by Jessica Lee
“We’re not done with you yet,” Arran spat.
“You got your punch in,” Markus muttered. “You’re going to want to leave it at that.” His fist curled.
“Markus!” The master vampire sighed. “Talk to me.” His tone tempered, but Markus could tell the more-than-three-century-old creature of the night barely held the reins on his control. “There’s got to be more going on here.”
“That’s why I came back.” Markus glanced back over his shoulder at Kenric. “But what I walked into feels more like a lynching party, and I am the guest of honor. Doesn’t seem like anyone here is ready for a chat.”
“What did you expect?” Guerin chimed in. “Balloons and cake when you popped in?”
“You brought Alex back unharmed,” Kenric said. “For that, we’re all very pleased.”
“I would never harm Alexandria!” The idea that they thought he would hurt her breathed oxygen onto the spark of anger simmering in his gut. “The only reason I stepped foot in this place was to return Alexandria to the care of her sister and to let you know I’m out of here.”
“Out of here?” Kenric’s questioning gaze darted to Guerin, his friend and second-in-command, before pinning Markus. “You’re leaving the Enclave—permanently?”
“The Enclave?” Markus laughed. “I didn’t realize I was a part of that gig anymore.” He shook his head. “But yeah.” He nodded. “I’ve got personal business to take care of with Enrique, so I’m moving on.”
Alexandria’s delicate, sleeping face flashed inside his mind, her long dark lashes casting shadows beneath her eyes as he’d laid her on her bed. He had no idea how long he’d stood there, memorizing her features, before Elle had rushed into the room. The thought of never seeing her again sent a pang of agony through his chest, threatening to double him over. Markus clamped down hard on his jaw, refusing to flinch. He had to do this. When she woke and took a good long walk through the memories he’d awakened, she would despise him.
The most merciful thing he could do for her now was to remove himself from her sight. And her life.
“Enrique?” Kenric crossed his arms. “What business do you have with him?”
“The kind that involves a silver-plated dagger to his heart.”
“Are you saying you think he was responsible somehow for the DEAD ambush the other night?” This time it was Guerin asking the question.
“I most certainly think that,” Markus said.
“But how?” Kenric leaned his hips against one of the leather chairs. “What makes you think he has that kind of influence, especially since Marguerite is no longer in the picture?”
“I don’t know how he’s managed to make it happen,” Markus said, the vein in his temple throbbing with his effort to remain civil. “But after the message he sent through Alexandria, then Christian showing up and bedding down with the Enclave…” The sharp points of his fangs dug into his lower lip. “Like I said before, it’s too damn coincidental. I know him.” Markus grunted. “Too fucking well. He wants payback—from the Enclave for Marguerite’s demise, but especially from me. And he knows the best way to make that happen is through Alexandria.”
“You sound like a male with a plan.” Kenric laced his fingers and rested his hands across his lower abdomen.
“You’re damn straight I am.” Markus ran his fingers along the cherrywood shelving, absently scanning the spines of the books the Enclave’s master had gathered over the many decades: Poe, Twain, Dickens.
“So how do you intend to find him?” Kenric asked. “And when you do, how do you intend to prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that he’s the one who set the whole event in motion, before you kill him?”
“Locating the bastard won’t be a problem. Eventually, someone who knows where the rat is holing up will point me to him.” Markus faced the others in the room. “As far as proof, I don’t need any hard evidence to know that attack had Enrique written all over it.”
Like a bug under a magnifying glass, Kenric studied him before going on. “What happened between you and Marguerite’s former commander that would have him seeking revenge against you?”
Spilling his guts to the males in that room about his history with Enrique would have about as much of a chance of happening as him becoming a Belieber. “Enrique and I had our differences when it came to leadership.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” a voice murmured. All heads swiveled toward the library door and the uninvited male. Christian stepped fully into the room and pushed the door closed behind him.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Markus snapped. The young vamp had some big-ass balls.
