by Larissa Ione
Now there was hypocrisy at its finest, given how Ares had stormed into Limos’s bedroom, hoping she’d arm up and give him a good battle. Fortunately, she’d mated a decent, honorable male who had talked some sense into Ares.
The veins in Than’s temples throbbed, and his voice scraped gravel. “I’m not sure I can do that right now.”
Shit. That left them with only one option; brace for impact. “Cara said everyone’s gone. It’s just your vamps, so you don’t have to worry if you go nuclear. I’ll make sure my Ramreels and Cara’s hounds are gone too.”
Than nodded, and Ares knew better than to stick around. He found Cara and headed outside to open a gate. It really sucked how their run of their rugood luck had turned to utter disaster. And as he glanced back at Thanatos, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the disasters were just beginning.
* * *
They found Hekili in the cellar, and Limos, who had seen every atrocity possible, who had grown desensitized to violence, reeled in shock. He truly had been butchered as if he were a cow in a slaughterhouse, and she had no doubt he’d been alive when the cutting began.
She didn’t know if she’d have reacted the same way to his gruesome death before she’d let Arik into her life, but it didn’t matter. The fact was that she’d liked the warg, had trusted him, and he’d died because of her.
He’d died in part because of her lies… lies she’d tried to protect by killing Sartael. And by killing Sartael, she’d enraged Lucifer, who would stop at nothing to hurt her and everyone around her.
Arik tried to pull her into his arms as they stood in the dark, dank cellar beneath her kitchen, and there was nothing she wanted more.
But she avoided his embrace, certain she’d lose her resolve if he caged her in his strong arms.
“Limos?”
“Don’t.” She darted up the steps and blew through the kitchen and out the front door. Arik followed, but she wouldn’t let him close. “Don’t touch me.”
He stood in the light of the moon, his dogtags glinting on his bare chest as if beckoning her. They’d been her comfort when he’d been in Sheoul, and now she hoped they’d be his. “Sweetheart, what’s going on?”
“I made a huge mistake, Arik.” She wrapped her arms around her middle, trying to hold herself together. Funny how she’d calmly dressed in shorts and a tank top after being told about Hekili, but now she was ready to come apart at the seams. “I’ve let what I want to be, a woman, a wife, a mother, overshadow what I need to be.”
“What are you talking about?” He moved forward, his bare feet sinking in the sand, but she stepped back.
“I’ve been a fool, hoping for what I can never have. I’m a Horseman of the Apocalypse. Half demon, half angel. All warrior who is meant for nothing but fighting.”
The lean angle of his jaw became a knife blade as his expression grew fierce. “You are all of those things and more. You are a beautiful woman, a wife, and we’ll make you a mother. Until then, we’ll fight together—”
“No.” She bit back a cry at what he’d just said. She wanted those things so much, but it was just a fantasy. “We won’t. It’s over, Arik. Divorce isn’t possible for us, but separation is.”
His head rocked back as if she’d slapped him. “You don’t mean that.”
“I do. You’re in danger because of me. You’ll always be in danger. If not from Pestilence, then from Lucifer. They’ll kill you to hurt me. I can to me.ze="t live with that, Arik. I won’t.”
“Dammit, Limos, it’s my choice to be with you. I’m willing to live with the danger.”
Of course he was. He was braver than anyone she’d ever met. But he was mortal, and bravery got more men killed than cowardice.
“I’m not.”
He ground his teeth so hard she could hear the scrape of enamel. “I don’t care. We’re married. That means I don’t walk away at the first little fight we have. And trust me, this barely counts as a fight. Get drunk, beat the shit out of everyone around you, and tell me you fucked a few neighbors, and then we’ll talk.”
His father was so lucky he was dead, because at this moment, she’d hunt him down and kill him for planting that kind of memory in Arik’s head.
Then it occurred to her that she had to go just as far now, or Arik would never give up on them. She might hate herself for doing this, but at least he’d be alive.
