by Lund, S. E.
“Don’t, please,” I say, stepping closer to Soren. “Don’t hurt him.”
Soren looks at me as he holds Julien up by the neck.
“So sweet that you care about him,” Soren says. “I just love a good romance. And you two are just so sweet together! All that beautiful lust and love. I can’t resist you two. But poor Michel, Eve!” He throws Julien fifteen feet through the air, where he falls among the rocks along the shore. The students ignore what's happening, and continue to play volleyball. I turn to run to him, but Soren stops me, one hand gripping my arm like steel.
“Poor Michel” he says, pulling me closer. “All alone after breaking his vows for you. How cruel are you to do that to him? Reignite his eroticism, then cast him away for his brother? I had no idea you were so heartless. I like it. I can use that heartless side of you.”
“I’m not heartless!” I say, angry and fearful at the same time. “You’re the heartless one, playing these two brothers against each other, compelling them so that they can’t even hear the truth.”
“Ahh, you discovered my little trick.” He smiles a wicked smile. Then I feel his mind searching my memories. “You loved it, I see.”
My cheeks burn that he can just see what’s transpired between Julien and me.
“Don’t worry,” he says quickly. “Michel’s got a replacement for you. I found someone for him to assuage his broken heart. Her name is Gabrielle. He doesn’t love her but he surely is getting some much-needed solace from her.”
At that, my heart squeezes. Michel is already with someone else?
“You’ll like her, Eve. She’s just about the opposite of you in every way. I figured he needed someone totally different to wash you out of his memories. Make new ones. Beautiful breasts, Eve. Perfect – large, firm, probably three times the size of yours. A man could drown in them. Long blonde hair, flaxen, like a river of silk.” He laughs softly.
“You’re a monster. You’re probably compelling him to be with her.”
He shakes his head.
“Not at all. He needs someone, Eve. He’s been so lonely all these years. I care enough about him to help cure that loneliness. Poor Michel. She’s a real submissive on top of it all. You know how much Michel loves to control things. Such a Dominant, is my sweet soulful Michel. I love that contradiction, don’t you? Sweet, soulful, kinked out and all Dom? How could you possibly turn him down?” Soren smiles. “My little Marguerite was like that as well, but a bit naïve about things, which led to her destruction.”
“You abandoned her,” I say, unable to keep my mouth shut. Julien has recovered and is by my side. “She abused Michel and Julien. She enslaved them.”
Julien steps forward as if to stop me.
“Only fitting and just for my progeny.” Soren pulls me closer and places his hand over my chest, above my heart. “Don’t even think of trying anything, Julien. I’ll have her heart in my hand in a second if you do.”
“Please don’t hurt her,” Julien says and steps back. I can hear the submission in his voice.
“I don’t want to hurt her, Julien, but I will if I have to. I’ll just have to get my scientists to go back to the drawing board and make another one of her.”
“What do you mean?” I say, weakness flooding through me. “Make another one of me?”
“Oh, that’s right. No one’s really told you the truth, have they? Even Julien, who promised to tell you everything…”
“Tell me now.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Let Julien tell you.”
“What do you want from me?” I say, my hands fisting. “Other than to use me to torment Michel and Julien and get your sadistic pleasure.”
“Oh, Eve, have I told you I love your saucy mouth?” Soren says and smirks. “Most normal humans with any sense would be down on their knees right now, terrified of me, but you? You never fail to stand up to me. I like that. You can’t be intimidated. You will make a magnificent High Priestess.”
“I’ll never be your anything.”
He steps closer and takes my chin in his hand. “You will be mine, Eve. Don’t worry. I’m not interested in you sexually. I prefer blondes, as I said. But you will be my creature. You are my creature. I decide what happens to you. Now, I’ve had enough sun for one day. I’m hosting a dinner party at my home tonight. You and Julien will come. Dress in something risqué, Eve. I want Michel to see how happy you are with Julien. It will keep him all motivated. I want you to see him with his new slave. She actually wants to submit to him, Eve. It will be good for you to see them. It will keep you all motivated.”