“You have something to say, Christian?” Kenric straightened from his spot against the chair.
“Yeah.” Christian nodded, his attention nervously flickering among the warriors in the room. “Markus is right.” He shrugged. “For the most part.”
“What do you mean, for the most part?” Markus’s pulse edged higher. Heat radiated from his chest, up his neck, and into his face. “Spit it out already.” He charged the male, two-fisting the SOB’s green hoodie, yanking the other guy up and into his face. “What the hell do you know about this?”
“Bloody hell, Markus!” Kenric appeared next to him. “Give him a second to open his mouth.”
Reluctantly, Markus exhaled and released the young vampire with a shove. Christian staggered, but quickly recovered, shrugging his shirt back into place on his shoulders.
“I’m listening,” Markus chewed out.
“What I was trying to say…” Christian narrowed his green gaze at him, the tattooed black lines around his right eye adding an extra dose of menace to his expression. Markus had to choke back a laugh. It’d take more than this pip-squeak to rattle Markus’s cage. Christian turned his attention to Kenric. “…is that what Markus said about Enrique wanting to dole out some revenge on his head is true, but Markus and Alex aren’t his main target.”
“What are you getting at?” Guerin asked, mirroring Markus’s exact thought. The other two males in the room circled in closer.
Christian looked to Guerin, then back to Kenric and sighed. “Eve, sir.”
Curling his fist, Markus raised his arm, and had to backstep a few paces to keep from carrying out the impulse to coldcock the traitorous asshole. “Son of a bitch!”
“You bastard!” Guerin roared and surged for the male, but Kenric grabbed him seconds before he made contact and shoved him back.
Markus pinned Kenric with his best no one ever fucking listens to me glare.
“I told you I didn’t trust him the moment the bastard set foot in this house.”
“You don’t think Christian’s been on my radar?” Kenric met him with one of his own you think I’m stupid? stares. “These are my walls, my people, my Enclave. I knew it was a risk letting him inside here, knowing Enrique had sired him. But that old saying is true about keeping your friends close and your enemies closer.”
“So you knew he was a spy and you still brought him in?” Guerin closed the few steps separating him and the master vampire. “What the fuck?”
“I didn’t say that.” Kenric glanced over at the male in question. “I said I allowed Christian to move in to get a better idea if he was working for Enrique or not.”
The redheaded vamp stared in the direction of the fireplace. The guilty asshole didn’t have enough backbone to look them in the face.
“And if he was,” Kenric continued, “what the hell was their agenda?”
“And you all wonder why I took Alexandria away to take care of her—to protect her.” Markus flipped his hands up as if in surrender.
Kenric quirked his brow. “I suspected that if you knew about Eve, there was a chance Enrique would have known about her as well.”
Dammit… He had a good point. Enrique had been with Marguerite longer than he had. Yet the way she’d handled Enrique indicated he’d never been more to her than an obedient tool and an occasional fuck. “But I never got the i
mpression that she shared such secrets with him.”
“She didn’t,” Christian said.
The warriors in the room turned back to the mole.
“He’d overheard Marguerite a couple of times talking about a daughter. Later, after she died, he found a picture of Eve in Marguerite’s vanity. Then, when he spotted that same female with you, Guerin…” Christian shrugged. “He put all the pieces of the puzzle together, and sent me in for any additional information about her I could gather.”
“I see,” Guerin said and began pacing a slow circle around the male. Christian followed him with his gaze as far as he could, but seemed to instinctively realize, like a human who’d been pinned by a bear, that he shouldn’t even dare to move a muscle. “What I don’t understand is, why?”
“Why what, sir?” Christian muttered.
“You’ve gotten away with your deception this far, why come clean now?” Guerin came to a stop in front of the new vampire. “Don’t you fear for your life?”
“You mean Enrique?” Christian looked up, meeting the larger vampire’s stare.
“No. Me.” Guerin snarled, then snagged the male by his neck, dragged him across the floor, and slammed the back of his head into the door with a loud thud.
