by Devyn Quinn
Iollan didn’t appear human. His brow thickly ridged, he bared his canines in a snarl, half-pain, half-despair. His skin was ashen, gray with the poison of the silver spikes seeping into his system. God, he looked…fragile.
Seeing him, Callie felt her heart twist in pity and shame. She couldn’t speak. Tears threatened. She successfully blinked them back. It was a shame that people who called themselves rational and intelligent would needlessly inflict pain on another living entity, alien or not. It upset her to think this beautiful, magnificent man had been reduced to little more than a shell of his former self because of what he wasn’t. Human.
Fury hit. “Jesus Christ, can’t you see you’re killing him with those things?” She looked again, wincing. “It’s almost like he’s going into shock. Catatonic.”
Antsy, Forque searched her face. “We tried to get the restraints off. He won’t let us near him.”
Callie wanted to throttle the living shit out of him. She had to suck in a breath to calm herself. “Try harder.”
Forque, face white as milk, countered, “We’ve noticed he’s more responsive when you’re with him.”
Her glare withered. Her palm just ached for a strike at his stupid face. “Maybe that’s because I treat him like a man instead of a circus freak,” she shot back between gritted teeth.
Pale and pensive, the professor acquiesced. “The bond you’ve developed with him is undeniable. We’d like you to continue working with the subject on an exclusive basis.”
Callie winced as soon as the words were out of his mouth. She should have expected this, known exactly what Forque wanted when he’d summoned her to his office for a meeting. Listening in on the call, Paul Norton had shaken his head and mouthed a silent “No!” The actions of the bureau had been too volatile for his comfort zone.
Exclusive basis automatically implied a long-term commitment. Given that she and Norton were scheming to expose the project and its inhumane practices, lingering unnecessarily wouldn’t be possible much longer. Her own life hovered on the line. If she didn’t get out now, she never would.
An excruciating decision.
Walking away from the bureau might be the only way to save his life, but where would that leave him in the meantime? Alone.
Her conscience prodded in protest. Hands flexing at her sides, Callie looked back into the cell, hating the sight. Christ. Could she leave Iollan without even saying good-bye or trying to explain what she had planned?
Her feelings chimed in with a volume and intensity difficult to ignore. Walk away and she’d surely be signing his death warrant. A cold, damp sweat rose on her skin. In captivity, Iollan wouldn’t survive. She knew that as surely as she knew her own life wouldn’t be worth a shit if she didn’t try to help him before she skipped out.
Damn it. She hadn’t expected to fall in love.
The thought jolted. How unbelievable. But how wonderful, in a strange and bizarre kind of way.
Torn between honoring the greater cause and duty to a single cause, Callie had a decision to make. A no-going-back decision. Step into that cell with Iollan and she might never step out again. There might never be another chance for her to walk away from the federal compound a free woman.
It was a risk she had to take. Leave now and Iollan probably wouldn’t survive the night.
Callie trembled, barely able to stop her words. She shouldn’t be feeling this way, shouldn’t let her desire for Iollan override her own instincts for self-preservation. “I’ll do what I can.”
Forque looked relieved. “Thank you.” He started to punch a series of numbers in the keypad.
She pointedly cleared her throat. Her mouth felt parched. “Those cuffs are going to have to come off. No telling what damage that shit Yuan pumped into him last night is doing to his system.”
Extracting a key ring from his coat pocket, Forque selected a key and handed it over. “I warned her not to go so heavily with the sedatives. We don’t fully understand this species’ biology yet. If the damages are irreversible, he’ll be useless for study.” He sighed. “If he’s even able, he’ll need to feed. Now that we know they need their sustenance straight from the source…” A slight rush of red blotted his already ruddy cheeks.
Fingers curling around the precious key, Callie trembled, unable to stop her reaction to the thought of Iollan’s lips on her pulse. Blood rushed through her veins, flooding her with an erotic warmth. The attraction she felt for Iollan was both powerful and absolutely tangible. Keeping an objective distance had ceased to be possible.