With that, he turns to Julien and cups his cheek, staring into his eyes.
“Bring Eve tonight. You are so looking forward to it. We’re going to have fun.” He releases Julien and faces me. “An orgy of fun, so let loose your inhibitions.”
He turns away and Nate follows him, smiling back at me. “See you at school tomorrow, Eve.”
Julien seems to be released from whatever power Soren had over him and comes to me, turning me around, checking me out, his gaze moving over my face and down my body.
“Are you OK?”
I nod but when he pulls me into his arms, his face in my neck, I can’t help but tear up.
“He’s a monster,” I say, my voice breaking.
“I know.”
“We won’t go, will we?”
“Of course. We’re going to have fun.”
I look in his eyes. He has no idea he’s been compelled.
I have a very, very bad feeling about this.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
"If an injury has been made to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared."
Niccolo Machiavelli
We drive back to the cottage and my mind is numb from our encounter with Soren.
“We won’t go, Julien. We can’t. I can’t stand him.”
“We have to go,” Julien says, glancing over at me as we drive along the road that borders the coast and leads to our cottage. “Soren invited us.”
“He said it would be an orgy. Is he serious?”
“Oh, he’s serious,” Julien says, a frown on his face. “He’s very, how can I say… licentious.”
“I’m not going. I won’t go. Michel will be there with some woman Soren’s probably compelled to be his slave.”
“We’re going,” he says and turns to me. “I have to take you. He expects us there.”
“Do you do everything he says?”
“We’ll have fun, Eve,” he says and smiles as if this is just a nice party among friends.
I’m so frustrated that Julien doesn’t realize he’s been compelled. There is no way I can get through to him.
Once home, I shower and dress for my interview at the Cove. Julien drives me there and goes in to start his first shift as a bartender, working over the dinner hour with the usual guy to learn the ropes while I meet the manager for the interview. Mr. Taft is an older guy, looking close to retiring, a buttoned-down kind of person more suited to the boardroom than bar. He tells me he’s an escaped Corporate America type who came here for small town life. He’s nice and offers me a job working twice a week, Tuesdays and Friday during the dinner hour.
“What time do I finish on Friday?” I ask, hoping it won’t prevent me from going to the pub crawl – if I survive tonight, that is.
“Five to ten’s the usual Friday shift.”
I cringe. “Can I start on Tuesday? I was planning on going to the pub crawl at the College…”
“I’m actually short-staffed, Eve. That’s why I agreed to hire both Julien and you. The job’s yours, but I need you on Friday to help out. Take it or leave it.”
I take in a deep breath. “I’ll take it. There’ll be another pub crawl.”
Mr. Taft extends his hand for a shake. I do as well, but I get no strange reaction when he shakes it. He’s no Adept. I’m suspicious of everyone now.
“Wear black pants and a black long-sleeved t-shirt. We’ll provid
e the apron. If you get here about fifteen minutes early, Carrie will do your orientation, show you the schedule and everything.”
“Thanks," I say. "I appreciate the opportunity.”
“You’ll be happy to learn that I can’t go to the pub crawl.”
I stand at the kitchen island and watch as Julien hangs up his leather jacket. It’s after seven and Julien is just home from his supper hour shift at the Cove.
“Why?”
“I have to work until ten. Besides, now that I know Nate is with Soren, I don’t want anything to do with him.”
He shrugs. “Go after. Make friends with the others. Maybe some of the Rhys girl’s friends will be there.”
I shake my head. “It’s no use. I know that these murders were Soren’s doing. There’s no need to infiltrate. He’s behind all this.”
“Eve, Soren being here is just a coincidence,” Julien says, shaking his head. He comes to me and takes my face in his hands and kisses me. The kiss is passionate. Every time I mention Soren’s guilt, Julien gets all aroused. “Now, quit being so tempting and get ready.”
