Tormented by Darkness

by Claire Ashgrove

  Mick reveled in her rich flavor, a heady combination of sweet gentility spiced with just a touch of something darker, more erotic. Something that screamed sin and pleasure in ways he had never imagined. In all the countless women that had strolled through his life, not once had he tasted such intoxicating splendor. And he wanted more. Far more than he suspected Rhiannon was willing to give.

  As all the things he’d like to do to her pummeled into his awareness, desire coursed through his veins with an avalanche’s fury. Where they touched, his skin burned. The taunting press of her hips against his swelling cock stripped him senseless. She hadn’t moved, but he desperately needed her to do so. Needed to feel the grind of her body, the silent permission to indulge until he couldn’t remember his stepfather’s passing, or all the senseless death that had become so much a part of his life.

  When that saving roll of her hips didn’t come, Mick dropped his hand to the small of her back and pressed her against the hard evidence of his arousal. Shock coursed through him, ripples of pleasure that threatened to squelch his already short breath. Even more shocking was the low, satisfied murmur that bubbled in the back of her throat. That simple little sound devastated him. He took a step sideways, turning her back to the table, and nudged her backward until the tops of her thighs met the thick oaken edge. When she could go no further, he slipped a hand beneath the short hem of her sweater, traced his thumb along the silky skin just above the waistband of her jeans, and trailed his lips across her cheek, along the dainty line of her jaw, to the delicate shell of her ear. “I’ve wanted you, Rhiannon,” he whispered hoarsely. “So goddamn long.”

  She tipped her head back, giving him access to her throat. Her hands slid around his waist, then lower, her fingertips tucking into his back pockets. She gave his buttocks a squeeze that drew his body closer to hers and brought his straining erection against the juncture of her thighs.

  A shudder surged down Mick’s spine. Invitation—he should step away now. Nothing good could come of this. Nothing that wouldn’t tarnish all the goodness that drew him to her with the unrelenting power of a siren’s call.

  Instead, he grazed the thick vein along the side of her neck with his teeth. “You’re so alive. I need that, need you.” He flicked the tip of his tongue against the hollow of her throat, traced it with a lazy circle. “Tell me you want me too.”

  “I do,” she murmured huskily.

  A throaty groan tore from Mick’s throat. Sweet heaven…

  He captured her face in his hands and claimed her mouth once more. She was his to enjoy to the fullest. His to become lost in. His to escape with.

  In thirty-two years, he had never wanted anything more.

  ****

  Rhiannon struggled against the demonic pull of her divided soul that demanded she surrender to the tidal wave of desire building within her. Mick’s kiss scalded parts of her she hadn’t known existed. The seeking thrust of his hips, the way his big hard body enveloped her with promises of unbridled pleasure made it near impossible to resist. She longed to lean back on the table, draw him into her arms, and give over to arousal.

  Yet if she did, she’d never come back. She’d fall so deeply into him her heart wouldn’t stand a chance at resisting his charm, his devastating good looks. And giving her heart to Mick was the biggest wrong she could commit. Her father’s curse already hungered for death. She fought the dark call daily. But that ever-present restlessness was nothing compared to the inescapable damnation that came with love.

  Love meant killing Mick.

  As the reality of circumstance punched through her momentary bliss, she slipped her hands to his shoulders and gently pushed him away. His mouth left hers reluctantly, lips clinging for a drawn-out heartbeat before he let go and lifted his head. Confusion passed behind his onyx gaze.

  “I do want you, but not like this.” Not until she could share Cian’s mortality and escape her sire’s evil curse. But Mick would never understand that reasoning. As it was, the frown that crinkled his brow said he was having a difficult enough time understanding her sudden refusal.

  She caught his hands, brought them together, and lifted them to her lips. Her eyes held his as she kissed each one. “You need to rest, Mick, not exhaust yourself further.”

  “I’m old enough to know what I need, thank you.” As annoyance flicked over his handsome face, he turned away. A sigh tumbled free, heavy like the sudden tension in the room. “Sorry. You’re right. This is a bad idea.”