Watery blue eyes searched every feature of her face. “Are you all right, Agent Whitten?”
Nipples tingling, Callie almost trembled into pieces. She and Iollan had forged a bond, an unbreakable connection between—dare she think it?—mates. He’d entered more than her body. He’d crossed the threshold into her mind. What they shared went beyond explanation or mere words.
Fear cooled the warmth trickling between her thighs. “I’m fine,” she bit out.
The professor’s gaze searched her face. “If this is something you can’t do, perhaps we can find a surrogate donor.”
The words went all over her like a dash of ice water. Surrogate donor. The fuck they would! Didn’t Forque understand the connection the Niviane Idesha developed with their lovers (victims?) was more than a matter of sharing bodily fluids? It was a symbiosis, a joining going past the physical and into the metaphysical.
She shook her head. Determination and resolve turned her spine into a steel rod. She’d do what she had to, no matter the consequence. “He trusts me. Take that away now and you’ll lose him. He’ll will himself to die.”
The muscles in Forque’s jaw tightened and jumped. “That’s what I’m afraid of.” Unexpectedly, he took her arm, squeezing. He bent close, keeping his voice low. “I don’t agree with the direction our research is taking us in. I’m doing my best to get Yuan off the project now. She’s getting…unstable.”
The conspiracy thickened.
Callie bit her tongue. No way she’d jeopardize a potential ally. “I hope you’re able to do that,” is all she allowed.
Abruptly, Forque seemed to sense his confession was out of order, or had perhaps left him too exposed to an untrustworthy source. Inward searching eyes cooled. He straightened and his hand fell away. “We do what we must.”
Callie nodded, but said nothing. She ached to press him for more details, but he’d obviously discarded the subject. She took a moment to rethink her decision and knew she’d decided on the correct course of action. Somehow she’d bring this facility down, brick by brick if she had to.
One wrong step and she’d blow everything. “I’m ready,” she said simply.
Concern creased his face. “Do you want a guard?”
She negated that immediately. “No. Just me.”
Forque cleared his throat.
Her look wasn’t friendly. “What?”
“I can’t let you take in a weapon,” he said in a half-apologetic manner.
“Oh.” Callie drew her gun. “Right.” Surrender it and she’d be unarmed and wide open—without immediate backup. Not from Iollan. In his condition he couldn’t harm a fly. Reluctantly she surrendered her service weapon.
Securing the weapon in a nearby bin, Forque punched a series of numbers into the keypad by the door. It slid open, a giant mouth eager to consume.
Callie drew a breath, and stepped over the threshold. The door slid shut, lock clicking into place behind her back like an unspoken threat. Her pulse thrummed in her throat, and her mind jammed.
Too late to turn back now.
25
Copper eyes tracked Callie’s progress across the room. As she closed the distance separating her from Iollan, a low growl of warning emanated from his throat. No recognition lit his narrow gaze.
Callie took another few steps. Closer.
Iollan’s lips curled away from his fangs. A strange look of intense cunning settled across his pale face. The beast inside
him watched, and planned. His eyes were slits, twin pools of hostility. His long growl deepened, primal. A warning. In his eyes she was prey. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The sound delivered an unpleasant jolt to her nerves. She hesitated, wondering if she’d be able to get close enough to get those cuffs off. He’s hurting.
Callie forced her fear away. Behind the mask of the angry vampire, she believed the gentle side of this man still survived.
The lights glared down, an illumination keyed up to an almost unbearable degree. No wonder he was listless. He normally rested during daylight hours. Not only had he been thrown into an artificial environment, he was being denied a basic element every living thing seemed to need: sleep.
A panel on the wall controlled light and temperature for the occupant’s comfort, though a master board outside overrode the internal one. Callie doubted Iollan knew or cared.
She keyed down the lighting, turning off the overhead tracts and activating the strips running along the lower edges of the walls, the kind of unobtrusive lighting theaters use to guide patrons in dark arenas. Tinted in a soothing shade of peach, the lights were restful on the eyes. Swathed in a veil of pastel illumination the cell felt more habitable, less of a threat.
