“Mortal realm.”
“I figured that out for myself.” He curled his fingers into tight fists and his claws cut into his palms, the sting of them slicing into his flesh strangely calming as he stared the demon down. “Where in the human plane?”
“Hundred miles or so north of London.”
“And is she still there?” Zephyr raised his right hand, curled it around the front of the demon’s throat and held him. “Can you take me to her?”
“But—”
“No fucking buts,” he barked.
He knew the risks. He had been aware from the moment he had lost Emelia that getting her back was going to be dangerous, involving a journey into a realm where he would be weak and vulnerable, and would die if he wasn’t careful.
That was the reason he had hired the demons.
He had needed to reduce the amount of time he would be exposed to the curse. If he could get in and out, the curse wouldn’t have time to kill him. He would be weakened, but he would still be strong enough to retrieve Emelia.
He would still be strong enough to make her belong to him.
He tightened his hold on the demon’s throat, lost in the vision building in his mind, spurred by the constant ache in his chest. He needed her back. He had to get her back, and then he would make her want him and only him.
“I will give you every drop of gold I possess if you take me to her. It will be yours once she is safely back here, in this cave, with me.”
He didn’t care that he would be a dragon without gold.
She would be his prized possession.
He had been mistaken earlier. She was more valuable to him than gold.
He could get more treasure, but there was only one of her. She was unique, had been born for him. His fated mate. If he could have her, he would want for nothing else.
But it had to be now.
If the demon was right and she had slept with the angel. He growled, and emerald scales rippled over his skin, causing the demon’s eyes to widen. It didn’t bear thinking about. He would forgive her indiscretion, because she would be his. He would cleanse her of the angel’s corruption.
He would make her love him.
He looked into the demon’s eyes and saw his reflection in them, barely recognising the crazed male staring back at him.
“Take me to her.”
CHAPTER 26
Emelia finished drying off and tugged on a pair of black panties and then her jeans. She fastened them, enjoying the buzz in her muscles as they recovered from her swim. The forty lengths she had forced herself to complete had been just what she had needed to unwind after working in the garden.
She didn’t bother with a bra, just pulled on a purple tank and brushed her wet dark hair from her face.
Now it was time for a glass of wine on the patio as the sun set.
Would Wolf come by tonight?
Her blood heated at the thought he might and the images that popped into her head, ones that no longer frightened her. She wanted him again, ached to feel his hands on her now, had fantasised all day about what it would feel like to be touched by him. She had proven to herself that she could handle being intimate now, with him, and she wanted to take the next step. She needed his hands on her as they made love, his lips caressing her flesh as he took command.
Panic rose, but it was only a trickle now, a brief flare that she easily conquered as she thought about how gentle he would be, how he would never hurt her.
She took the rosé from the refrigerator, placed it in an ice bucket, and selected a glass from the cabinet. She paused and added another one, just in case Wolf did show. It would be rude not to offer him a drink.
Emelia walked barefoot down the stairs to the ground floor and pushed the door open with her hip.
The sun was still warm on her skin, the patio toasty beneath her feet, as she stepped out and let the door swing closed behind her.
“Is that to celebrate our reunion?”
Her eyes leaped to the owner of that voice.
Her heart stopped.
The ice bucket and glasses fell from her hands, smashing on the stone paving. She didn’t feel the shards of glass as they cut into the tops of her bare feet, didn’t hear the sound of everything breaking as she stared into the dark green eyes of the man opposite her.
All the rage she had expected to feel, the strength she had always believed would surge through her in this situation, failed to come.
Numbness swept through her and fear stole her strength, had her legs quaking beneath her as she fought for air.
Rather than launching herself at him to fight him, to take him down while he was weakened by her world, she wanted to run as far as she could. She wanted to escape.
Zephyr’s gaze roamed over the pool and the loungers, the house, and then her. She shivered as he raked his eyes over her, heat blooming in them, and swallowed hard as he held his right hand out to her.
Bloody crescents marked his palm.
“Let us go home.” He smiled, flashing all-sharp teeth that had her backing away another step and searching his eyes.
Panic flared as she saw the darkness in them, the same crazed look he’d had whenever he had been about to hurt her.
She shook her head and somehow found her voice. “I am home.”
His face blackened and he took a hard step towards her, his strange accent thick and his English stilted as he hurled the words at her. “Here? Where you fucked another male?”
She blinked.
He roared at her and closed the distance between them so quickly, she didn’t have a chance to react. He was stronger than she had anticipated, the pressure of his grip more than humanly possible as he grasped her throat and choked her.
“I did not want to believe it,” he snarled in her face, his eyes glowing brightly now, shining like deadly emeralds as he leaned over her, easily bending her to his will. “You fucked him.”
She clawed at his hands as the instinct to fight finally kicked in, scratching him with her short nails and drawing blood. He flicked a glance at the marks and glared into her eyes as he tightened his grip, squeezing so hard she couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t fight.