  Rhiannon flinched. Not so much a bad idea. Just a bad idea now. If she were mortal, if she’d found another portion of her mother’s spell book so she could lift the curse, she’d rush headlong down this path, regardless of consequence.

  Mick swiveled to face her, a wistful smile playing on his lips, regret shadowing his dark eyes. He cupped the side of her face in one hand. His thumb stroked her cheek. “You’re so sweet. So good.”

  If you only knew.

  She willed herself to smile even as she heard the finality in his voice and realized her rejection had just destroyed any chance of someday in the future. Mick was shutting her out. Closing the door on what had just erupted between them for reasons she couldn’t understand. Whatever they were, the warm energy that had invited her to get close morphed into aloof nothingness.

  Mick pushed a hand through his hair, and his smile took on more strength. “Thanks for bringing the arrangements by. And for feeding me.”

  As he lowered his hand, it passed through a ray of late-evening sunlight streaming in through the window. An iridescent blend of purple, gold and blue that she hadn’t noticed before gleamed against his fingertips. Her heart knocked into her ribs as her breath caught.

  The mark of her mother’s powers—Mick had touched the Celt high priestess, Nyamah’s lost spell book.

  Rhiannon impulsively captured his hand, turned it over, and stroked the veins of power that glinted against his calloused palm. He stiffened, but he didn’t pull away.

  Aware she’d just acted on something he couldn’t see, she dropped his hand and forced out a light chuckle. “You’ve got dirt on your hands.”

  Mick wiped his palm on his jeans. “Probably from the stuff I was looking at in the attic before you came.”

  She scrambled to recall what he’d said about Steve’s belongings while he ate. If her mother’s spell book, or even portions of it, were in this house, she and Mick would have the chance to explore what brewed between them. But the ritual could only be performed on a Sabot, and Rhiannon needed to find the writings before tomorrow night. Then, she and Dáire could perform it, she could free herself from the curse, and by the time Mick recovered from his stepfather’s death…

  Her mind churned with facts and possibilities. She glanced at Mick, hoping her expression didn’t reveal the anxiety that thrummed through her blood. “You said you found journals?”

  Mick nodded.

  “Do you think…” She hesitated, a frown tugging at her brow. If he asked questions, she didn’t have answers. She’d sound like a freak if she tried to tell him she was one of eight living descendants of the ancient Selgovae tribe—that she was half demon, and she was immortal. If she tried to explain why it was so important that she find the spell book—that she was already half in love with him and if she fell further she’d kill him—the cop would arrest her in a heartbeat.

  She took a deep breath and tried for casualness. “Would you mind if I looked at them?”

  Mick shrugged. “I doubt you’d like them. It’s just stuff about ’Nam. But, sure. I’ve got to take a shower, and I owe you for helping me out today.”

  Her breath came out in a rush. Thank the ancestors. Please let it be here. Let it be intact.

  Beckoning her to follow, Mick strode from the room. He ushered her to a closed door off the hall and opened it. Stairs led up. A wave of muggy heat washed down. “The trunk’s open up there.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Thank you. For everything.” With the first true smile she
’d witnessed since she’d arrived, Mick gave her elbow an affectionate squeeze. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  With a chuckle, he strode down the hall.

  By sheer force of will, Rhiannon managed to walk, not run, up the stairs.

  Chapter Four

  Rhiannon’s hands shook as she fingered the fragile papyrus Celt writings. Her mother’s handwriting scrawled across the aged sheets, corner to corner, side to side, crafting meticulous runes that detailed eight pages of ritual. Ceremony that would grant the sibling who recited the words on the night of a Sabot freedom from the damning curse of immortality, and deal Rhiannon’s incubus father another crippling injury.

  In time, should all eight rituals be discovered and performed, Drandar would cease to exist. Their mother had paid for discovering the way to destroy her evil mate. Her body had been butchered while blood still flowed in her veins, but her spirit refused to rest until the eight children she had saved from Drandar’s bloodthirsty quest for power found salvation and gave her the ability to piece her fragmented remains back together.