Callie tried approaching him again.
Pulling her shoulders back, she held out a hand. Her fingers uncurled. Palm up, the key to the cuffs rested in the center of her hand. “I can help you,” she said slowly. “Just let me come a little closer.”
Iollan shifted so that he looked directly at her. Gaze glittering like the blade of a knife, he glared with savage intensity. “Closer hurts.” His accented voice was guttural, forced, as if he’d just learned to speak her language. Gaze flicking over her, he snapped his teeth, a gesture of disdain and contempt.
Shock and sympathy made her hands tremble. Her fragile wall of self-control threatened to crack and shatter entirely. The key nearly slid off her hand. “I’ll help the pain go away. I promise.”
A shudder wracked him as he fought to shake off his stupor. He eyed her warily. A laugh escaped him, sharp and fractured. “Every time humans get close, we suffer.”
Callie felt as if her heart twisted and broke in half. “God, no—” she started to say. A sad sigh murmured deep in her core. “I never meant for this to happen.”
Iollan’s gaze slowly lifted and focused for the first time in definite recognition. Growl subsiding to silence, his snarl dropped away. “My mistake was not killing you first, Calista.”
Absolutely numb, she rubbed a hand over her face. Her whole body felt weightless, insolvent. “You should have.” She swallowed heavily, forcing herself to go on. “I wish you had.”
Turning his head just a bit, Iollan closed his lips over his fangs. His long canines shrank away, vanishing. “I couldn’t—Better to lose my life.” A grim expression settled on his face. He swallowed heavily, forcing himself to go on. “My kind has no value, no right to live. Humans hunt us to slaughter us.” Nails gory from clawing at his own flesh, he flexed his fingers. “If I take my own life, at least I’ll die my own way.”
Hearing his words, a tremor went through Callie’s whole body. She drew a shuddering breath, wanting to deny it all. The flood of emotions threatened to turn her limbs to liquid. No. A fierce inner protectiveness rose. He wasn’t going to kill himself. “That’s not going to happen.”
The barest trace of a smile crossed his arid lips. “It’s happening, love,” he murmured softly.
Looking at him, she imagined how painful such a death would be.
Reaching deep down into her resolve, Callie somehow found the strength to go to Iollan’s side. His damn legs were so long she had to step over them to get close to him. Moving in a slow and easy way, she knelt, and paused. “It doesn’t have to.”
Iollan didn’t stir. Limp, heavy, he breathed with forced endurance. There was a long and faintly uneasy silence. Then he slowly shook his head. “Might as well.” Voice faltering, he slipped back into silence. He was tired, his nerves frayed.
She reached out and stroked her hand down a cheek rough with stubble. “You don’t have to die.” His skin was cold, frightfully so. All warmth had abandoned him, leaving an arctic chill in its wake as his strength ebbed away. Wishing the warmth from her body could somehow be transferred to his, she tried for a smile. None arrived. “Let me help you.”
A sad look haunted his gaze. “I can’t live in this cage they’ve got me in. I’ve always needed the wind at my back.”
Callie’s heart beat wildly. Even in pain, he was so damn striking it made her throat ache to look at him. Her fingers itched to sift over his skin, to feel the rippling planes of his body against hers. “It’ll be that way again,” she promised.
Silence.
He doesn’t care anymore.
She’d have to convince him otherwise. Would he ever forgive her? Who cared? Alive he’d have the luxury of anger. Dead, he’d be nothing. And she’d be alone.
Callie’s hand dropped to his neck, to the collar cinched tight. “This is coming off.” Fingers shaking, she guided the key into the lock. Somehow she got it open. “You don’t have to wear it anymore.” Loosening the straps, she peeled the leather away from his abused flesh. A row of shallow punctures ringed his throat.
Pushing out a breath, Iollan raised his hand, tracing the damages in his neck with the tips of his fingers. “I’m sorry you had to see me this way.”