“Do it,” Christian wheezed out despite the tight hold Guerin had around his throat. “I’m sick of being somebody’s puppet, their servant, or their Calyx.” The other male’s hand fell away from Guerin’s fingers at his neck. “Kill me,” Christian chewed out, and closed his eyes. “Just get it over with.”
“What the hell…” Markus groaned. “You’re not even going to give us the satisfaction of a good fight?” What was this world coming to?
“To hell with this.” Guerin stepped back, allowing Christian to sag onto his knees. “I’m not going to kill you.” The Enclave’s second-in-command frowned. “Not that you don’t deserve it, but because you still have information I want about Enrique.”
“That, and the fact that he did come to us before things went too far,” Kenric added.
Markus sauntered over to the male on the floor. “Get your ass up.” Markus leaned over, grabbed a handful of his hoodie, and pulled him back up onto his feet. “You still haven’t said why you came in here now and decided to essentially throw yourself at the mercy of the Enclave.”
Christian’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “At first, I thought I could stomach what Enrique had planned. But after living here, seeing how things could be so different, getting to know Alex, Elle, and”—he glanced over at Guerin, then back to Kenric—“Eve, I couldn’t keep up my cover any longer. Enrique gets fucking crazier every day.” Christian wrapped his arms around his midsection. “I overheard what Markus said about his plans to go after Enrique, and I couldn’t keep my mouth shut any longer. You deserve to know the whole truth.” Christian looked to Markus. “If you still want to go after Enrique, I can help you.”
…
Markus grunted, kicked the bedsheet off his legs and rolled onto his back. Keeping his eyes closed, he ran through the conversations with the other Enclave warriors, over and over, inside his head. Staying planted in his room and waiting for the moon to rise before acting on their plan was driving him insane. Worse, Alexandria was in her room, only a few feet away, and the last thing she wanted was for him to come anywhere near her. Yet not knowing how she was coping—what she was thinking—was eating him alive.
The delicate scent of vanilla mixed with honey tantalized his nostrils. His cock stirred, lifting the sheet covering his pelvis, his pulse a throbbing beat inside its head. Christ. His mind was playing tricks on him, tormenting him with her fragrance. He was fucking losing it. Markus squeezed his eyes shut, raised his arms, and settled the weight of his head on his palms. He had to let her go. If only he could force his mind to obey and give him some peace.
A slight stirring in the air was his only warning before the cool edge of a blade pressed to his throat and he felt the weight of another body straddling him.
Markus didn’t twitch.
Didn’t open his eyes. Sight wasn’t necessary to figure out who the likely suspect was.
“Hello, Alexandria.”
“Don’t you dare speak my name,” she said, pressing the serrated edge a little harder against his neck. The sharp points stung as they opened his flesh, and a warm trickle of his life essence pooled at the base of his throat. “You don’t deserve to even feel the consonants on your tongue.”
“You’re right.” He lifted his eyelids. Alexandria stared down at him, her hair falling around her face like a midnight veil. The warmth of her core seared his semihard cock through the thin fabric of the sheet. He curled his fists beneath his nape, willing himself to focus. If she hadn’t been threatening to slit his throat right now, he’d be hot as hell. “I didn’t deserve anything we ever shared.” And he meant it.
“You make me sick.” Her voice broke, and her body swayed on top of his.
“If nothing else, please believe me when I say how much I hated—”
“Don’t!” She shook her head. “I don’t want to hear your lies about how sorry you are or excuses about why you did that to me.”
“I get that I can never make things right between us. I blew that chance a long time ago.”
“That’s one thing you’ve gotten right,” she snapped. Her rapid breaths were the only other sound in the room.
“I also know you don’t want to kill me,” he said. She was pissed off. Understandable. But Alexandria wasn’t a cold-blooded killer.
“You’re so wrong.” She reseated the dagger against his throat for emphasis.
The sharp edge of the blade dug into his flesh. Triggered by the pain, his fangs burst through his gums.