“You are mine, Emelia.” The longer strands of his green hair fell down to brush his brow as he brought his face close to hers.
His breath washed over her skin, warm and sickening, and she sagged in his grip as tears filled her eyes.
“You will come to want me as I want you.” He loosened his grip on her throat, frowned as he smoothed his fingers over the bruises she could already feel, his face softening and eyes losing their wild edge as he looked at them. “I hurt you again. See what you make me do?”
She blinked back her tears and stood still, too afraid to move, sure that if she tried, he would turn violent again.
She stared at his hand out of the corner of her eye, trembling as she tracked it, gut twisting as she imagined the worse. He knew she had slept with Wolf, that Wolf had touched what he clearly viewed as his. He hadn’t forced her before, but she had never seen him so crazed.
Maddened by the thought a male had tasted what she denied him.
What he viewed as rightfully his.
He chuckled low in his throat, “You make me so… mad. Why do you make me hurt you?”
She wanted to spit in his face and say that she didn’t. He hurt her because he was cruel, because he wanted to break her because some part of him knew it was the only way she would ever come to want him. As long as her mind and her spirit were intact, she would keep denying him.
But he didn’t want to break her.
She could see that in his eyes as he stroked her throat, his focus on the bruises he had caused, wounds that hurt him too. He honestly wanted her to love him and choose him, as Anais had chosen Loke.
Why?
The reason Anais had grown solemn just before she had left when they had met at Underworld suddenly hit her.
Rocked her and almost sent her to her
knees.
Zephyr was obsessed with her, craved her and wanted her, couldn’t live without her, and there was only one possible explanation for it.
She was his fated one.
“We are meant to be together.” He dipped his head and brushed his cheek against hers, sending a cold shiver through her. “You will come to want me.”
“Never,” she bit out, echoing the word she had thrown at him in Hell when he had tried to convince her to be his, that she would come to feel something for him if she only gave them a chance. She shoved her palms against his bare chest, forcing him off her. “I will never want you.”
“Because of the angel?” The crazed glimmer was back in his eyes. “I will remove the angel from the equation, and in time, you will forget him. He comes to Hell looking for me, but he will never find me. I move constantly. We will do the same.”
Which meant if he took her to Hell, Wolf would never find her in time.
She couldn’t let that happen. Zephyr was weaker in her world, she had felt it when she had pushed him away, could feel it as her palms pressed to his bare chest. His heart raced against them, but it wasn’t steady. It faltered at times, and whenever it did, his lips quirked, as if he was fighting a grimace.
Because he didn’t want her to see he was already weakening.
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” She pushed with all her might, sending him staggering and falling onto his backside.
She pivoted, breaking to her left, not feeling the pieces of glass as they cut into her soles. She sprinted as hard as her tired muscles could manage, cutting around the pool and through the formal garden.
Zephyr growled, and she resisted the desire to look over her shoulder. He was coming. She didn’t need to see it. She just had to keep running. If she could keep running, he would keep chasing her, and the longer he chased her, the weaker he would become. Once he was weak enough, she would fight him.
Although she didn’t have a weapon.
Her eyes leaped to the patio table and the bucket of tools she had left there. She changed course, heading towards them, aware that Zephyr altered direction with her and she was closing the distance between them now rather than opening it up.
A distance that was only going to get narrower when she stopped to grab a tool she could use as a weapon.
She reached the bucket and bit out a curse when the leaf scoops were on top, blocking her way. She tossed them aside, losing precious seconds, and grabbed the first two things that her hands hit.
A pair of shears and a hand fork.
She twisted to run.
Zephyr made a triumphant noise as he grabbed her trailing wrist and spun her to face him. Emelia turned it into a bellow as she drove the fork into his right thigh, shoving it deep through his green leathers.
When she gave it a vicious twist, he released her on a roar to grab at it.
Emelia started running. No looking back. She just had to keep running. If she was lucky, the pain and blood loss would slow him down.
She reached the end of the patio that ran the length of the rear of the house and kept running, heading towards the meadow.
Zephyr snarled something, closer than she had expected.
Pain shot over her skull like lightning as something struck the back of her head and she staggered, missing a step and barely keeping her balance as she flung her arms forwards, bracing for a fall. She reached up as she regained her stride, stomach twisting as she felt her wet hair, and her scalp stung where a warm patch was spreading.
The fucker had thrown the hand fork at her.
Anger poured through her veins like acid, and she stopped dead and turned to face him. She was done with this. She clutched the long shears in her grip like a dagger and stared him down, using every ounce of her experience as a hunter and her knowledge of him to calculate what he would do.
As predicted, he came straight at her, a flare of victory in his eyes.
Pain shimmered in them a heartbeat later, twisted his lips and had him scowling. He slowed to a halt, keeping his distance instead of making an attempt to seize her, and glared down at the wounds on his right thigh. Thick ribbons of blood chased over his green leathers, coating the entire side of his leg.
