by Cassi Carver
She might have missed the hell out of him, but there was no way she’d let him get away with manners like this. “Don’t try to scare me, Julian. Is that how you treat the woman you love after all this time?”
He laughed, and it was the same seductive sound she remembered, only hollow somehow. “I think I like this game. I love you?”
He wrapped his long fingers around her chin and pinned her head back, then cupped his lips around the cut and drew deeply. When he brought his head up, his lips were crimson with her blood. A shudder ran down his spine like he’d taken a hit of a potent drug. “Yes. I love you. The taste of you. Do you taste that good everywhere?”
Kara knew she should be scared out of her mind. She’d never heard of her people drinking blood. She knew for a fact their fangs were built for tearing and rending, not for plunging into someone’s veins like pointy little straws. Why was he doing this?
He wasn’t a thing like her bondmate. And yet, he looked like Julian. Under her fingertips, he felt like Julian. Her nipples peaked, reaching for his attention. Her body was warm and pliant, the apex of her thighs flooding with moisture. He might not know her, but her damn body knew him, and it had been denied him far too long.
“Taste me, then.” She leaned toward him, and he allowed it. The fingers holding her chin slipped behind her head and captured her nape. She kissed him harder this time, thrusting her tongue into his mouth, trying to block out the metallic flavor of her own blood.
He growled and cupped her ass, lifting her against him with one hand. Demiáre were strong, but he didn’t even seem to notice Kara’s weight as she wrapped her legs around his waist. She wondered if he could hold her there with his will alone.
He brought both hands to her rump and pressed her against his long, thick shaft. Now that was something that hadn’t changed at all. He was still as massively built, and all that perfection was just two layers away from her throbbing core.
She pressed her lips harder against his and invaded his mouth with her tongue. She couldn’t prevent her throaty sigh or her desperate grind against him.
“They said you were gone.” She tangled her fingers in his thick hair and kissed his cheeks with damp lips. “You don’t know what that did to me…thinking you weren’t coming back. It felt like a piece of me was buried alongside you.”
He lifted his head and flared his nostrils as if sampling the wind. “You should fear for your life, and yet you toy with me instead. I could have made your death quick, but now…” He ran his hands over Kara’s sides, and she shivered. “Now I think I will take my time with you.”
“Don’t say that. You’re not going to hurt me.” She felt a stab in her heart that he could be a part of her and not remember what they’d shared, but she couldn’t bring herself to move from his arms. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but I will help you figure this out. I promise.”
“Help me?”
“Yes, Julian. We can get through this. I love you.” She should have told him before the accident, but now she’d been given another chance, and she couldn’t say it enough. Her hand molded to his cheek in a tender caress. “I love you.”
His wings expanded in a powerful arc, hovering over them like a bird of prey, and claws like polished black marble extended from his fingertips. “Cunning bitch! What kind of trap are you setting, woman?”
“What are you talking about? I’m not trying to trap you.” Seeing the unrestrained fury in his obsidian eyes, Kara instinctively leaned away, bringing her hands up to shield her face.
With his top lip bunched in a snarl, his expression was all fire and fangs. “The next night our paths cross will be your last,” he spat.
And then he vanished.
He flashed out of existence, and Kara fell straight on her ass, sailing through the air and landing square on her tailbone.
She moaned and rolled to her side, bringing a hand to her rump to soothe the damage. When she was sure her tush was still attached to the top of her legs, she grasped Jaxon’s and Aiden’s pendants around her neck and sent her thoughts screaming into the night. “Code red! Get your asses over here!”
Aiden appeared within seconds, silver wings unfurled, scanning Kara’s rumpled clothing with a concerned but slightly bemused expression. He held a huge sword at the ready, and his white-blond hair was gelled into pointy spikes. Kara could smell Demiáre sex on his skin from four feet away.
“What in the hell is a ‘code red’?” he asked, but any humor left his eyes when his gaze landed on the grounded Mercury warrior.
Stuffing down her aches and pains, Kara rose to her feet. “That’s code for Julian maimed your scouts and pretty much wants to kill me.”
Jaxon stumbled onto the scene a second later, gripping a dagger in each hand. His chest was bare and his unbuttoned black jeans rode low on his hips. He took one look at the wounded warrior at Kara’s feet, and his face fell. “Mistress?”
“It’s okay, Jaxon.” I think. She glanced at Aiden, realizing he hadn’t said another word. “What?”
He was looking at her with a mix of concern and pity. “Julian is gone, Kara. Whatever you saw tonight wasn’t Julian.”
Jaxon let the knives clatter to the ground, then wrapped his arms around Kara, almost crushing her ribs. “Who hurt you?” He pressed his nose to her hair, his body melting around hers as he brought her cheek to his bare chest. “Who touched you, mistress? I swear I won’t rest until he’s dead.”
Aw, crap. It was hard to stay mad at Jaxon when he was unraveling at the idea she’d been attacked. She reached up and petted his hair. “No one hurt me, Jaxy. I’m fine.”
