more vigilant. You can also tell Blythe not to worry.
Kysen cut off the connection. He looked at the women. “Mehen is going to tell the others. He told me to stay here for the rest of the night.” He focused on Jordan. “I also suggested he tell Akori to come home early.”
She sighed as if in relief and smiled big enough to flash him her fangs. “Thanks. At least I won’t have to be worried sick for the entire night, just for some of it.”
He turned his attention on Blythe when she dabbed a rubbing-alcohol-soaked cotton ball to his wound. His hissed in pain. “Frick, that hurts. Mehen also told me to tell you not to worry,” he said to her.
“Almost done,” Blythe said as she reached for the pad of gauze and cloth tape. “That’s nice of him, considering he isn’t answering my telepathic calls,” she added with sarcasm.
Once a blood exchange was done between mates, a mating bond formed and they could telepathically communicate with each other. They also felt whatever the other felt—physically and emotionally. The women only had this ability with their mates.
“I’m sure Mehen isn’t answering you for a reason,” he said.
Blythe snorted. “He has his reasons all right. He just doesn’t want me to check up on him every few minutes.” She pressed the gauze to his wound and taped it to his skin. “There. That should hold you until the morning.”
“Thanks,” he said. “I guess I’ll go get a clean shirt.”
“Not so fast, buster,” Desiree said before he could get out of the chair. “You haven’t told us why you were at that bar in the first place. Obviously you didn’t go there to feed or you wouldn’t still be wounded.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Why do you think I was there then?”
She gave him a knowing smile. “Maybe you’ve met a certain someone who will be joining our ‘family’ soon.”
Kysen shook his head. “You shouldn’t assume things like that, Desiree. Haven’t you heard that old saying that it only makes an ass out of you and me?”
“You’re being an ass, all right,” Desiree replied.
“Enough, children,” Blythe said with a chuckle. “If Kysen wants to keep why he was at the bar to himself, I guess we have to respect that.” She then smiled at the other women. “But that doesn’t mean we have to stop watching to see if he starts showing the signs of finding his mate.”
Kysen pushed up from the chair and stood. Now would be a good time to make his exit before the mates put him under a microscope. Blythe and Desiree had done that to both Denger and Akori when their time had come to find their women.
“You can watch me all you want, but you won’t see anything,” he said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to my quarters to get a new shirt.”
He walked out of the kitchen, feeling four sets of eyes on his back.
Ch
apter Six
Cena awoke the next morning still feeling angry about what Kysen had done the night before. He might have made her feel things she hadn’t felt with another man, but that didn’t mean she’d be a pushover. She wouldn’t allow any man to use her as his personal carpet.
Muttering under her breath about how men could be nothing but jerks, she got out of bed and went to the bathroom. She brushed her teeth and took a shower. Just as she was stepping out of the tub, Cena heard the sound of her telephone ringing. Thinking it more than likely could be Kysen calling, she didn’t rush to dry off and get it. If it was him, he could talk to her answering machine.
She took her time rubbing her body dry with a thick towel. When she finished, she wrapped it around her and blew dry her hair. Back in her bedroom, she leisurely picked out something to wear and dressed.
It wasn’t until she headed for the kitchen to get some breakfast did she stop by the living room and check the digital answering machine built into the base of her cordless phone. It flashed, showing she had one message. She hit the play button.
Kysen’s deep voice filled the room. “Hey, Cena, it’s Kysen. If you’re there, can you pick up?” After a moment of silence, he continued speaking. “Okay, either you aren’t there or you’re pissed at me and won’t pick up. I know you’re mad. You have every right to be. I shouldn’t have left you like that. Just so you know, I had a really good reason for doing it. It isn’t something I can talk about right now, but if I didn’t, I never would have done it.” She heard him sigh. “I’ll call back later this afternoon. Can you please talk to me then?” The machine beeped at the end of his message.
Cena hit the button to erase it. Kysen could call back in the afternoon, but she still wouldn’t be taking any of his calls. She’d make a clean break from him. It would be better that way. Because if she saw him again, he’d just have to touch her and she’d more than likely cave and take him back.
No, she had to remain strong. So what if she had to wait another six months, a year, even two years before she found that right man again that lived up to her expectations. She’d gone this long without having sex, she could wait a little longer.
* * * * *
Cena was dusting her apartment when the phone rang again in the late afternoon. Leaving the dust rag on top the TV, she went over to the cordless and picked it up. The call display showed Kysen’s number. She put the phone back on its base without picking up the call. This time he didn’t leave a message. She returned to her dusting, thinking Kysen might have finally gotten the message she had no intention of talking to him.
The rest of the afternoon went by with no more phone calls. Cena finished her cleaning and whipped up something for dinner. While she ate, she thought of what she wanted to take for her lunch the next day at work. Thinking about that got her thinking about Emiko. The older woman would more than likely ask her if Cena had caught up with Kysen on Friday after the tea ceremony. Cena didn’t know if she wanted to tell Emiko that she had, and then had him ditch her when things had started to get good.
When it grew dark, and since she wasn’t going anywhere, Cena changed into her pajamas to sit and watch TV until she went to bed. She’d just settled onto the couch when the phone rang, showing Kysen’s number on the call display for the third time. Once again she didn’t pick it up and he didn’t leave a message. She returned to watching TV.