She inhaled deeply, preparing to throw a punch that was going to knock him down. “If you don’t accept my decision, I can make you accept it. I’ll get in your head and do some creative work so you think our breakup is your choice, not mine. Is that what you want?” Her ability wasn’t that extensive, but hopefully Arik didn’t know that.
He paled, and Limos’s chest broke wide open. “You wouldn’t. You swore—”
“I lied.” Steeling herself against his anger and disappointment, she shrugged. “You should be used to that by now.”
“Limos…” His voice cracked, and it dawned on her that he’d avoided saying her name for so long, and now he used it over and over in this conversation, as if using it as a lifeline. “Don’t do this. I love you. You love me.”
And now for the knockout blow. “That,” she said, reaching deep into the Limos she used to be, the Limos who enjoyed being a demon, “was a lie too.”
Heart wrenching, she threw a gate and left Arik alone on the beach.
Thirty
Regan hadn’t left when everyone else had.
Arik had told her to go, but she wasn’t a quitter, and what happened tonight only strengthened her resolve. Some big, bad evil had gone through like a tornado, tearing up the ground outside and completely destroying two outbuildings. A number of the demon guards had been slaughtered, either by Pestilence or by the gargantuan thing, and Regan’s mission had been clearer than ever.
The demons had to be stopped, the Apocalypse turned back. And if it took a Horseman’s kid to do it, so be it.
While she waited for the last of the wedding guests to leave, she patrolled the grounds l. Bundled in her parka, a stang in her gloved hand, she studied footprints and the bloodstains in the snow where demons had died. She’d encountered a lot of demons in her life, but some of the tracks she found were new to her, and some of them, like the Godzilla-sized one thirty yards from the keep, left her shaken. Regular-sized demons were hard enough to fight. How would humans fare against monsters as tall as twenty-story buildings?
Tired and shivering, she finally went back inside, but as she entered the great room, the sensation of being watched froze her mid-stride. Her pulse pounded in her ears as she swiveled her head toward the big warrior standing in front of the fire.
His merciless gaze was trained on her, flickering with cold death. All around him shadows swirled, turning his white bone armor gray and moving faster and faster as she watched. Her dark gift reared up, tapping against her skull as if wanting out.
Stay calm… must… stay… calm.
In horrifying slow motion, the shadows formed mouths and eyes, and then suddenly, one shot toward her.
A scream escaped her as she whirled and sprinted toward her bedroom, but the thing hit her from behind, sending her sprawling on the stone floor. Pain, as if a million tiny needles were being jammed all the way to the bone, became the air she breathed. Something seemed to reach inside her, and she swore she felt an icy hand close around her heart. A tugging sensation joined the pain, and holy shit, now she knew how it felt to be skinned alive, to have an essential part of you peeled away from other essential parts.
The thing was ripping her soul right out of her body.
All her training, all her discipline, went out the window, and she unleashed her gift. Her body vibrated, and light spilled from her, seeping from her very pores, until she was blinded from the white flash. The pain dissolved as a coil of living light extracted the invading shadow from her body.
Thanatos burst around the corner and skidded to a halt, his eyes wide. More shadows tore away from him and attacked
the light. The ball of dark and light writhed, tangled in the air, and then, gradually, the shadows swallowed the glow.
Regan didn’t wait around to see what would happen next.
On legs so wobbly they could hardly bear her weight, she stumbled into the bedroom and slammed the door. His vamp servants had started a fire in the hearth, but the room was cold, which didn’t help the shakes that wracked her body as she collapsed against the dresser, nearly knocking over a bottle of mead and two glasses sitting on a tray.
Mead… yes. Alcohol sounded like a really good idea. Her trembling fingers knocked over one of the glasses, but somehow she caught it before it hit the floor. The door opened, and she did her best to not shake even harder as Than walked in and gently took the glass from her.
She couldn’t look at him, couldn’t let him see in her eyes how terrified she was at the close call she’d just had. As a Guardian, she’d been in more life-or-death situations than she could count, but this was the first time she’d actually felt herself dying.dying.
