Magic After Dark: A Collection of Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance Novels

by Margo Bond Collins

  “Let Dante and Ryker go, please.” I swallowed, my throat tightening. “And I’ll do what you want.”

  He flicked a loose strand of hair behind an ear and licked his lips. “I need you to die.”

  “You’re a sociopath.” Hatred fueled my words because Lash should never be in charge of a city, in charge of people’s lives, making decisions on their behalf. He belonged in a looney bin.

  “Ryker,” he called out, yet Lash’s narrowing gaze never left me. “Kill her.”

  I shuddered and my attention flew to Ryker who moved forward with haste. Just like in the Lower Corner, this wasn’t my boyfriend, but someone under possession.

  But that didn’t matter now. Not when Ryker glared at me with hatred in his eyes. He retrieved a gun from his utility belt.

  I threw myself into a forward roll, the heat and deafening pop of the bullet skimming across my back. On my feet, I unleashed a blast of power, targeting his hand. The pistol flew out of his grasp, vanishing into the darkness smothering us.

  When Ryker turned toward me, the corner of his mouth twitched, and pure evil filled his gaze. I didn’t want to remember him this way.

  “Ryker, please.” My whole body shook, desperate to break through to him, to have him smile.

  He didn’t respond, but instead, Lash’s voice boomed. “Dante, go help your buddy. Tear her apart. Ninjas, join in.”

  “You son of a bitch.” I turned to the mayor, my hand raised, except he stood behind Dante, who had blood coating his arm and running down his chest.

  Now both of my men stared at me with death glares. Two ninjas followed them. And on a strange plane of existence, I was glad they wouldn’t recall this moment. No one ought to live with the memory of butchering a loved one.

  Golden sparks zapped from my fist, clenching the balls. The prospect of hurting either Ryker or Dante wrenched my soul.

  All four darted toward me.

  I shoved the raw energy coursing through me at them. The electrical lines zigzagged between the four attackers like spider webs. Seeing them convulsing and frothing at the mouth curled my insides, but I wouldn’t kill them. I swung my attack toward Lash.

  Except something dark shifted in my peripheral vision. A ninja crashed into my side with a jab to my ribs, and I crumbled to the ground, the wind knocked out of me.

  I pushed myself to my knees, but punches slammed into my back, my sides. I tossed a fiery ball at the attacker. He flew backward. I gasped for air and sat up.

  But with a sudden strike to my thighs, my face shuddered. I flinched, crying out loud, and curled in on myself, muscles tight, cries building in my chest. Failure wasn’t an option, not when it involved everyone remaining at the mercy of a madman.

  I drew on my energy, pooling it down my arm, and stuck out my fist. But a staff struck my knuckles like a branding iron. Agony flashed through me, and my arm flopped downward, the marbles tumbling from my hold, scattering around me.

  “No!” I reached for them, but a stick clubbed my arm. I drew it back, cradling the wound against my chest. My mind was an empty void. Desolation consumed me; all hope evaporated. My world lay in ruins and if I didn’t find the marbles, I’d lose everything.

  Tears blurred my vision. Sticks slammed into me. I screamed in agony, broken, shattered. My skin felt stretched over beaten muscles.

  Desperate; I wailed from each hit. My ears filled with the distinct crack of my bones. I bit my tongue until the metallic taste of blood coated my mouth, grazing my teeth. My insides felt as if a vice squeezed and smashed my organs into a tiny box. I couldn’t stop shaking, but if I stayed, I’d die. I called the power, and it flowed through me with a thread of hope. I raised my hand, and at once, a jagged bolt of energy sprung from my fingers, striking the assailants. They collapsed near my legs.

  I kicked a ninja in the head and pushed myself onto my stomach with a groan. With a hand to my side that burned with fire, I crawled on knees, searching for the marbles. Blood rolled into my eyes, and my vision blurred. Please. Please, let me find them.

  When someone kicked my lower back, I collapsed. White light kept flashing in my vision. I chanced a look upward.

  Amusement painted Dante’s smirk. He gripped a knife as did Ryker on my other side.

  Not only would I lose my life, but I would die at the hands of the two men I’d given myself to, and that ripped me to shreds.

