Glass exploded from the building, showering the square. Olivia tensed and curled into a ball as quickly as she could. People screamed and she screwed her eyes shut, not wanting to think about everything that was happening. Because of Loren.
Because of that maniac she had seen.
She uncurled and realised that Loren had wrapped himself around her, using his body to shield her from the glass. Olivia hated that the self-sacrificing action warmed her even a fraction of a degree. She was supposed to be mad at him.
Olivia jerked back, dislodging him, and continued her work. The fingers of her left hand ached even though she did her best not to move them and her leg was killing her, but she kept going, stitching the wound on the man’s head. He needed her help. She couldn’t flake out now. She couldn’t, no matter how tired and weak she felt.
“You need to rest,” Loren said in that commanding snarl of his and Olivia ignored him.
She finished stitching the wound, cut the thread and then bandaged the man’s head. She checked him over for other injuries and Loren growled. Olivia knew why. She was touching the young doctor, feeling her way over his body. Her patience snapped again.
“Don’t take that tone with me,” she barked at Loren and his irises flashed purple.
Bleu’s eyes widened and he gave her a look that asked if she had lost her mind.
She had. She had lost it the moment Loren had come into her life. It was the only reasonable explanation for the insanity that had occurred in the few days she had known him, both in her world and where her feelings were concerned. She had to be crazy to have felt attracted to him.
He was rude, inconsiderate, treated everyone as though they were liable to attempt to bed her or kill her, and she’d had enough of him.
“Get away from me.” She shot to her feet, regretting it the moment the dizziness hit her and she almost collapsed.
Loren caught her and she wanted to punch him, but she didn’t have the strength. She tried to knee him in the balls instead but he blocked her and smiled softly.
“Olivia, you need to rest.” He cradled her against his chest and righted her, and she cursed herself for leaning into him, seeking his warmth and how safe he made her feel. “You are injured and need proper medical attention.”
“No.” Olivia wouldn’t let him coddle her. It would be the last straw. She didn’t need a man to take care of her, especially not Loren. He only wanted her to rest because she was in pain and that meant he was in pain too, because of this ridiculous bond. She pushed out of his arms and looked around her at the blood and the glass, the fire and the chaos. Olivia calmly brushed her hair from her eyes, wiping her tears away at the same time, and faced Loren. “I can’t take a break... because people are dying. My friends are dying.”
Regret shone in his blue eyes. “I should have anticipated this. I shouldn’t have left you here alone. It made you an easy target and I am sorry.”
“Save your apologies for them and them.” She pointed to the injured and then the row of covered corpses, and then swung her hand behind her and pointed at the building. “And them... Loren. Apologise to them... trapped in there... afraid... dying because of you.”
Olivia turned away and scrubbed the heels of her hands across her eyes, sniffed back her tears and focused on the people who needed her.
“Olivia, please,” Loren called after her but she didn’t slow down.
Sable left a group of hunters who had been helping the injured out of the building and glared beyond her at Loren and Bleu. “Want me to kill them?”
Olivia smiled and shook her head. “No. There’s been enough death today... and I do think he’s honestly sorry for what happened.”
“What did happen?” Sable drew her collapsible crossbow anyway and played at pointing it at the two men who hadn’t dared to move after her.
Which was Sable threatening?
It had to be Bleu. If it had been Loren, he probably wouldn’t have hesitated to attack her.
They had both been injured though. Had they been fighting the man who had blown up her world?
“His enemy just became our enemy.” Olivia trudged towards her next patient.
She focused on taking care of the injured with Sable’s assistance. The night wore on, the fire department put the blaze out and more were rescued from the building, many of them from the floors above the laboratory levels, including Mark and others she thought of as her friends. Olivia found it increasingly difficult to concentrate through the pain but she soldiered on, unwilling to give up while there were still people who needed her.
The sky lightened and the sun broke the horizon, painting ribbons of cloud in pinks and gold, but she found no warmth or beauty in it today.
The last of the injured were ferried away to one of the medical facilities used to tend to wounded hunters.
Olivia sat in the middle of the square, surrounded by blood and glass, tired to her bones.
Sable patted her shoulder. “I think he’s about to lose patience.”
Olivia could feel it in him. He had kept away from her, but had never been further than a few metres, and his eyes had constantly been on her. He had protected her from a distance, ignoring Bleu’s suggestions that they return to their world, determined to watch over her.
She lifted her heavy head and looked across the square to him.
He wobbled in her vision and darkness loomed up and swallowed her. The world came back a heartbeat later and she slowly opened her eyes and found him looking down at her, his blue eyes flooded with concern and his anxiety mixing in with her weariness and the pain throbbing deep in her bones.
“No more arguing,” Loren whispered and she nodded, too tired to resist him. He gathered her closer and she leaned her head against his cool hard chest and shut her eyes.
The scent of smoke and blood disappeared, replaced by a crisp fresh breeze that carried the scent of blossom.
He had taken her away from her world again, back to his.
She opened her eyes and looked up into his, and he softly stroked her cheek, his crystal blue eyes warm with tender concern.