“It is not nice to hurt your mate, little one.” He ran his fingers through the blood and curled a lip at it, exposing his sharp teeth.
“I’m just extending you the same courtesy you’ve shown me,” she bit out and tightened her grip on the shears.
She would have preferred a distance weapon, one she could use without having to get close to him, but the shears would do. At least she hadn’t grabbed the trowel or the secateurs.
The shears were a ten-inch dagger. They were strong, sharp, and she could use them. She kept telling herself that as he stalked towards her, his face darkening as he closed the distance between them. Just a few more feet and she could attack.
His gaze lowered to her weapon, narrowed on it, and then tracked up her arm to lock on her face.
“Think to hurt me again, mate?”
She nodded. “I dream of it every damned night.”
His eyes narrowed further, his lips compressing as he glared at her. Hurt that she dreamed of dealing him all the pain he had given her? It was dangerous to anger him, to wound him in a way she could manage without getting close to him, but it was also an advantage she would be a fool to dismiss.
When he was angry, he was easier to manipulate, his emotions fuelling his actions. Anger clouded his judgement and his mind, turned the skilled warrior into a male who reacted to his emotions before he could think things through. She was counting on that happening and giving her an opening she would take to bring him down.
“I dream of crushing you under my boot heel,” she snapped and flashed her makeshift blade at him. “I had an army at my disposal, ready to go to Hell and hunt you down.”
He frowned. “So why did you not come to me?”
She smiled and canted her head, looked him over with a critical eye that held no emotion, gave away none of the fear brewing inside her as she made her final move.
One she knew would push him over the edge.
“Because I knew you would come to me.” She weighed the blade in her hand.
“I will always come for you, mate,” he murmured, a hazy edge to his gaze as he looked at her, one that turned her stomach.
“You’re weak here, dragon. I can see it in you. You hide it well, but you’re weakening. It’s only a matter of time now before you’ll be begging me to end you.”
He flashed sharp teeth at her, his green eyes glowing as they narrowed on her. “I am not weak and you will be the one begging me once I get you home. You will be aching to have me between your thighs.”
Her stomach rebelled, heart lodging in her throat despite her attempt to let those words roll off her without affecting her. “I told you. I am home, and I will never want you. I will never love you. I love—”
He was right in front of her, barely space for air between them. She gasped and reacted on instinct, thrust her hand forwards and relished his grunt as the blade plunged into his side. She went to pull it out and he grabbed her wrist, gripping it so tightly her bones ached and pain shot up her arm. She cried out.
“Enough of your games,” Zephyr snarled from between clenched fangs. “You will want only me. Once you have tasted me, only I will be able to please you.”
Her eyes widened as he struck hard on the side of her throat, sinking fangs into her flesh.
Electricity whipped through her as the world around her faded, her body growing numb as he pulled on her blood. Pain arced along every nerve ending, a static charge that raised the hairs on the back of her neck as her mind screamed at her to do something.
Before it was too late.
But fear locked her in place as he pulled his fangs from her flesh, as he eased back to stare down into her eyes, his lips coated in her blood.
He shoved the arm he held, forcing her to pull the shears free of h
is side, and the numbness that had overcome her faded as he lifted them.
As he licked the blade, tasting his own blood.
As he lowered his mouth towards hers.
She had to move. She had to fight. If he forced his blood on her, she would be his mate, and she feared he would be right and she would be blinded by the bond between them, convinced she felt something for him when she would be nothing more than a slave.
Zephyr’s mouth neared hers and she still couldn’t move.
His breath washed over her face.
She closed her eyes.
Mustered the remnants of her strength to put it into one last attack as his grip on her wrist loosened.
Zephyr reared back and howled in agony.
Only she hadn’t moved.
And it wasn’t her blade held above his shoulder, blood rolling down its white length.
She looked to the male towering behind the dragon, rage burning in his golden eyes, and all her strength flooded out of her, sending her sagging to the ground as Zephyr released her.
Wolf.
CHAPTER 27
Wolf returned his gaze to Emelia as he finished cleaning the blood from his apartment, the ache to see her too strong to ignore any longer. The layers of his realm whizzed past him, and he felt as if he was leaving it behind, escaping whatever madness had come over the healer and the gnawing fact his superiors had lied to him.
Everyone had lied to him if Rey was correct and he had been born of a union between a demon and an angel, a half-breed who had chosen to serve Heaven and had been given a clean slate, his memories removed as his demon genes were suppressed.
What would Emelia think of him if he told her about that? He was finding it hard to take in himself, had struggled with it the entire time the healer had been tending to him.
And then she had tried to seduce him.
Had kissed him.
He hadn’t kissed her back, had been quick to push her away, but he still felt as if he had betrayed Emelia. He should have forced the female to leave the moment she had removed her robe, but he had been distracted by Emelia and it had taken him a second to realise what the female had done. She had taken full advantage of his distracted state. His fingers flexed at his side, eager to call his blade.
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