  Rhiannon traced a fingertip over the bold flourish that identified her mother’s personal mark. Beneath the signature, a line of intricate Celtic scrollwork adorned the final page. Whorls and linked designs that mirrored the design on Rhiannon’s face. Once, she had been shamed to bear the brand of the Selgovae. Soon, ancestors willing, Rhiannon could look at her reflection with pride.

  Like her eldest brother, Cian, she could know the blessing of mortality.

  She carefully turned the pages back to the third page, rereading the passage that brought her the most hesitation.

  Ten drops, I require, the blood a wounded heart must yield. For only then can I heal.

  Rhiannon knew two wounded hearts—her youngest brother, Taran, and Mick. Getting Taran to sacrifice his own blood to damage the father he adored would be like asking a lamb to open a vein before a starving wolf. It simply wouldn’t happen. She’d be hard-pressed to even get Taran to aid with the ritual. Though, to her benefit, in the quick skim read she’d given the spell book excerpt, this ritual didn’t require the participation of Rhiannon’s entire family, unlike Cian’s.

  Acquiring blood from Mick would be equally as difficult. Short of slicing his skin while he was asleep, she couldn’t think of a single way to convince him into giving her ten drops of his blood.

  Certainly not in a matter of twenty-four hours, give or take.

  Triumph punched through her as her darker half recognized the futility and leapt to celebrate her inevitable failure. The nonsensical urge to cackle in glee tickled the back of her throat. She cleared her throat, grimaced against the restless darkness in her veins, and bent over the preserved papyrus again. Somewhere in here there had to be an alternative. For the only one she knew breeched inappropriate and tread right on into unacceptable. No matter how she craved mortality, she would not allow Mick to be influenced against his will.

  She hadn’t become that desperate yet.

  ****

  As hot water rained down on Mick’s weary body, he closed his eyes and leaned against the shower tiles, trying to make sense of what he’d allowed to happen in his kitchen. Want still thrummed in his veins. A craving he couldn’t explain, but could not curb no matter how he reminded himself he had no business getting tangled up in Rhiannon McLaine. She represented everything he wasn’t. If she knew the things he’d witnessed, the things he confronted daily, the deals he’d struck with criminals just to gain the information necessary to put someone more dangerous behind bars…

  He closed his eyes, searching for the boy who had once known the innocence of the world. The youth who had vomited at the sight of his first dead body. The inexperienced detective who hadn’t yet learned how to think like a killer.

  But that man was gone. Dead like everything else around him.

  What remained was a man who found fleeting escape in the constant parade of women who passed through his life, faces and names he deliberately forgot. He buried everything but the pleasure because his heart couldn’t suffer any more scars.

  Until Rhiannon.

  Until a year ago when he’d left the Augusta, Maine force, hired on in Petersville, and walked into the flower shop to see her long red hair swishing against the tops of her thighs as she stood on a ladder and adjusted a dried flower arrangement in her showroom.

  Until she turned around, and he witnessed the startlingly beautiful tattoos on her face.

  Until she began to haunt his dreams, and the weekly trip to her shop became more about a chance to see her than purchasing flowers for dates he would experience only once.

  Thumping a closed fist against the wall, Mick straightened and ducked his head under the warm water once more. He could still taste Rhiannon’s exotic flavor against his tongue. His body remembered, all too vividly, the perfect fit of her gentle curves.

  And he had no goddamn business fooling around with her. While his dick might hold fantasies, they were polar opposites. He didn’t possess the goodness she required. Didn’t even know the meaning.

  Flipping off the faucets, he stepped out of the shower and quickly toweled off. His body ached, the recent nights of too little sleep having taken their toll. He couldn’t rest yet though. In less than an hour, this house would be full of people he was supposed to remember, all of them expecting him to celebrate Steve’s passing.

  Son of a bitch.

  Muttering a stream of muffled curses, he went to the closet and pulled out a dark charcoal suit, crisp white shirt, and matching dark tie. He dressed quickly, driven by the desire to somehow move time fast enough that the night would end and he could wake up tomorrow with only the funeral to make it through. Then he could put this all behind him. Move forward.