“Oh my God,” she scoffed, leaned her head back, and tossed her hair over one shoulder. “Just yesterday, I almost cared about you. You sat there in that basement and let me open myself up to you like you were my friend. Like I meant something to you.” Her voice trembled. “You listened while I cried about the man who’d molested me when I was a child, then held me, comforted me, and the whole time you sat there keeping your own dirty secret of how you messed with my mind.” She drew closer, her cheek almost touching his, her breath warm on his ear. “You’re a damn hypocrite,” she whispered. “And I want you dead more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.”
Markus closed his eyes. She hated his guts, and nothing he had to say, no excuse, would ever change that fact.
“Wait till sundown,” he managed to utter despite the threat of her dagger. “After that, you’ll more than likely get your wish without having to get your hands bloody in the process.” It was the truth. According to Christian, Enrique had a partner with high stakes invested in acquiring Eve. Money meant resources. Power. None of them had a damn clue what kind of situation they’d be walking into. As a result, there was a good chance both he and Christian would end up dust. But not before he made sure Enrique went down with them.
“What are you talking about?” Alexandria lifted her head and glared down at him.
“As soon as the sun sets, I’m out of here,” he said. “You won’t have to worry about putting those pretty eyes of yours on me again.” The moment the words exited his lips an arrow of pain arced through his gut. But he held it together. He had to. For her. Getting away from Alexandria was the best for everyone.
“Kenric’s finally kicking you out?” A corner of her mouth lifted in challenge.
“Not exactly.” The muscles in his arms began to cramp, and Markus eased his hands out from under his pillow.
“No you don’t!” Alexandria drove her point home with a wiggle of her blade. “Keep your arms where they were.”
Reluctantly, Markus shoved his hands back in place. Whatever she needed to feel in control.
“Kenric isn’t forcing me to leave. I’m blowing this house to settle a debt with Enrique. He has to be stopped. We found out he’s not only set his sights on you, but his primary target is Eve.”
“Eve?” Her eyes widened. “How does he know about her?”
“Somehow he put two and two together after running into her with Guerin that night. Come to find out, that’s why Christian is here.”
“Dammit,” she breathed, and her lashes lowered. “And Elle and I walked him right through the door.” She opened her eyes. “Is Christian still alive?”
“Very much so. In fact, he says he’s willing to get me a one-on-one with Enrique.”
“Oh my God…and you believe this plan of yours could be a suicide mission.” Keeping the blade in place, Alexandria leaned back. “I get it now,” she said, her tone firm, determined. “It all makes sense why you allowed yourself to rot away in that cage in the basement. You would’ve rather died than have to face what you did with Marguerite—to me.” She withdrew the dagger and slowly shook her head. “Death is too easy for you.” She stared down at the weapon, the metal glinting from the low light filtering in from the hallway. “You’re right.” She glanced up. “I’m not going to kill you.”
Alexandria maneuvered off him and stood. Markus rose up on his elbows as she backed away from the bed. Even in the shadows, she captivated him in her form-fitting black T-shirt and shorts. He would never stop loving her, craving her, with every ounce of what was left of his soul.
“I never thought you would,” he said. “That’s not who you are, Alexandria. Life’s been hell on you, but through it all, you’ve managed to hang on to your compassion.”
“Even now, you’re so damn arrogant,” she snapped. “Don’t pretend like you know everything about me. Because you don’t. You have no idea how close I came to following through with this.” She palmed the hilt, pointing the blade toward her inner arm. “You hurt me,” she said. “It took me a long time to come to terms with the fact that you stole my humanity, but this…” She shook her head. “You violated my mind. Not once, but twice when you stole my memories to hide the evidence. Then you played me. Pretended to care about me.”
“That wasn’t a game,” he said, his voice hoarse. She could believe whatever she wanted about him and the reasons he’d had to do what he did to her. But when he’d shown her affection, told her he’d wanted her, his feelings had never been a lie.