He goes to the fridge and takes out a bottle of blood. “I’ll be done at ten on Friday so I’ll take you. I wouldn’t mind checking out the locals.”
I shrug. It’s useless. He won’t hear anything about Soren’s guilt. He doesn’t seem to care that Soren’s here. He’s blind to the danger.
“Whatever.”
“Don’t get all ‘whatever’ with me. Remember, we’re here to hunt down Blackstone. I know you dislike Soren, with good reason, but he’s a side issue.”
That makes my pulse quicken and I have to bite back an angry retort. Surprisingly, tears bite at the corners of my eyes.
“I don’t want to go tonight,” I say, a choke in my throat. “I’d rather stay and look over my files. Whoever’s doing the murders, we’ve got to find out who might be an Adept in town and who’s got a thing for beautiful college girls.”
“Eve,” he says tilts my chin up so I can’t avoid his eyes. “Every man has a thing for beautiful college girls.” He leans down and kisses me. “Look, I understand, I really do. You hate Soren. You have a vendetta against him.” He sighs. “We can’t be sidetracked by personal vendettas. We’re on an operation to infiltrate Blackstone. This is work.”
I nod, and he pulls me into his arms, his warmth enveloping me, and he calms me, my anxiety about tonight dissipating.
I hate that he can do that to me. While he can’t compel my mind, he can affect my body and my ability to resist him. I bite my cheek. The pain helps block him.
“Eve, why must you always fight me?”
“I don’t like it that you can just manipulate me, make me feel things or not feel them against my will.”
“I’m a vampire, in case you forgot. You’re lucky I can’t compel you.”
“If you could, what would you do?”
“I’d compel you to go get dressed in that pretty black velvet dress Luke gave you when he held you at his warehouse,” he says, sighing when he feels me block him out. “But do what you want. I’m going tonight. I’ll have a shower and then, if you want, you can come with me. If you’re not with me, who knows what he might compel me to do. Or who to be with.”
“Would he have to compel you?”
“Eve,” he says, exhaling. He brushes hair off my cheek. “Of course he would but if he did, I wouldn’t even know it. I don’t want anyone but you.”
“So you do realize he’s been compelling you not to think he's the one responsible for the River Man killings, right?”
He smiles, his mouth quirking in that grin of his. “Eve, you are sooo cute…” He bends down and kisses me. “Now go get dressed before I ravish you right here on the floor.”
Soren is such a bastard…
I put on Luke’s dress and brush my hair, put on a bit of makeup. Julien dresses in something a bit more formal – a black suit with white shirt and black silk tie. He looks devastatingly handsome with his dark hair and blue eyes, a few days-worth of stubble on his jaw.
“You look good enough to eat,” he says and pulls me against him. “Don’t worry about tonight, Eve. Just be with me. Ignore what goes on around you. You and me – we’re together and that’s what matters. Soren will try to shock you. He loves getting a reaction from people, testing their limits, seeing how far he can push them to go beyond their normal behavior.” He runs his fingers through my hair and strokes my jaw with the backs of his fingers.
“Don’t think you can outwit him. Don’t look him in the eyes unless he tells you to. Don’t talk back to him – at least not too much. Actually, I suspect he loves it when you resist and when you fight him, Eve. He needs you but he could decide to just kill you if you were too much trouble.”
“What did he mean when he said he would just make another one of me?”
He exhales heavily and sits on the bed, pulling me between his thighs. He runs a hand from my cheek to his bite mark, which he touches softly, down my shoulder to my hand.
“He used DNA from the Grigori to create all the new Adepts in your group.”
“He created us?” I say, shocked, adrenalin flooding through me.
“Not him personally, but his scientists.”
“But I thought he was out for Dominion… I thought we were created to fight those out for Dominion.”
“He wants his own version of Dominion. Instead of a military structure, he wants a religious one.”