  He slapped a touch of aftershave on his now-smooth face, straightened his cuffs, and left the bedroom. Halfway down the hall, he stopped to shut the open door to his stepfather’s media room-office. The glint of crystal drew his attention to a half-full descanter of scotch sitting on the coffee table. Drawn by the sudden need for a stiff drink, Mick crossed through the room, poured a double-shot, and downed it in one gulp. The burn spread through his gut, dulling the coiled anxiety there. He closed his eyes and allowed the heat to infiltrate the rest of him, until his collar felt tight.

  Tugging at his tie, he returned to the hall and shut the door. Though many of his buddies on both Augusta’s and Peterville’s forces would be here tonight, there was no need to tempt the virtual strangers he was about to let inside the house with a full view of Steve’s expensive, home-theatre system.

  Mick mounted the stairs to the attic, convincing himself with each step that Rhiannon had done the right thing by stopping things before they got out of hand. At the top of the stairs, however, his thoughts ground to a halt when he saw her sitting beneath the solitary attic lamp. His stepfather’s papers spread across her lap, her shoulders formed a graceful curve as she read, oblivious to his presence. The fine angles of her profile spoke of elegance, refinery that he appreciated but had never truly known another woman to possess. Light haloed over her shoulders, illuminating silken strands of gold woven into the thick braid that cascaded down her back and rested on the dusty floor.

  All the warmth he experienced every time he stood in her presence flooded over him. The tense hours that lay ahead no longer loomed like a waiting nightmare. The empty place in his heart that had ached for so many years filled to capacity.

  Drawn by something greater than himself, he quietly crossed the attic to her side and set a hand on her shoulder. She looked up, startled, then blue eyes filled with something far more dangerous than the want that simmered in his blood.

  Rhiannon’s eyes shone with affection. That and a healthy dose of appreciation as her gaze skimmed from his shoulders to his toes.

  Mick swallowed down a staggering dose of unexpected feeling. Christ this wasn’t really happening—was it? Less than a few hours alone with her, and he
was drowning in things he didn’t understand, things he’d spent the vast majority of his adult life running from. Only it didn’t feel terrifying. It felt damn good.

  “Find anything interesting?” At the sound of his raspy voice, he cleared his throat.

  Her smile impacted like a gunshot. Whatever she answered, he didn’t hear. He couldn’t remember all the reasons Rhiannon was a bad idea. In that moment, all he knew was he needed this. Needed her. Here. If he was to survive the agony of celebrating death, he needed Rhiannon at his side.

  He hunkered down beside her and set two fingers under her chin, locking his eyes with hers. Shame that he wasn’t strong enough to make it through his stepfather’s wake bubbled around in his gut. But the cerulean pools that gazed back at him kept that shame from choking him to death. Words still came with difficulty, turning his voice into a whisper. “Keep me company tonight, Rhiannon?”

  Her smile dimmed. “Mick, I didn’t even know your stepfather.”

  “It’s okay.” A wry smirk pulled at one corner of his mouth. “Steve wouldn’t mind.” Where he found the ability to make a joke, he didn’t know. But laughter tickled the back of his throat.

  To his surprise, she chuckled as she pulled her chin out of his grasp. “Look at me. I’m in jeans, I’m covered with dust. I’m sure I have bits of fern in my hair somewhere.”

  Grin broadening, Mick gathered her thick braid in his hand and made a show of inspecting it for plant matter. “Nope. No fern.” Bending in, he wiped a smudge of dust off the tip of her nose with his index finger. “Dust washes.”

  His teasing mood faded under the very real possibility she’d refuse. He released the weighty length of her hair and took both her hands in his. “I’ll make a deal with you. You can keep that journal if you stay.”

  Rhiannon’s gaze drifted down to her lap. Indecision passed over her pretty features, animating the intricate designs on her cheeks for a millisecond before she nodded. “Okay. But I need to go home and change.”