Marked by an Assassin

by Felicity Heaton

  In the room with her.

  His deepest instincts seized control again at that thought, telling him that there was a male in the room with his female, even when the logical part of him could see that there wasn’t. It didn’t matter how much he told himself that she was alone and they were the only two snow leopards. He couldn’t stop himself from pushing away from the glass and tearing into every item on his side of the room that smelled of the male.

  A male that wanted his female.

  He roared.

  He wouldn’t let the male have her.

  She belonged to him.

  He was vaguely aware of the danger of his thoughts, but nothing he did could douse the needs coursing through him. His more human consciousness was just a passenger as his animal side drove him to destroy everything. He ripped apart the plastic barrels and boxes, and raked his claws down the ropes, erasing the male’s scent as he left a wake of carnage behind him. When everything on his side of the room was in pieces, he stalked back to the barrier and growled as he attacked it.

  He had to reach the things on her side.

  He had to kill the male that wanted his female.

  The female backed away from him, towards the white wall at the opposite end of the room to him, her fear a palpable thing that beat in his veins as she stared at him through striking wide eyes.

  He needed to get to her.

  Blood smeared the barrier as he clawed at it, wild with that need, and he growled weakly as it consumed him, together with a sense of hopelessness and despair that sank its fangs into him and refused to let him go.

  He needed her.

  But he couldn’t reach her.

  “Lift the barrier.”

  Harbin’s eyes narrowed on the intercom and then the female.

  She gasped and shook her head, her eyes darting around as she looked for an escape route. Her black hair swayed, brushing pale cheeks that he wanted to stroke to feel their satin softness beneath his fingertips. Desperation flooded her scent, jacking up the fear in it.

  The barrier started to lift.

  Harbin didn’t wait.

  He rolled under the gap as soon as it was large enough and sprang to his bare feet on the other side. The primal part of him that wanted to erase the male’s scent from the room decided it wanted something else even more.

  Her.

  Harbin launched himself across the room, leaping the gap between them in one bound, and slammed against her. He grasped the back of her neck, pressing his short claws into her flesh to hold her in place, and kissed her, swallowing the gasp that left her lips.

  Her fists struck his bare chest, punching one moment and shoving the next, desperate noises escaping her as she tried to break free of his hold.

  He kissed her harder, her taste flooding him with pleasure as he dominated her, obeying every instinct he possessed.

  She tasted forbidden and sweet.

  Cold washed over his skin and snow rushed down his neck and back like a waterfall. The stillness of the mountains surrounded him. Her warmth met his, penetrating his skin and sinking deep into him together with this kiss.

  Etched on him forever.

  He groaned and tightened his grip on her, not wanting this to end, intent on taking more of her into him.

  He needed more of her.

  Her claws raked down his right cheek, the stinging fire and the tang of blood forcing his primal instinct to have her to recede, replaced by an instinct to defend himself.

  It was enough to shatter the hold of his hunger.

  A sickening awareness flooded him and he staggered backwards, reeling from the mental blow delivered by the horrific realisation of what he was doing.

  Forcing himself on her.

  He didn’t stop moving until the wall at the far end of the room struck his back, stopping him from placing more distance between them. He stared at her, breathing hard and shaking. Gods, what the fuck had he been on the verge of doing?

  The female curled into herself, her head lowering as she turned her side to him and pressed against the far wall, her fall of black hair obscuring her face. Her bare shoulders trembled and the salty scent of tears reached him, making him feel even more like a bastard.

  He raised his hand, paused and lowered it, sure that whatever words he could muster wouldn’t be enough to apologise for what he had done. It would be all too easy to blame his hormones, but it would be a lie, because they weren’t wholly responsible for how he had acted.

  He wanted her. He had wanted her before he had smelled her scent or seen her clearly. He knew that now. He had wanted her the moment he had set eyes on her. She rocked him as no other female had, and that frightened him, because he couldn’t do this again. He couldn’t allow a female to have that sort of power over him.

  Never again.

  Harbin spat out a curse as a trickle of red ran down the back of her neck and swallowed hard as he lowered his gaze to his bare feet, guilt and shame flowing through him at the same time as a feral need to sink his fangs into that same place and pin her while he mated with her.

  He laughed, the sound out of place in the strained silence.

  He was so fucked up.

  Killing her wouldn’t have bothered him at all, but the thought of taking advantage of her had him tied in knots and disgusted with himself. Gods, Hartt would be pissing himself laughing if he knew just what twisted shit was going on inside his head and in this room.

  He pinned his back to the wall and breathed slowly as he waited for Archangel to remove the female from the room.

  When close to thirty minutes must have ticked past, he realised that they weren’t coming to help her.

  Bastards.

  They were leaving her at his mercy even after witnessing what he was capable of doing to her.