Aiden closed his eyes. Kara felt power flowing from him like small streams of water pouring into the space around them from every direction before being quickly sucked back into his body. By the time he opened his eyes again, a deep frown had worked its way between his brows. “Aniliáre. A black-wing has been here.”
“No shit.” Kara had been through too much tonight to be polite.
“You said it was Julian,” he accused.
“Exactly. Julian. With black wings.”
Jaxon brushed her hair away from her eyes. “Shh. Everything is going to be all right.” He ran his fingers over her scalp, inspecting every inch, then turned to Aiden. “Her head has already healed, but the internal damage must be severe, my lord. We’re wasting time.”
Aiden nodded. “Agreed. Step aside. I’ll flash her to the island for my healers to inspect. Get some men to transport the guards back to the island.”
Jaxon held on tighter. “No. I won’t leave her again.”
Aiden laughed. “How noble. Finally acting like a protector instead of a house pet. But you’re a little late, don’t you think?”
Jaxon’s cheeks reddened as if he’d been slapped. He opened his quivering lips, but Kara spoke first. “Nobody’s questioning you, Jaxon. You’re the best. Take care of the warriors first, then I want you to go home and tell Abbey to reinforce the wards. She may need Grammy D to drive down to help.”
He steeled his jaw. “My duty is to you.” The guilt in his eyes said more than his simple words. If a man could keel over from shame, Jaxon was a goner.
She backed away and forced a smile. “Aiden can drop me off when we’re done. I’ll rest easier knowing I’m coming home to a safe place.”
“I can’t leave you in this condition. And I need to speak with you—” he lowered his voice, “—about tonight.”
Kara sighed. She was still reeling from seeing Julian and didn’t have time to worry about Jaxon’s feelings. No matter what arguments he came up with, she knew one thing—if an angry black-wing came after them, she’d heal a hell of a lot faster than Abbey would. “We’ll talk. But right now, I need you to do this for me.”
He turned his head away and nodded. “Very well.”
“Now that that’s settled…” Aiden brushed past Jaxon and gathered Kara in his arms. Without another word, he dissolved, transporting Kara into the mind-num
bing sludge.
And it hurt. The weight of the universe pressed in from all sides…bearing down on her soul. But somehow…it still felt like her guts were being sucked out through her pores.
A moment later, Aiden set Kara on her feet at the entrance of his large bedroom, but he kept an arm wrapped around her waist. She knew to stand still for a moment until the world stopped spinning and she didn’t feel like she was going to puke stardust. “Thanks for the ride.”
She didn’t understand how these warriors could seem so unaffected by something that made her feel as if she were being turned inside out, every single time. She missed visiting Julian’s grave, but she didn’t miss the travel.
“Lie down. I’ll fetch the healers,” Aiden told her, swiping his palms over his eyelids as if to clear the sleep from his eyes.
He showed her to an oversized bed with navy blue silk sheets, then walked quickly from the room. The comforter was pulled back and the bedding disheveled, as though he’d left in a hurry when he’d answered Kara’s call, but it was the middle of the day here on Mercury Island.
She glanced around. Vanilla candles burned low, mixing with the subtle scent of female blood. Clothes were strewn across the floor, and judging from the lace and pastel colors, not all of the clothes were his. His bedside table held vials of lotions and oils that Kara didn’t want to ponder too deeply.
She drew the covers over his bed and fell into the soft mattress. Sleeping for a week was sounding like a pretty good idea. Now that Julian wasn’t standing in front of her, she wondered if the whole thing had been a dream, or worse yet, if an Aniliáre really had been playing a trick on her.
But she wouldn’t believe that. What could anyone gain by posing as a violent, disoriented Julian? If they wanted to mess with Kara’s head and break her heart all over again, coming back as the loving, kind Julian was a better bet.
Aiden returned with two other men trailing behind him. Kara was ready for gnarled healers, wrinkled with age and ready with wisdom. She didn’t know if she would ever get used to the fact that Demiáre didn’t age like witches. The handsome men coming toward her might be twenty-nine—or twenty-nine hundred—for all Kara knew. She sat up and swung her feet over the side of the bed. So much for a nap.
“Kara, you may remember Rasi from your time here on the island.” Aiden gestured to a black-haired man with Asian features.
“Hi, Rasi.” She didn’t want to admit that she couldn’t keep all the men she’d met straight in her head. He might have been one of the men who’d helped to subdue Julian when he’d been in a mating rage.
Aiden gestured to a man with a long brown braid tied behind his back. The man wore brown leather pants and a flowing white shirt. “And this is Tyre. He’s recently come to live with us.”
Kara nodded. “Nice to meet you.”
“The pleasure is mine, my lady.” Tyre approached the bed and knelt before her. Rasi came to stand on Tyre’s other side.
Tyre picked up Kara’s hand and touched it to his forehead, and at the same time, pressed the fingertips of his other hand above her brows. She felt a strange sensation, like a cat’s paw batting the inside of her skull, and jerked away. “What are you doing?”