Callie wanted to kiss him so badly that she ached. Feel his lips on hers, taste him. “No need to apologize.” A harsh laugh escaped her. “We both got fucked in this one.”
His gaze searched for and found hers. In the depths of his eyes she saw past the pain and anger to the hunger. Not physical hunger, but emotional hunger. He touched the corner of her left eye, tracing the bruise there. “Your people?”
Need jolted through her like lightning striking. Knowing hidden cameras probably monitored every move, she quickly shook her head. “It’s nothing.”
The growling beast threatened to return. “If they’ve hurt you, it’s something to me.”
Callie shivered. If only he knew. But no, he must never…
Catching his hand in hers, she gave the lightest of squeezes. “I’m fine.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’re not a very convincing liar.”
Forcing herself to focus, she turned Iollan’s hand over, revealing the deep trenches he’d scored around the hateful cuff binding his wrist. She unlocked it, then worked the buckle open and peeled it away. The second one quickly followed. “Seems we’re right back where we started.” Letting the cuff drop, she traced the punctures in his wrist.
Iollan reacted instantly. Trembling, he closed his eyes. “Damn it, when you touch me it’s like fire through my veins.” A yearning sound tumbled from his mouth, not of pain, but of pleasure.
Exactly how she felt.
Callie put a little more pressure on his sensitive skin. His body wasn’t the only one responding. “Do you remember the first night we made love?”
Uncertainty flickered. Then he slowly nodded. “Yes.”
She leaned in, closing the distance between them, so that only he heard what other ears shouldn’t. Knowing if he died, it would be the end of her, she must convince him his life still had meaning.
“You said you knew the darkness inside me,” she whispered, low, tormented. “I know your darkness now. What you are doesn’t scare me.” Her words caught on a sob, but she swallowed and forced herself to keep speaking. “Please, I need you to be strong.”
Iollan’s gaze fell to their hands, fingers entwined as their bodies had once been. A desolate look clouded his eyes. “What you ask of me, I can’t give you.” He glanced around the cell. However comfortable his captors had tried to make it, it would never serve an adequate purpose. “Surviving here, like this. I’m not an animal, Calista. I can’t be kept. Not even for you.”
Guilt descended, grinding her under strong jaws. Callie’s soul compressed at the despair
in his eyes. A wave of bitter torment rose at the back of her throat. Heart close to pounding through her chest, she bent closer. “Please…I’ve done something.”
He didn’t seem to understand. “Don’t,” he said through a resigned sigh.
She persisted. Untangling their fingers, she slipped her fingers around the back of his neck, persisting until his gaze met hers again. “My job, my ass, my life is on the line here,” she grated through clenched teeth. “I can’t say how, but I’m going to get you out of here.”
As if shaken by the intensity in her voice, he lifted his brows in a silent question. She’d caught his attention.
Relief crashed over her. Callie recognized in his eyes the plain unspoken truth. He didn’t want to die. Not in this place.
“Trust me, please. That’s all I can say.” To seal her words, she leaned into him. Her lips met his, soft as the brush of a butterfly’s wings. Now that the cuffs were off, his skin was warming.
Iollan stiffened for a fraction of a second, then accepted her kiss. Hope sparked in her soul and caught hold. Telling him what she and Norton planned would put him in more danger, something she dared not risk. She just needed time.
Precious time.
And he needed strength.
To get it, he’d have to feed.
Callie’s grip on the back of his neck tightened, fingers digging in. Iollan stifled a moan when her tongue brushed against his, a sweet hot tangle of craving and desire. The feel and taste of him zinged through her, bringing to mind every angle of his cock, the memory of his full length sliding into her waiting sex. A soft pulse warmed between her thighs. Just like the first night she’d encountered him. She’d wanted him then.
And she wanted him now.
When their kiss broke, the warmth inside her skittered away, taking its pleasure back to the darkest corners of her mind. The fine hair rose at the nape of her neck. Scary how right it felt between them. She’d never felt like this when she’d been with Roger.
“No fair,” Iollan breathed.