Swallowing over and over, she pointed at the mead. “Open?”
“Damn,” he murmured, as he popped the wax seal off the rim. “Where did you find this?”
“V-vampire,” she said, hating herself for the stuttering.
A comforting gurgle and splash filled the room as he poured. Taking her hand, he placed the glass in her palm, wrapped her fingers around it, and guided the rim to her mouth.
“Drink,” he said softly, tipping the glass as it touched her lips.
The red liquid, spicy and smooth, flooded her mouth like a balm, easing her nerves before she even swallowed. “Those… were your souls, right?”
“Yes.” Thanatos stepped back with a glass of his own. He took two large drinks before saying, “When I’m angry, the souls that live inside my armor can break free. They want only one thing, and that’s to kill.”
“Why?”
“Because if they make a kill, they’re freed from me.”
She shuddered, remembering the pain as the thing tried to rip her apart from the inside. Was that what her victims experienced when she let loose her ability? Did they feel the living light tear the souls out of their bodies? She took another sip of her wine, and a tingly sensation joined the warmth spreading through her. “How do they get inside your armor?”
“Whenever I make a kill, the dead’s soul is sucked into it.” His voice was so casual it was chilling. She could barely talk about her own soul-sucking ability, and he might as well have been discussing grocery shopping. “Souls make my armor stronger.”
“And they just hang out, waiting for you to get angry?”
“Or to be released. I can release them in battle to do my bidding.”
Huh. “Sort of like those ghosts in the third Lord of the Rings movie? The Return of the King.”
His smile was stunning, but his eyes were sad. “Something like that.”
“How come they didn’t all come out?”
“I wasn’t fully enraged.”
She shuddered. “I don’t think I’d like to see that.”
“No, you wouldn’t.” His blond brow lifted, the silver piercing glinting in the firelight. “You wanna tell me about your little surprise?”
Her glass froze before it touched her lips. “Not really.”
A glistening drop of mead clung to his full lower lip, drawing her gaze and igniting a tiny flame of desire. The liquor, by itself, was bold and exotically spiced, but how much better would it taste if taken from Thanatos’s lips? Her breath caught as his tongue swept it uue sweptp. God, how could he make something so simple and normal seem so sexy?
“Ares would command you to talk,” he mused. “Reseph would charm it out of you. Limos…” His voice took on a rough, serrated edge. “She’d annoy the hell out of you until you spilled just to shut her up.”
“And you?”
His eyes gleamed. “I excel at torture.”
Of course he did. Her hand drifted down to her coat pocket, where she’d tucked her stang. “Are you going to torture me?”
“Are you going to tell me what you are?” He put the glass to his lips and regarded her from over the rim. “And don’t think your little Aegis weapon will be effective against me.”
Little Aegis weapon? Arrogant ass. “I’m one-hundred percent human.”
“A human with empathic abilities, I’d buy. A human who can communicate with the dead, I’d buy. But you have power over souls.” He surged closer, no doubt in an attempt to intimidate her with his height and size. It might have worked if she wasn’t buzzing from the wine. As it was, her pulse fluttered madly, and she mentally urged him to come closer. “So I’m not buying the human thing.”
“You want a DNA test? I’m human. My parents were both Guardians.” Technically, that was true. At the time she’d been conceived, her father had been possessed by a demon, but the Horseman didn’t need to know that.
“Is that so,” he murmured, and that fast, the aura of anger and menace that had surrounded him shifted into something more pleasant but no less dangerous.
His fingers came up to his throat, and his armor disappeared, leaving him in the clothes he’d worn for the ceremony. The white shirt under the tux jacket was unbuttoned at the neck, and his scorpion tattoo peeked out, its pincers opening and closing.
She blinked, wondering if the wine was affecting her vision. “Your tattoos are special, aren’t they?”
“All tattoos are special. People might get one on the spur of the moment, but everyone cares about the design they put on their body.”
“No, I mean… they do something for you.”