  I scoured the surrounding shore, spotting the glass marble out of reach. But where were the others?

  “Hold her down,” the mayor barked.

  Two ninjas held me down, the third gripping my hips. Dante and Ryker stretched my arms outward in a T-shape and placed their knees against my hands.

  My mind numbed, and tears slid down the sides of my face.

  Lash crouched above my head. “Now, Robyn. You didn’t want to play my game, so we’ll do this differently. No mistake—you will die tonight, but first, let’s have fun.” His malevolent leer left me quivering with fury, and my loathing for him dug deep within me through pity and guilt.

  I spat blood in his face and wrestled against the hands restraining me. I bucked and writhed, but nothing helped. Soreness settled across my body in a sharp throbbing as if someone had poked my wounds with a fire stick.

  “I love your spirit. But now, Ryker and Dante, listen carefully. Carve your names into her arms. Then kill her. Once the police find her, you two can enjoy the pleasure of rotting in prison for her murder. Jealousy makes people do crazy shit.” His lips morphed into a twisted line and his eyes carried the wildness of an unpredictable animal.

  I trembled and shot hatred at Lash, but he stood, brushing his crumpled jacket. “I should have brought popcorn.”

  “You fucking asshole. Killing me won’t get your revenge.”

  “No, but it will get you out of my way.” He slapped Dante on the back. “Come on now, slice her up.”

  Fear chewed on my insides. The moment their blades pierced the flesh on both arms, dragging, stabbing me, I screamed.

  Chapter 19

  Ryker’s blade met soft flesh on my inner wrist. The tip tore across my skin, making a revolting squish. I bucked, drowning, gasping for air. Dante sliced his name into my other arm.

  “S…stop, please, stop…” I bellowed from each deep, precise, and excruciating cut. The viscous red drenched me. Make it stop! Three ninjas held me down. I screamed, remaining glued to the ground. In that moment, it was hard to remember what smiling or happiness felt like.

  “Dante, you’re hurting me,” I cried, tears streaking my cheeks. But he didn’t even flinch, and neither did Ryker. The world around me faded in and out. I’d seen darkness before, endured the grief of losing my brother, but I wasn’t sure I’d survive this.

  The mayor laughed as he towered above me, his hands folded across his chest, his eyes devouring my suffering. “Ryker, you’ve got quite the skill at calligraphy.”

  The maniacal psychopath had my insides boiling with rage, twisting with the horrible reality of me dying. I fought the ninjas, Ryker and Dante, but their determination was unwavering. Sweat slid down my neck, and my shrieks were a constant siren in my ears.

  Escape seemed an impossibility as I lay there, imprisoned, involuntarily twitching. But then how many more children would he kill? A blaze of fury shot through my veins as I pictured Peter fed to the demon, along with the other missing kids, all for Lash’s revenge.

  The knives shredding my skin left me convulsing. “Enou…”

  Lash’s grin had me burning from the inside out. Who the hell didn’t have shit in their past. The vast majority never morphed into mass murderers.

  My insides rattled like a volcano about to detonate. A fire consumed my core. The edges of my sight darkened. I wouldn’t let myself pass out, wouldn’t stop fighting until my last breath.

  Ryker pulled back, sitting on his heels, studying his handiwork, his head tilting. When I looked down my arm, I found a massive pool of blood. Dante did the same and raised his blade above me.
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  A cry choked me, freezing me as I stared up at the moonlight glinting off his knife.

  I curled my butchered arms to my chest, cradling them, biting my lower lip until I tasted the metallic flavor, but nothing detracted from the blinding pain feasting on me. The tears blurred with the memories of my times with Dante and Ryker.

  But a fire within raged wilder, fiercer. Was this a state of delusion taking over, panic and shock digging its claws into me? The heat scorched me.

  “Aim for the heart, gentlemen,” Lash called out. “A fitting and ironic end.”

  “Ryker, Dante, don’t do this.” I hated pleading. “This isn’t you. Concentrate on what you’re doing. I love you both.”

  Lush tapped his palm to my brow. “Nice try; now die already.” He wiped his hand on his pants. “Why are you so hot and clammy?”

