Darkness Burning

by Delilah Devlin

  She began to shake. She knew she was suffering from a mild case of shock and needed to lie down, but she couldn’t until she was done. Until she was clean.

  Tonight, she’d learned a lesson. One she would never forget. Despite the strides she’d made in repairing her damaged, hollow life, she was still vulnerable to monsters, human and inhuman. Regardless of whether or not she kept her eyes wide open, she could be seduced into lowering her reserve, could be tempted to enter dangerous waters.

  She’d nearly drowned tonight. Nearly begged Alex to take her, to make her one of them, because for a moment, she’d felt whole, desired, complete. An illusion. One fostered by his allure and her loneliness.

  She’d never forget. But what she feared most was that she wouldn’t be able to resist seeking him out again.

  Miki finished washing herself, then found a soft, shapeless nightgown. She slipped it on and lay down on top of her sheets. She closed her eyes, tried to clear her mind of everything she’d learned and experienced. So much had happened, so much that made sense of things she’d already known instinctively.

  Vampires weren’t just cool kitsch for Halloween. An underworld filled with creatures of the night preyed on humans, feasted on their blood and sexual appetites, manipulated their emotions, toyed with their vulnerabilities.

  Okay, so maybe she was just superimposing her beef with Alex on the whole species, but damn if he hadn’t made her trust him.

  How he must have laughed up his sleeve at how naïve she’d been. She’d thought him an average guy. She’d spilled her confusion and self-disgust, then pleaded with him to help her assuage the hunger the vamps’ Spanish Fly had caused in her.

  And like the Spider to the Fly, he’d waited, while she’d writhed and cursed and finally begged him to make love to her.

  He’d even used a condom. Pretended he’d had the need for one to reassure her. Only he’d forgotten the farce that last time, hadn’t he?

  She’d assumed he’d been overcome with lust—until he’d taken that wicked bite. Alex hadn’t been a hero, hadn’t been her knight in shining armor. He’d been after the same things as Nic and the vampires who’d attacked Leo in the alleyway. Blood and sex.

  Because he’d built her trust first, the lovemaking had transcended her first two experiences. Not until he’d sunk his fangs gum-deep had she suspected the lie. Why he’d bothered at all with the subterfuge, she didn’t understand.

  Perhaps he liked a little mind-fuck with his side of pussy.

  Miki rolled to her side, tucked a pillow against her belly, brought up her knees, and wrapped her arms around it. She didn’t need a man in her life, didn’t need romance…didn’t need to connect with another person.

  She’d awoken alone, crawled out of the ditch naked, and flagged down a passing car all on her own.

  She relaxed her grip on the pillow and stretched out her legs. Tonight had been an anomaly, nothing more. A lesson. Not to be forgotten.

  With so few memories to fill her thoughts, she wondered if she’d ever be able to let it go. Before tonight, she’d only had her nightmares to review like an endlessly looping tape. Perhaps she should be grateful to Alex after all.

  The monster whose teeth had gnashed at her burning flesh wasn’t nearly as preoccupying now as the memory of Alex’s handsome face, flushed with desire as his cock and his warmth slipped inside her soul.

  CHAPTER 12

  Alex “flashed” with Gabi back into the exact moment they’d departed from Inanna’s salon, his lips still smothering hers. He broke the kiss and cast a quick glance around the room to assure himself no one had noticed anything.

  And they hadn’t—not the flash of light that had engulfed them or the fact that he now wore a different shirt.

  “Bastard!” she spat, as soon as she shook free of his embrace. “A little warning that time wouldn’t have been amiss.”

  Alex smothered his grin at her predictable annoyance. Gabi didn’t like surprises or feeling out of control—except, of course, during sex. “You looked lovely. I saw no reason to delay.”

  “As soon as that condom rolled off,” she hissed, “you couldn’t get me back into my gown fast enough.”

  “Did I rush that last bit?” he drawled.

  “Shut up, Alex,” she said, her lips crimping into a straight line.

  Ignoring her protests, Alex slid his arms around her again and bent toward her.