“The Church.”
Julien nods. “He thinks he’s one step ahead of Blackstone and will just swoop in and take over when they make their move, using your group of Adepts to do so. I don’t know all the details, but he’s maneuvering himself into place to take power when the opportunity arises.”
“You think Blackstone’s the real threat?”
“They most definitely are. They’re the ones who will send things into a tailspin. Soren’s hoping to take advantage, fill the power vacuum. In times of crisis, people turn to religion. They need to believe in something. He wants to be the one thing they can hold onto in times of chaos.”
“Why haven’t you told me this before?”
He shrugs. “Before the bomb, I figured there was only so much you needed to know. Things changed when I thought I’d lost you. When I thought you were dead.”
“So you’re less concerned about Soren than Blackstone.”
He nods. “If we stop Blackstone, Soren’s pretty much out of luck. He’s hoping they’ll succeed and then he can launch his strike and then take over. I have to prevent that.”
He pulls me close and kisses me, then kisses his bite mark on my neck.
“Things will be uncomfortable for you tonight with Michel there. I can drug you so that you’re not upset.”
I take in a deep breath, and wonder what to expect. With Soren, I just don't know.
“Let me manage on my own. I have to get tough if I’m going to be of any use to you. Besides, I chose you.”
“You did. I hope you don’t regret it.”
“Never.”
I cup his face in my hands. He’s so beautiful with those black-lashed blue eyes, that soft mouth. I lean down and kiss him.
“You smell so nice,” I say as he pulls me into an embrace.
“Sandalwood.”
I pull back. “You like it, too?”
“You like it,” he says, a wistful smile on his face as he brushes hair off my cheek. “I want you to be happy.”
“It doesn’t bother you that it’s Michel’s scent?”
“You like it. That’s good enough.”
“I love you,” I say and kiss him, running my fingers through his hair. I pull back and stare in his eyes. “I’m afraid of Soren.”
“You don’t show it,” he says and smiles. “He really thinks that when he needs you, you’ll just do what he says. He has no doubt. If he threatens you, it’s just for show. I doubt he’d kill you no matter how much you resist him.”
“Why is he so sure?
”
Julien shrugs. “He’ll just use his secret weapon.”
“Which is?”
He strokes my hair. “He’ll just threaten to kill us and you’ll have to choose between our deaths and compliance.”
I close my eyes. When I open them, his face is somber.
“It can never get to that point, Julien. Never.”
Soren’s place is just as ostentatious as I expect. I step over the threshold into one of the most beautiful homes I’ve ever been in. The opulence overwhelms me. White marble floors and walls, pink sandstone tiles on the floor, a huge crystal chandelier in the foyer. Art from every era hanging on the walls.
I stand in the entrance and my heart rate increases as I see all the vampires standing around in their finery, beautiful women draped over them. I’m afraid to look around too closely in case I see Michel. Beside me, Julien slips his arm around my waist and pulls me closer.
A servant comes to us and takes our coats, while another one escorts us into a large room with several seating areas set up where couples stand and sit, drinking champagne and eating canapés. They’re all beautiful – vampires and their pets. About ten couples in total. I don’t see Michel or Soren and I take in a deep breath and try to relax.
Julien squeezes my hand. He knows how I feel.
“If at any time you need help, just let me know.”
I squeeze his hand back. “I have to be tough. I made my choice.”
Julien leans down and kisses his bite mark on my neck. “I’ll do everything I can so you don’t regret it.”
We go to a set of wingback chairs by a floor to ceiling arched window. I sit while Julien stands beside me, one hand on my shoulder. I take a big sip of champagne punch from a tall crystal glass a servant offers me. I need the courage.
“Watch how much you drink, Eve,” Julien says. “Remember your lips become even more loose when you’re tipsy.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“Personally, I love it when you’re a bit stoned or drunk,” Julien says and squeezes my shoulder. “You’re so funny. So honest. No lies.”