  I threw a punch to his face but screeched from the movement. It felt as if someone had jabbed broken glass into my arm.

  Lash staggered upright and licked the crimson from the cut on the corner of his mouth. He grabbed a dagger from the back of his belt. “Hold down her arms.”

  Ryker and Dante seized my wrists. I yelled with pain, but they wrenched them outward, their knees pinning my palms to the ground.

  A cocktail of electrifying energy twirled across my limbs. The fingers on my left hand tingled. Small movement caught my attention from amid the pebbles near my arm.

  A faint thread of electricity twined around my thumb, then vanished. I concentrated, drawing on my ability, but found nothing.

  “Okay, boys, make this brutal,” the mayor said. “Robyn has led you both on, promised you herself, but like all bitches, she played you.”

  Ryker and Dante stared down at me, their expression vacant. How would they have reacted if they were clearheaded? If I died here tonight, they’d never know the truth. I’d lose the two men who made me complete, who offered me something different, yet everything I wanted. And I’d been too stupid to realize that earlier. I’d run away from Dante. Lied to Ryker when I should have come clean and given him the chance to accept me as a Traveler. I’d lived with too many lies and secrets, pretending I could start a new life. I’d been an idiot. Desperation to fix my mistakes streamed through me. My heart slammed beneath my breastbone like a bomb, counting down to the final explosion.

  “Lash, please. Maybe I can help you.” I stared at my arm. From within the shadows, the three marbles tumbled over the pebbles of their own volition. I sensed them like a stretched elastic band between us.

  “Don’t need your help,” Lash replied with a smirk.

  The moment the marbles touched my wrist, power jolted me, and I shuddered.

  The balls rolled higher along my arm, and all three sunk into my wound, vanishing below the surface. What the…? Fear shackled me. I didn’t want them inside my body! Perspiration soaked my skin, and I heard the raspy sound of oxygen flooding my lungs, the rushing of my blood.

  “Kill her now!”

  A bonfire of energy cracked around me. I thrashed about, unable to stop.

  The knives plunged toward my chest, one aiming at my face. But in that same split second, white light burst out of my mouth.

  Everyone was flung outward from the force.

  The earth quivered beneath me, and within moments, I lay still, no longer exhaling threads of electric currents. Above me, golden stars stabbed the night sky, the nearby river lapped at the shore, and the hum of motorbikes sang on the wind. The tension that had suffocated me earlier now melted into nothing.

  I pushed myself to my feet, my broken body almost limp. With a hand clutching my ribs, I stumbled forward. Red splattered my clothes and ran in thick rivulets down my arms. Somehow, the marbles had entered my system and hadn’t come out. But I didn’t care, not when they drove my pulse. On either side of me lay Ryker and Dante, both unconscious, along with the three ninjas. But near the water’s bank, the mayor lifted himself. His attention jerked in my direction, and he snarled.

  “Fucking bitch. When Lilith returns, she’ll take everyone’s soul but mine. So fighting me now is futile.” He smirked his delusional smile.

  A snap of electricity swirled toward my fingertips, and the earlier blaze flared alive once again, bubbling at the center of my body.

  The more I studied Lash, the hotter fury filled me. He’d killed so many and brought a demon into our world. “You’ll never harm anyone again.”

  He stormed closer, arms swinging by his side. “This time I’ll slice your throat myself.” Lash spoke with coldness.

  Time seemed to slow down. I drew on my energy, the electricity my judge and jury. Enough blood had been spilled.

  Lash pulled a knife from his belt, his eyes wider than a saner person’s. His face splattered with blood—mine.

  I reached out, calling for the energy, bubbling within my veins.

  He was ten feet away, his hard stare assaulting me. “I’ll skin you alive.”

  But he would never harm me again, or anyone else. The demons could have him.

  I forced all the energy into my hand. And suddenly, a fireball of power shot out, smashing into his face to shut him the fuck up, propelling him backward. His scream was swallowed by the current coiling around his head, weaving into his mouth and out his nostrils. Lash’s frozen eyes held mine for a fraction of a second before they blackened with the rest of his face. The putrid smell of burning flesh blanketed the air.

  Lash crumbled to the ground. His head had disintegrated into black dust.