  Gabi’s face tilted slightly, the glinting anger in her eyes warring with the softness of her pouting lips.

  “Can you really stay mad at me?” he whispered. “After everything we’ve shared?”

  Her mouth curved despite her will to cling to her irritation. “Maybe I rushed you,” she admitted sulkily. “I was just a bit aggressive.”

  “Lady, I have the scratches to prove it,” he growled.

  Gabi’s gaze broke with his, and a flush bloomed on her cheeks. Her glance swept the room. “I can’t help thinking how amusing it would be to shout out, ‘I’ve found him!’—just to see them push their lovers off their bodies and scramble into their clothes for a chase.”

  Alex bit her earlobe. “But you won’t.”

  Her smile dimmed. “You knew that was a foregone conclusion. Even before you showed me your magical mirror.”

  “Because you regretted killing me and have lived with the guilt for two centuries?”

  “No, because there isn’t a vamp here who can match my sexual appetites.” She gave him a smoldering glance from beneath her thick eyelashes and slid a hand down his abdomen to cup his sex. “How dull my life here would be for me…without you.”

  Alex’s eyelids dipped. “Planning on staying long?”

  “As long as I’m amused.”

  He tilted his head, narrowing his eyes. Something in her shifting gaze alerted him. “Why am I not buying that?”

  “Because you know me so well?”

  “I know you well enough to be sure a simple hunt was never the only reason you came. Are you scoping out Inanna’s territory?”

  Gabi’s fingers trailed along the tops of his shoulders. “And if I am?”

  “I would tell you to pull your pack from New Orleans. You won’t get whatever it is you want by stealth.”

  “Then how will we get it?”

  “By treaty. By my promise to you.”

  “You don’t even know what I’ll demand.”

  “Will it be more than I can give?”

  She hid her gaze beneath another sweep of sable lashes. “You really think you have a chance to knock Inanna off her throne?”

  “She sits on sand,” he ground out. “She’ll die choking on it.”

  “Such bitterness. You sound as though you know her, but I bet you’ve never even met the woman.”

  “I know what she is. I know what she’s done.”

  “I wish I could be around to see her fall.”

  Alex backed her up against a wall, his body flush with hers. Her tightening nipples stabbed at his chest. “Then help me avoid detection. Let me continue to operate out in the open.”

  She caressed his cheek and rubbed a finger over his lips. “I’ll give you some time, but you can’t leave me waiting long. I want to see you.”

  Alex stroked her fingers with his tongue, gauging her arousal by her quickening heartbeats and breaths. “Think I can resist finding you, and soon?” Alex slipped his hand beneath her hair. The kiss he gave her lingered, tasted, supped. When he drew away, her face glowed.

  Alex felt a twinge of remorse for the game he played. Gabriella, for all her bluster, was a sensitive, loving creature. When her fierce heart was engaged, there was no holding back. The woman didn’t do anything by halves. He might hurt her again.

  Once had been devastating. Twice, and the consequences might prove fatal for him.

  Voices from the foyer drifted inside the salon. Alex went still at the sound of Nicolas’s deep timbre. He raised his head. “Sorry, love. I have to go.”

  She turned her ear toward the
door. “The sabat must have concluded this night’s meeting. Anyone in particular you don’t want to meet?”

  Alex didn’t answer. Instead, he kissed her lips hard, thrust her away, and turned, striding toward the library again to escape through the garden.

  Just as he opened the French doors, a gust of air brushed against his back. “Hello, Nic,” Alex said, turning slowly.

  Nicolas stood in shadows, his tall frame bristling with anger. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t raise the alarm now and let the coven know their daywalker is here.”

  Alex breathed a sigh of relief. If Nic was taking the time to have a conversation with him, he might actually listen to what he had to say. “Let’s take this outside.”

  “And give you a chance to escape into the sky?”

  Alex blinked. “You know I’m Born?”

  Nic closed in, his lips stretching into a mirthless smile. “Not until you just said it.”

  “I’m not trying to keep it a secret from you, but it’s interesting Chessa didn’t give me away.”