  He curled his fingers into fists at his sides as she shuffled slowly and carefully towards the door on her side of the room, moving as quietly as possible, as if that would stop him from noticing how desperately she wanted to escape him. She pressed one slender hand to it and remained there, tucked close to the cold metal that kept her dangerously within his reach.

  Another eternity ticked past and then everything changed.

  She changed.

  She turned her head and slid her silvery-golden gaze his way, and she was different now. Darker. Angry. Was this what Archangel wanted to see?

  Is this why they had kept her in the room with him?

  They wanted to see how long it would take for her to turn from fearful female to dangerous woman.

  She pushed away from the door and came to face him, her posture no longer meek and afraid. She clenched her fists at her bare hips and fixed her unflinching gaze on him. Her chin tipped up and her eyes brightened, turning more silver than gold, her snow leopard side emerging as her emotions grew stronger. Darker still.

  “I know who you are.”

  Harbin stared at her, having trouble taking those five words in and making them stick. He had to be hearing things.

  Her eyes didn’t shift from his and the look in them sent a chill creeping through his chest. He had heard her right. She did know who he was.

  Which meant, holy shit, that she was part of his pride.

  He staggered a step towards her, senses reeling and mind racing. “How long have you been here?”

  A confused crinkle formed above her silvery eyebrows and then she frowned. “Only as long as you have… this time.”

  This time. His stomach dropped and his blood turned to ice. He had meant how long had she been in London, but she had taken his question to mean how long had she been in Archangel’s hands. He shook his head, not wanting to believe what he was thinking because it would break him, but she nodded slowly, confirming his worst fears.

  Archangel had captured her twenty years ago.

  They had put her through hell because of him.

  She snarled, flashing little fangs, and her eyes turned to liquid silver as fur rippled over her exposed skin. “I hope they give
you what you fucking deserve. It took a lot for me to return to this place, but I had to do it.”

  That hit him like a tonne of bricks and he couldn’t breathe as she smiled viciously across the room at him.

  Victoriously.

  She had lured him into a trap. She had known he was tracking her, knew who he was, and she had gotten herself caught because she had known he would have to do the same in order to stay close to her and fulfil his mission.

  Son of a bitch.

  She calmly walked to the steel door of the room and rapped her knuckles against it, and he was unprepared for the deluge of raw emotions that crashed over him when the door opened to reveal no one to escort her on the other side.

  She wasn’t a prisoner.

  But he was.

  Harbin roared and kicked off, intent on reaching the traitorous bitch before she slipped beyond his grasp forever. He leaped over every obstacle in his way but the door slammed shut before he could reach her. He rained blows down on it and a panel slid open, revealing glass and the female. She donned a robe, wrapped it tight around herself, and glanced over her shoulder at him, not even a flicker of guilt in her eyes.

  “Why?” he barked, even when the question felt redundant because he already knew the answer.

  He just needed to hear her say it.

  Her smile faltered and something akin to guilt or possibly sorrow entered her silvery eyes.

  “I wasn’t the only one Archangel captured that day, but I was the only one left alive when Archangel was placed into the hands of a person with a more noble vision, one where humans and fae could live and work in harmony.” She pressed her hands to her chest and screwed her eyes shut. Tears slipped down her cheeks, and a stupid part of himself he couldn’t quite kill ached with a need to wipe them away, proving just how fucked up he was. “I’m doing it for the ones I had to watch die during my three years of captivity, whether it was a slow and torturous death of the spirit that took them or a corporeal one through vivisection or poison testing for weapons.”

  Gods, it had been hard enough when he had only had the weight of the deaths of those at the pride village on his shoulders, swift ends by steel and bullets. He couldn’t bear the weight of what she was placing on them. He pressed his hands to the metal door, his arms shaking and his knees threatening to give out as what she was saying slowly sank in.

  She lifted her head and looked into his eyes, and he could see that she might have been strong enough to survive whatever horrors Archangel had inflicted on her, but she was haunted by the things she had seen and endured.

  Things that were his fault.

  “The people around you were the ones who killed your kin by experimenting on them and killed the others back at our pride,” he bit out and her expression didn’t change, didn’t reveal one single emotion to him. It remained flat and cold. He snarled and slammed his fists against the steel that separated them. “Archangel are the ones who fucked up both of our lives. They were the ones who sent a huntress to seduce me, drug me and betray me… and they were the ones who killed my sister and mother.”

  Shock flitted across her face before she schooled her expression again. She hadn’t known the whole story, he could see that now. She hadn’t known that he had been used by Archangel. What twisted spin had Archangel put on what had happened back then to make her believe that he was the one who had orchestrated everything?

  His stomach dropped as the answer hit him.

  They had told her and the others they had captured that he had sold them out.

  Her lips parted but two male hunters appeared before she could speak, ushering her away. He stared at her as she walked down the corridor, wedged between the two mortals, her arms wrapped around herself.

  At the last second, before she was stolen from view, she looked back over her shoulder at him.