“You will rest now?” he said in a low gentle voice and lifted her in his arms. Olivia curled into him, battling the call of sleep, and clung to his long black coat. He laid her down on the rich purple covers of his soft bed and she didn’t let him go. Her fingers clutched his coat lapels. Loren smiled but there was no warmth in it and covered her hands with his. “I am sorry, Olivia.”
She nodded. He didn’t need to tell her that he was sorry about what had happened. It was there in his eyes and in the connection that linked them. She could feel his sorrow and his suffering as if it were her own.
“What sort of freaky ass shit did you just do to me, you weirdo?” Sable’s voice echoing in from outside drove some of the sleepiness from her and she frowned at Loren.
A distinctly Bleu growl came next.
He must have teleported Sable with him.
“Back off... back the hell off, vampires!”
He also must have forgotten to remove Sable’s weapons first. Olivia thought she heard a few disgusted mutters about vampires and mortals.
“Excuse me.” Loren eased her hands away from his coat, released her and disappeared.
He reappeared a moment later with Sable, who promptly threw a right hook at him. Loren dodged it, held his hands up, and stepped aside. Sable’s golden-brown eyes instantly shot to her and she raced to the bed.
“They took you too?” Sable said and Olivia tried to sit up. Pain shot up her left arm from her fingers and she grimaced.
Loren was by her side in an instant, helping her up and arranging his pillows behind her. A little more of her anger towards him melted but she clung fiercely to the rest.
“I’ve been here before,” Olivia said to her friend and Sable’s eyes widened. “No... no... not like that. It’s not what it looks like. I told you... we’re just bonded and we’re breaking that bond. Loren doesn’t want me, and I definitely don�
�t want him.”
Much.
She kept her eyes on Sable, resisting the pressing desire to look at him and see if his expression matched the feelings flowing through their bond. Loren did want her, and his increased heartbeat and elevated hormone levels said the sight of her on his bed had him thinking about wanting her right that moment.
Bleu burst into the room.
“You want another round?” Sable raised her fists.
Bleu wiped the back of his hand across his bloodied lip and narrowed his purple eyes on her friend. He definitely wanted a second shot at Sable’s title.
“Bleu,” Loren said, and Bleu’s gaze drifted to him. “I require a moment alone with Olivia. Please show Sable around the castle and answer any questions she might have.”
Sable smiled viciously at Bleu. “There’s only one room I want to see and only two questions I have.”
Bleu straightened, his eyes flashing dangerously as Sable sauntered up to him.
She prodded his chest. “Where’s your sparring room and do you want me to whip your butt in it?”
She tossed Olivia a good-luck wink and dragged Bleu from the room. Loren stared at the closed arched doors.
“Your friend is trouble. It is not wise to challenge Bleu.” Loren slowly looked across at her and Olivia forgot her pain and her anger for a moment as she smiled at the thought of Sable taking on Bleu. That was the huntress she knew. She was sporting an injured arm but she just couldn’t resist the opportunity to fight a new species.
“I think Bleu will find it’s not wise to challenge Sable,” Olivia said and then her smile faded and she looked down at her ruined dirty white coat and her ripped jeans. Blood had soaked through the bandages around her lower right leg. Here in Loren’s castle, she felt as if she were thousands of miles away from what had happened tonight and it would be so easy for her to just shove it aside and forget what she had lived through, and why.
She looked up at Loren and his expression turned sombre, the light that had been in his purple eyes fading to reveal the sorrow she had witnessed often in them.
“Who was he and how did he plant the bombs in Archangel?” she whispered. “No more dancing around this... Loren... I need to know what I’m dealing with. He’s not just your enemy anymore. He’s our enemy now.”
Loren sighed, sat on the edge of the bed and scrubbed a hand through his black hair, tousling the longer lengths on top and revealing the pointed tips of his ears.
“Vail is... my younger brother.”
Olivia stared at him, waiting for that to sink in. Loren had been at war for all these centuries with his younger brother.
That was why he had talked of containing him and capturing him. That was why he hadn’t killed him before.
Ice formed in her veins, engulfing her heart, dragging up memories she had fought hard to suppress. She drew her left leg up and held on to it, resting her chin on it as she realised that she and Loren weren’t so different after all. They came from different worlds but both of them wanted to save their brother. She had lost hers. Loren still had a chance with his.
“Olivia?” Loren whispered and she dashed away the tears lining her lashes. “Are you feeling unwell?”
She nodded. She hadn’t felt right since the night she had fallen into a parallel world full of monsters and mayhem.
She didn’t want to think about it so she focused on Loren and his brother, locking away the memories of her one.
Loren moved closer to her, his proximity comforting her, stealing away some of her pain.
“Tell me... what happened to make you go to war with your own brother?” She stared down at his hands on the bed, pale against the purple sheets, afraid to look at him because she feared she would give in to her need to feel his arms around her if she did. She wanted to lose herself in him and forget everything, even if it could only be for a handful of hours.
Her gaze betrayed her and drifted up his arms, and she pulled it back to his hands. It was strange to see him in a shirt and jeans, and the long coat. They didn’t suit him at all.