  “Chessa’s emotions are complex right now. She’s hormonal. Something to do with her pregnancy, you bastard.”

  Alex folded his arms over his chest, pretending he wasn’t already shifting his balance to bolt through the door. “Are you really unhappy about that? Unhappy for her? Or jealous you couldn’t be the one to plant it in her womb?”

  Nic’s eyebrows lowered and his hands tightened into fists. “I’m going to kick your ass.”

  Not kill him. Alex took note. “Again, let’s take this outside, where we’ll draw less attention. I promise the wings will stay folded until we’re done.”

  Nicolas stuck his fists on his hips; his scowl was brutal, his gaze penetrating.

  Alex turned again to the door, giving Nicolas his back, trusting the core of honor he knew still resided inside the former warrior monk.

  “Out to the grounds behind the barracks,” Nicolas growled behind him.

  Without glancing back, Alex nodded, striding through the door and straight past the flower garden and the bench where he’d seduced Sarah, past the gazebo where he’d fucked her, ravaged her, tasted her rich human blood. He’d thought to teach her a lesson and hoped to never see her again. But he’d made a grave mistake. An oversight that further complicated his already muddled life.

  Later, after he bested Nicolas, he’d seek the information he needed to track her down.

  If he bested Nicolas. Nic wasn’t your average vampire. He’d trained as a warrior all his life and long afterlife. Strong and skilled, he also had righteous anger bulking out his muscles and his resolve.

  Alex had no doubts that Nic wanted to hurt him. Badly. Adrenaline had to be slamming through his body as they approached the barracks and took the path to the arena behind it.

  Perhaps he’d let Nicolas get a few licks in to help assuage his anger and self-recrimination. Nicolas had his own guilt to deal with. He’d manipulated Chessa’s emotions and her sensuality to burrow beneath her gruff façade and stake a claim on her heart. He’d invited Alex’s participation in her seduction, thus enabling him to impregnate her.

  He’d betrayed Inanna and the Born he’d served for centuries in a bid to earn if not equality, then at least respect and a voice on the ruling council. His means had been questionable, nearly earning him a death sentence. But he’d prevailed.

  Because the time was nigh.

  Inanna sensed it. Knew she needed all the allies she could amass. Alex needed to turn Nicolas from his devotion to the woman who’d been responsible for his induction into the Underworld.

  But first, he had to let Nicolas come to terms with his anger.

  With Nicolas at his back, Alex followed the pathway from the whitewashed barracks through a thin stand of oak trees to the training field. The scent of freshly mowed grass and heavy, humid air filled his nose and lungs. Lights on motion detectors flared as they stepped onto the field.

  At the center of the training arena, Alex faced Nicolas, who already prowled around him, tension radiating from his body in hot waves.

  “How do you want to do this?” Alex asked, keeping his tone casual as he deepened his breaths and summoned his own inner demon to the surface. Forcing his gaze away from his adversary, he calmly rolled up his sleeves.

  A gust of air whooshed ahead of the fist rising to collide with his jaw.

  Alex took the blow, letting the force drive him back a step. He raised a hand to rub the side of his face and glared at Nicolas, whose fangs curved beneath a feral snarl. “Nice,” Alex murmured. “Do you even know why you’re so angry with me?” He cocked his head left, then right, and shook out his arms, sinking into a fighter’s stance, with his hands raised and balled into fists.

  Air whipped around him. A kick landed against his knee, but Alex resisted, standing firm, thinking it better to let Nicolas spend some of his rage early. Perhaps then he’d be ready to listen.

  Nicolas flashed past him again, his forearm clouting Alex across the shoulders. “Fight me, bastard!”

  “I’m just letting you take a few practice blows, Nicolas. Just to be fair.”

  “I don’t need your handicapping me in any fight,” Nicolas roared. “This isn’t a game.”

  Knowing he was taunting the man into a fury, Alex still couldn’t help tweaking his anger a notch higher. “I don’t want you totally demoralized,” he said, his voice calm and sympathetic. “I’d rather you still feel strong, secure in your own power.”