  I dropped my arm and staggered. My legs wobbled, and my knees kissed the pebbly shore. The river spun around me, and I fell forward, hitting the rocks. Blackness dominated me, and for the first time that night, I welcomed the abyss.

  Chapter 20

  Grogginess clung to my brain. I ached everywhere, even in my toes. I shifted to get more comfortable, but a piercing ache stung my side, and I cringed, clutching the dressing around my ribcage. The mattress beneath me squeaked, and a teasing aroma of coffee caressed my nostrils. Wait… if I was laying in a bed… I wasn’t near the river.

  I pried open my heavy eyelids and stared up at a white ceiling glowing from the sunlight pouring in from the window. My mouth tasted like sandpaper, and I shifted onto my side. Spasms rattled me. Not only had I rolled onto my wrapped arm, but I’d come face to face with Ryker. He lounged in a chair alongside the bed, hands on his thighs. He offered no glazed-over eyes this time, just sympathy, and something else… misery.

  With Mayor Lash gone, did Ryker remember the past few days—the riot, our fight, him carving his name into my arm? Hell, the memory hacked at my insides—watching the two men I loved preparing to kill me. Ryker didn’t even move to comfort me when he saw I was awake, and that left me hollow.

  “Where am I?” I croaked.

  The sunlight behind Ryker gave him a glowing aura, but his lips turned downward and he kept staring at my injured arm, then sighed.

  “Marianne’s house.” Dante’s voice came from behind me, and, well… Oh, fuck! “She insisted on caring for you; to make up for how she treated you—turning you away when you first left the Hood.”

  I scooted up to sit up on the bed until my butt hit the headboard. When I turned my head toward him, I found him in another chair, offering me a smile. Bandages covered his shoulder and arm. Hell, how long had they been sitting there like gargoyles watching over me? What had they talked about? I was sure the topic had been me, and that notion had me curling in on myself.

  “Damn, sweetheart,” Dante began. “I’ve never seen anyone sleep for two days straight. But I’m glad you’re alive.”

  “Two days?” Did Ryker and Dante spend those days arguing and hashing things out, revealing every secret of mine? I felt sick to the stomach.

  Ryker cleared his throat. This situation right here was fucked. Couldn’t the universe have given me a break? I’d almost died, but no, apparently, now I had to deal with the two men in my life. Screwed-up shit at its finest. A rippling headache crawle
d through my skull.

  “What’s going on? What day is it?” Yeah, my mind leaped into panic mode and dribble came out.

  Ryker was on his feet and dragged himself to the window, and even without words, his disappointment pierced through me.

  “After we all passed out near the river,” Dante said, “the Hood took us to the Lower Corner.”

  I pressed my back into the pillow, staring at Dante, then flicked a gaze toward Ryker.

  Ryker turned to face us, his hands thrust into his pockets. “Dante and I had plenty of time to catch up on everything.” He exhaled heavily. “Though a lot of it still isn’t sitting right with me. I remember everything from the river that night, the mayor’s insanity, you shooting electricity bolts out of your fingers, me cutting…” He stared at my arms, and guilt crammed behind his gaze. His pain was difficult to watch, and shit, if I had to live with the memory of injuring someone I loved, it would tear me up from the inside out.

  “And now,” he continued. “I’m lying to the police chief about how the mayor ended up on the shore with his head burned off. But I guess you would understand since you’ve been lying since I’ve known you.”

  “Hey,” Dante interrupted. “Take it easy on her.”

  Ryker frowned, his expression darkening, and shifted his attention to me.

  I swallowed the boulder swelling in my throat. “That’s not fair. How could I have told you anything with the Hood being wanted criminals? I couldn’t put you in that position—to keep my secret or turn me in. You’d judge me like everyone judges Travelers.”

  Ryker pinched the bridge of his nose. “You didn’t give me the chance to make that decision myself.”

  I rubbed my face, but my arm throbbed too much, so I dropped it back to my side.

  “Okay, I fucked up, but if I had my time over, I wouldn’t endanger the Hood by telling you or anyone. If that pisses you off, I don’t know what to say.”

  Dante’s jaw tightened as he glared with intensity at Ryker.