She thought he was going to clam up, but instead, he surprised her by shedding his jacket, somehow making the process tantalizing, an unintentional strip tease. He tossed the tux coat to the bed, and those long fingers went to his dress shirt. She couldn’t look away as he unbuttoned it and then made the shirt join the jacket.
Man, oh, man. Didn’t matter that she’d seen his bare upper body before… she didn’t think she’d ever grow used to all that magnificent artwork. His Seal, mounted on a fine gold chain, lay flat between his pecs, perfectly outlined by a Celtic knotted tattoo.
“These are scenes taken out of my head and transferred to my skin.”
“I knew tha“I knet, but why?”
“How did you know?” He moved toward her, slowly, his gait rolling, and she got the sense she was being stalked.
The tingly feeling in her limbs spread, both energizing and relaxing her. “I saw it when I touched you before. I can read tattoos the way I can read ink on parchment.”
The tingle turned into a pleasant burn unlike anything she’d ever felt. What had the vamp said about the wine? Magic. Right. No more for her.
Thanatos stopped when he was standing so close that she had to look up to see his face. “Can you control your empathic abilities?” His voice was husky, wonderfully deep, and it rumbled through her in a curiously erotic wave.
She put down the glass, feeling disconnected, like she was watching someone else set the glass on the dresser. Then she watched as he took her hand and placed it on his throat, over the scorpion that always appeared to be stinging his jugular when he spoke.
“Yes,” she whispered. “I can turn it off and on.”
“Are you… turned on?”
Oh, she caught the wordplay, was very aware it was intentional.
“No,” she said, and it was both truth and lie. She hadn’t switched on her empathic ability, though she could read a faint energy radiating from the scorpion. She was, however, extremely aroused.
Being here now had nothing to do with seducing Thanatos for The Aegis. She wanted him. It was that simple. The fear that she might let her soul-sucking ability loose during an uncontrolled moment didn’t apply here. Thanatos’s shadows would protect him, and for the first time in her life, she wanted to unchain her carnal side and let it hunt.
As if sensing her thoughts, Thanatos fastened his hand t
o the back of her neck and jerked her close, so their bodies were plastered together, and he mashed his lips against hers. His arousal was a brutal, huge presence against her belly, and his tongue was an assault weapon, breaching the barrier of her lips and taking what it wanted. Everything inside her went liquid and hot. Her breasts tightened, her skin burned, and between her legs, her sex ached.
“And now?” he murmured against her mouth.
“God, yes.” Her pulse leaped in her throat, in time with the throbbing low in her pelvis.
“You drive me crazy.” He rolled his hips against her, and he thought she was the one who was doing the crazy-driving? “I want you, Regan. More than I’ve wanted anyone, and damn you, I’m about to give in.”
“Yes,” she breathed. “Do.”
His hands dropped to her waistband, and suddenly, it was a frenzy of who-could-strip-fastest. Her mind was fuzzy, her emotions blurry, but she knew nothing but a driving, primal need to get this man on his back.
And he would be on his back. She needed to be in control, and she would nevehe wouldr, ever be under a man.
When the last item of clothing dropped to the ground, they both stood there, facing each other, their breath sawing in and out, fists clenched. Good God, he was gorgeous. He had a runner’s body, sleek and toned. Twin nipple rings decorated his tattooed pecs, his abs rippled with deep, muscular grooves, and his slim hips tapered to powerful legs. And between them, his arousal rose up, thick at the base and ridged with veins all the way to the smooth head.
“I can’t,” he rasped. “Can’t go all the way.”
Disappointment sang through her, but hell, she’d take what she could get at this point. Wait… why couldn’t he go all the way—?
His powerful arms came around her, caging her against him, and all thought stopped. His kiss was hard, hot, desperate. His cock speared her between the legs, rubbing against her sex as he pumped as though he was inside her.
“Bed.” She spun him, clipped his calf with her ankle, and shoved against his chest. Off balance, he hit the mattress on his back. Before he could recover, she leaped on top of him, straddling his thighs.