  “Again, I don’t need any favors from you.”

  “If you’re ready, then…” Alex didn’t give him any more warning than that. He sank, gathering power in his thighs, then launched himself from the ground, springing high above Nicolas’s head, turning midair to land directly behind him. He swept out a foot, catching Nicolas below the knees and shoving him forward.

  Nicolas rolled, then quickly regained his footing to face Alex. His gaze narrowed. “You’re fast. I’ll grant you that. Faster than your womenfolk.”

  Alex lunged forward, clamping his hands on Nicolas’s shoulders, squeezing as he pressed him down to his knees.

  They wrestled a moment, Nicolas resisting the hold, his hands coming up beneath Alex’s arms to pummel his ribs and his chest with several solid, breath-stealing blows.

  Still, Alex held on, pushing to the point where bone popped and crackled.

  Nicolas must have sensed how close he was to defeat; he sank to his knees. “You’re stronger. But not invulnerable.” He slammed his fist between Alex’s legs.

  When Alex’s breath left him in a pained wheeze, Nicolas brought up his arms and swept Alex’s hands outward, knocking them away. Alex took a step back, his hands planted on his thighs as he bent, dragging in tight breaths. “I…underestimated…your venom.”

  “What? You thought I’d fight fair?” Nicolas swung his leg in an arcing roundhouse kick, aiming straight for Alex’s head.

  Alex dropped and rolled beneath the kick, coming up in a crouch, his groin still throbbing hard. “Won’t make that mistake again,” he gritted out.

  “You think you can cow me with your superior speed, your power…. Your showboating is wasted on me. I’ve fought demons a hundred times more intimidating than you and lived.”

  Alex grimaced and straightened. “If I intended to cause you serious harm, I would. What I prefer is a conversation. We have mutual interests—”

  “You won’t ever have Chessa again. She chose me.”

  “She’s the mother of my child. There will always be a bond between us.”

  Alex dug his heels into the grass and pressed forward at the exact moment Nicolas launched, his expression a mask of fury. Their bodies slammed together, their hands wrapping around each others’ throats as thighs and buttocks bunched to propel them forward.

  Alex had weight and superior strength on his side; Nicolas, blazing anger that shot adrenaline through his body.

  Alex dug his toes deeper in the grass, feeling his face heat and his expr
ession tighten as a growl of frustration ripped from his throat. He strained the muscles of his neck, bulking them beneath the powerful, tightening grip of Nicolas’s large hands.

  Nicolas’s feet slipped in the grass, enabling Alex to shove him backward, momentum allowing him to take another step and another, until he plowed forward, carrying Nicolas to the ground.

  Nicolas’s thighs strained, bucking beneath him, hammering his knees into Alex’s. Then he planted his feet and thrust upward, attempting to roll with Alex.

  Alex had had enough of the match, feeling frustrated and more than a little foolish for expending energy on a battle neither was really willing to win because victory could only mean the death of one of them.

  But how to end the match? They could battle like this for hours. Alex almost smiled as he stared down into Nicolas’s face, which was growing purple from his stranglehold.

  Alex was brawnier, heavier. Without leverage, Nicolas would have to concede.

  Alex stretched out on top of Nicolas, pinning his ankles with his feet, his chest with the weight of his own. Letting go of Nic’s neck, he clamped his hands around his wrists and stretched them above his head.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Nicolas spat, his lips curling in disgust.

  “Ending this,” Alex said glibly, relaxing now that he had Nicolas pinned and off-balance from the intimacy of their position. The humor of their situation had Alex fighting the urge to chuckle, which would only further enrage the vampire already trembling with rage beneath him.

  Nicolas slammed his head upward, but Alex drew back from the head butt. “Easy now,” he whispered.

  “Alex…,” Nicolas’s voice rose in warning.

  “Relax. I’m not after your cock. And I know you haven’t the slightest interest in mine. Let’s have that little talk.”

  “I can’t think with you plastered to me. This is…unseemly.”

  “But effective,” Alex said smoothly. “You have to concede that.”