  A touch of regret shone in her gaze.

  Harbin’s legs gave out and he crashed to the ground, still reeling from everything that had happened and what she had told him. She had lured him into a trap. She had wanted revenge and for a moment, he felt sure that she had thought she had it, but then he had driven a spike into the perfect image that Archangel had painted and made her believe, fracturing it and leaving her doubting the hunter organisation.

  He couldn’t take any pleasure from that, not while his mind was filled with thoughts of everything she and the others Archangel had taken from the village that day must have suffered because of him.

  Not while his mind kept whispering to him, filling his heart with a suspicion that he couldn’t shake.

  The female had taken out a contract on herself in order to entrap him and have her revenge.

  He had been betrayed again.

  CHAPTER 8

  Aya needed air. She couldn’t breathe as she rushed through the maze of bright corridors in the palatial sandstone building belonging to Archangel. Hunters eyed her as she hurried past them, her head bent and her short black hair concealing her face.

  And the tears streaking her cheeks.

  The events of the past few days had finally caught up with her, the male snow leopard dealing the final blow that sent them all crashing down on her and rattling her.

  Harbin.

  Gods, what was she doing?

  Had he been telling her the truth, or was it just another deception, a lie spun to shake her trust in Archangel?

  She shoved the flat of her palm against a glass door and sweet night air washed over her, the coolness of it sending a wave of calm through her as she could finally breathe again. She strode out into the welcoming darkness, heading for the spot in the centre of the courtyard where the amber glow of the lights emanating from the rows of windows on the walls of the quadrangle barely reached.

  Aya tipped her head back and breathed deeply, trying to centre herself again and settle her turbulent thoughts and feelings. Her fingers stroked over the soft material of her silver halter-top, a methodical rhythm that slowly calmed her.

  What had she done?

  It was her fault that Rocky and the others were in the hands of Archangel, and while she had been able to meet with a senior member of staff before her encounter with Harbin and secure their release, she didn’t fully trust Archangel to hold true to their word.

  Not anymore.

  All because Harbin had shaken her.

  She had thought herself prepared to handle facing him and finally having her revenge, making him pay for the years she had suffered at the hands of madmen and the close to two decades of reliving those nightmarish times that had come afterwards.

  She had been wrong.

  With only a handful of words, backed up by the pain that had shone in his silver eyes, hurt that had called to her deepest animal instincts and had made her want to soothe him, he had punched a hole in her beliefs and ripped them apart.

  She paced the small patch of darkness, the gravel crunching beneath her black boots. Her hands still shook, but not as violently as they had been when she had returned to the small room where her clothes had been waiting for her and had dressed. She had barely been able to fasten the button on her black jeans. It had taken her close to ten attempts before she had finally managed it.

  It wasn’t only Harbin’s words that had shaken her though.

  Her lips tingled and she pressed trembling fingers to them, her breath hot on their tips as she thought about the kiss.

  She’d had a deal with Archangel, a plan they had agreed on, and they had changed it. Twice. When she had contacted them about Harbin, they had agreed on a plan, one where they would wait until two days after her call and capture both her and Harbin together, taking them into custody when they were alone outside the club in order to maintain her cover as just another member of the fae community.

  They had promised to do things quietly, and that only the two of them would be captured.

  The senior member of staff she had met with tonight had apologised, stating that it was another operation that had seized her and the others the
night after she had contacted Archangel, and she had foolishly believed him.

  Until they had changed the plan again.

  They had sworn the barrier would remain in place, keeping Harbin separated from her. They had lied, and that only weakened her trust and made her feel they had been lying to her from the start.

  Harbin had been so swift to enter the room, to cross it and reach her, that she hadn’t had time to react. She had been in his arms, her back pressed to the wall and his powerful body caging her before she could move, and then his lips had captured hers and she had been thrown back close to forty years to a fumbled first kiss in a snowy mountain village.

  Aya spat out a curse and dragged her fingers away from her lips.

  That kiss had meant nothing. He had made that perfectly clear to her then. He felt nothing for her, but that hadn’t made it hurt any less when he had betrayed her.

  She looked back at the doors she had exited.

  If he had betrayed her.

  He hadn’t been lying when he had said that Archangel had killed his sister and mother, and part of her believed he hadn’t been lying when he had said Archangel had used him too. She had already known he had told them the location of the village, but the tale she knew differed from that point.

  When Archangel had changed hands, and she had been set free, a huntress had been sent to speak with her about everything. The pretty blonde female had told her about that night and that she had been there, and that Harbin had been given money and his pride given protection in exchange for three males and a female. Archangel hadn’t intended to spill blood, they had only fought to defend themselves when the males in the village had attacked them.

  Aya had believed her.

  She had been alone, afraid and angry, and she had needed someone to direct that fury at and the huntress had given her a target.

  She had directed Aya’s anger away from Archangel and made her focus it on one of her own kind.