At the knock on her apartment door she jumped, but remained on the couch. When the knock came a second time, only louder, Cena got off the couch and tiptoed to the door. Holding her breath so she wouldn’t make any sound, she looked through the peephole. Kysen stood on the other side. She watched him run a hand agitatedly through his hair.
She took a step back, but just about jumped out of her skin when Kysen said through the barrier separating them, “I know you’re at the door, Cena. I can see the shadow of your feet at the bottom of it. Please let me in.”
Cena let out the breath she held and silently swore. Now what? If she ignored Kysen and he got any louder, her neighbors wouldn’t be too happy with her. But she really didn’t want to let him in.
“Shit,” she whispered.
“I heard that,” Kysen said.
He heard that? How could he have possibly heard her? Unless he had supernatural hearing, which she knew was impossible.
“Come on, Cena. Open the door.”
She blew out a breath. There was no point in pretending she hadn’t heard him, but she wouldn’t be opening the door. “Go away, Kysen,” she said. “Whatever you have to say, I don’t want to hear it.”
“Won’t you at least give me a chance to explain?”
“Why should I? The message you left on my answering machine said you couldn’t tell me the reason why. If that’s true, you obviously won’t tell me the truth.”
“It had something to do with my work.”
“How convenient.”
“Can we please continue this conversation inside your apartment? I’d rather not have your neighbors listening in on everything we say.”
“Then leave,” she said. “I’m not opening the door, end of story. You had your chance and you blew it. I don’t give second chances.”
“I’m not going to just walk out of your life because you want me to,” Kysen said in a strained voice. “I just found you. I won’t lose… I’m not giving up on you.”
Cena’s stay-strong attitude slipped just a little at the depth of emotion she heard in Kysen’s words. She shook her head. She couldn’t back down.
“Go home, Kysen,” she said in a monotone voice. “Please.”
There was a long stretch of silence before he answered. “Fine, I’ll go, but I’m not admitting defeat.”
She waited until she heard Kysen’s heavy footfalls moving away from her apartment before she went back to the door and looked through the peephole. He no longer stood on the other side. Leaning her forehead against it, Cena told herself to just let him go. With a shove, she pushed away from the door and went back to the living room. She was doing the right thing. Right at this moment it might not feel that way, but it was for the best.
* * * * *
Kysen stomped out of Cena’s apartment building and headed to his car. He got inside and slammed the door shut. He gripped the steering wheel in his hands until it creaked. Damn, damn. Last night had done more damage than he’d first thought. He hadn’t counted on Cena being so stubborn. She’d shut him out, not giving him a chance to explain.
He looked up at her apartment building, tempted to flash himself inside and force her to listen. But of course he couldn’t do it. Having her afraid of him as well as angry would only make things worse.
After he put his key in the ignition, he started the car and drove out of the parking lot. He still had a night of hunting in front of him before he could concentrate on getting Cena back. And he would get her back. He’d let her have the win this time. The next, he’d be the victor.
Besides wanting Cena back because she could be his Acenith returned, he was falling for the modern-day woman who looked like her. All day he’d done nothing but think about Cena. Even when he’d stood inside the temple to Ra at the headquarters, letting the bright sunlight heal his wound, he’d only thought of her.
When she hadn’t answered any of his calls, he’d resorted to the desperate attempt of trying to force her to see him by showing up at her apartment. Well, Cena would soon find out he wasn’t that easy to get rid of. And she had to have some feelings for him or she wouldn’t have stayed this angry for so long.
Driving by The Oasis—the bar he and his brothers-in-arms liked to frequent to have a late night beer or find a donor to feed from—Kysen considered stopping there before he began hunting undead. Even though his wound was completely healed with no mark left on his skin to show where it had been, he needed to feed. His blood hunger hadn’t sunk its claws into him so deeply that he felt it all the time, but it was enough for him to know it was there.
Instead of stoppi
ng, Kysen continued on his way. The idea of feeding from an unknown donor didn’t really appeal to him. If he were to feed and have what happened the night before it would only increase his blood hunger. He didn’t want to ramp it up any more until he was sure Cena wasn’t the one for him. If he fed from her and found her blood didn’t satisfy him, he’d know for sure she wasn’t his mate. If that happened, he didn’t know what he’d do.
Feeling as if he were in a place where he couldn’t find a way out, he parked his car on a side street and prepared for his night of hunting. Tomorrow, one way or the other, he’d find out if Cena was actually his. The not knowing would drive him mad otherwise.
* * * * *
After Cena went to bed and finally stopped herself from thinking about Kysen, she fell asleep. She also dreamed about her dream man. Same as the last time she’d dreamed about him, he’d taken on Kysen’s face. And once again, the setting in the dream appeared to be of ancient Egypt.
Dream-Kysen and she were inside the small room again, only this time they’d already made love and dream-Kysen held her against his naked body. They lay on a blanket that Cena somehow knew her dream-self had kept in the room for such occasions. From firsthand experience, she’d learned the rough stone floor took away some of her pleasure while making love on it.
“I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of you,” said dream-Kysen.
He’d spoken in a language Cena didn’t recognize, but she somehow understood it. “What are you going to do about it then?” She spoke in the same language. “My father will only tolerate us using this storage room in the brewery for so long before he confronts you, Kysen.”
He chuckled and pulled her on top of him. “Is that a subtle hint for me to ask you to marry me?”
She sat up and straddled his hips. “And if it is? You know I love you. I’d like to have a home of my own to share with my favorite soldier in Pharaoh’s army.”
Reincarnated Hunger Page 6