He shifted again and heaved a sigh.
“Vail had been away with his legion of our army, scouting the borders of our lands that join it to the area we know as the free realm. Many different species live there, with no one king or queen to rule them. He sent back word stating that he had found something and he couldn’t wait to show me.” Loren’s deep voice held a sombre note and Olivia felt his pain. She reached out and placed her hand over his, hoping to give him some comfort, knowing what it was like to think back to happier times that were now tainted by one terrible moment of darkness. Loren shifted his hand beneath hers, moving it so their palms pressed together and his fingertips grazed her wrist. “Months later, the remains of the legion returned, a young Bleu amongst them. Many of them were savagely injured and I feared my brother dead until Bleu and other men had the courage to speak out, revealing that it was Vail who had turned on them. They said he had become crazed by the presence of a magic bearer.”
“Kordula,” Olivia said. “His ki’ara.”
Loren nodded. “I believe their completed bond triggered this change within him.”
She lifted her eyes to his and saw in them that he also believed that if he completed his bond with her, that he would follow his brother into madness.
Loren looked away, turning his noble profile to her and staring at one of the arched windows lining the dark stone wall behind her. “I dispatched my finest soldiers to track and capture Vail, but he fought and slew them all before disappearing. Over the centuries after that, he attacked other kingdoms, mainly the demon ones, bringing their wrath down upon my kingdom and my people. The number of my kind dwindled, our might diminished, and I was kept busy trying to carve out peace with the kingdoms who wanted to see me dead and my people destroyed.”
“That’s terrible.” Olivia brushed her fingers against his palm and felt his shiver race through her. “You never stopped trying to save him though.”
He shook his head. “No. I searched for him whenever I could, and fought him close to every other century, always failing to capture him. The council grew weary of my desire to imprison Vail rather than kill him, and I reluctantly agreed to seek my brother’s head in our next battle. I have to put the safety and wellbeing of my people before my own desires.”
Loren’s purple gaze filled with weariness that she could feel in him. The constant war against his brother had drained him and now all he had were tainted memories and a heart filled with regrets.
He didn’t even have his fated female.
He was giving her up too. She could see it now. He was placing his people before his own desires, and that meant sacrificing his one ki’ara and his brother.
Her heart ached for him and she curled her fingers around his hand, squeezing it gently, trying to show him that she was here even if she couldn’t understand what he was going through. He was giving it all up for his people. It made her feel cold, and sorry for him.
He had been alone for millennia and now this council of his and his own sense of duty to his people had him cementing that loneliness, seeking to shatter the bond with her and destroy his brother.
“Loren,” she started but he slipped his hand from under hers and stood.
“Rest, Olivia. I will take you home by nightfall.” He turned his back on her, blue and purple light flashed over his body and he disappeared.
She was beginning to tire of his tendency to do that but she couldn’t blame him for running away from her whenever things got too intense for him. He was trying to save himself from suffering more than he already was.
Olivia pulled her leg closer and stared at the spot where he had sat beside her, holding her hand and taking her comfort, until she had dared to voice the feeling in her heart.
He shouldn’t have to give up everything.
It wasn’t right.
He had already been through so much pain because of what had happened with Vail and now he was supposed t
o kill his only brother.
She hadn’t been able to kill hers.
She had wanted to save him too.
She hadn’t wanted to be alone.
And neither did Loren.
Olivia touched the marks on her throat, focusing on them, seeking Loren through their connection. He felt agitated, upset, and in pain. She ached to go to him and take that hurt away, to tell him that just because he was a prince, it didn’t mean he should have to live his life alone.
What was she doing?
She was supposed to be mad at Loren but she couldn’t blame him for wanting to save his brother, and she couldn’t blame him for what had happened at Archangel. She had demanded he let her stay there, even though he had told her it would be dangerous. She had ignored his warning and Vail had done exactly what Loren had said he would, targeting her in order to make him suffer.
Punishing him for the attempt he had made on Kordula’s life.
Olivia was as much to blame for the explosion as Loren was, but the true culprit was Vail. Vail was to blame for everything. He had turned on Loren and his people. He had driven his brother to war with him when all Loren wanted to do was save him and his people. He had forced this bond between Loren and her, all for the sake of revenge, stealing his brother’s only ki’ara because Loren felt too damned guilty about desiring her above the safety of his people and was too damned noble to say screw his duty and take a shot at winning her.
Olivia groaned. Did she want Loren to win her? She vaguely recalled feeling offended at one point by the fact that he wanted to break the bond, but that was before she had come to know him and know how attracted he was to her. He craved her as much as she craved him, and she was too tired and hurt to lie to herself anymore. It wasn’t the bond. Loren was six-feet-six of gorgeous with a heart of solid gold. Any woman in her right mind would want him and she was not certifiably crazy yet.
Did she want to win Loren?
Her heart tore her in too many directions until she wasn’t sure which one was the one she wanted most of all. There was one thing she kept coming back to though.
Kissed by a Dark Prince (Volume 1) Page 13