“I’m already finished. Rasi? Your turn.”
Tyre stepped back, and Rasi took his place. Kneeling beside Kara, he leaned into her and drew a long, slow breath. When he was finished, he stood.
“Well?” Aiden asked.
Rasi turned to the blond lord and replied, “She carries the scent of an Aniliáre, there’s no doubt about that. But I can’t place him.”
Aiden nodded. “And you, Tyre? What do you see?”
He looked at Kara when he spoke. “She remembers Lord Julian’s face. She’s telling the truth about that, and her memories don’t seem disturbed. Most likely a black-wing has taken his form.”
Kara shot to her feet. “These are your healers, Aiden? They seem more like your private investigators to me.”
Aiden placed his palms out. “I have to know what I’m dealing with, Kara. That’s the only way I can help you. You’ll learn soon enough that you can’t believe everything you see.”
“I know what I saw. It was Julian. He’s confused and alone, and…angry, maybe. But it was him.”
“Tell me what happened.”
She crossed her arms over her ribs, hugging herself tight. “I had a horrible night. I was in an accident and saw a couple of people…hurt.” That was all she could bring herself to say. “Tray walked me home, and we had a disagreement with Jaxon and Abbey.”
To call it a horrible night didn’t begin to describe it.
Aiden walked to her and placed his hand lightly on her shoulder, as if he didn’t really want to but thought it was the right thing to do under the circumstances. “I’m sorry, Kara. Please go on.” When she stiffened at his touch, he seemed to get the picture and folded his hands in front of him.
“I decided to take a walk. I walked down toward the bay and started feeling something strange in the air.”
“Did you hear anything?”
“No. And I don’t get that. If your warriors are that badly hurt and it happened around me, shouldn’t I have heard something?”
“The Aniliáre have powers you can’t begin to comprehend. If he didn’t want to be seen or heard, he could will a sphere around himself or whomever he chose. A black-wing can walk among the humans without ever being seen, or if he chooses to be seen, can change their memories with a glance. That’s what we are dealing with here.”
No flippin’ way. Kara knew the Aniliáre were powerful, but she clearly hadn’t realized the full extent of it. “Okay.”
“Tell me what happened next.”
“Well, next I decided to hide in an alley.” Had she just said that out loud? Shit. “Not really hide, but get off the street. Then the next thing I knew, the warrior landed behind me, and when I turned, Julian was there. I tried to run, but I smacked into some kind of force field. He didn’t seem to recognize me.” She rubbed the dried blood from her upper lip.
Aiden swallowed, his expression grim. “And then he…forced himself upon you.”
“What? No! God, no. Julian wouldn’t do that.”
The men exchanged glances. “His scent is all over you, Kara,” Aiden said carefully.
“Yes, but it wasn’t like that. I was scared, but I’ve just—” she searched for the words and then met Aiden’s eyes, “—I’ve just missed him so much. I wanted to touch him again. I wanted to feel that he was real. I thought he might remember if I kissed him.”
“You kissed him?”
“Yeah.” Kara ran her thumbnail under the tips of her fingers. She hated the nervous tell, but Aiden was acting like she’d done something wrong.
“And then you came to your senses?”
“And then he dumped me on my ass.” If he hadn’t, there was no telling how far she might have taken it.
Aiden frowned. “Has Jaxon been taking care of you?”
“Jaxon? What does he have to do with this?”
“When a young female tells me she willingly pursued a man who de-winged her scouts and smacked her into a shield, I have to wonder if her mating needs are being met. It’s not safe for you to go without, Kara. It can cause unpredictability and unwise choices.”
Tyre snickered. “Of course, my lord, a properly sexed female isn’t much better. If I hadn’t healed, I’d have the scars to prove it.”
Aiden let out a deep breath and pinned Tyre with an irritated gaze before turning his attention back to Kara. She looked at the men, not liking that she knew exactly what Aiden was talking about. If she wasn’t getting better at keeping herself in check, she could imagine taking any one of them this very moment. Her cheeks warmed at the thought. “It wasn’t that I couldn’t control myself, it was Julian. He’s back. He regenerated!”
“It’s not possible, Kara.” Aiden closed his eyes as he ran a hand over his flaxen spikes. “I saw his body.”
She blin
ked in bewilderment and shook her head. “What? When?”
“After the last time you visited, when we told you that Julian’s energy had run dry, Gavin and I dug up the coffin. We had to see it with our own eyes to believe it. His body was nothing but a rotting corpse.”
Kara sucked in a breath. “No.”
His eyes looked truly hopeless. “He never came back.”
She sat heavily on the edge of the bed. “Something might be wrong with Julian, but it was him.” She knew her voice sounded desperate, as if she were trying to convince them the sky wasn’t blue, but she couldn’t imagine any other possibility than Julian coming to her tonight in the flesh. “It was him.”
Aiden fisted his hand on the end of the bed. “Do you know what you’re saying? You’re talking about a Shadow Rising. They don’t exist except in stories from the ancient scrolls. No one has ever witnessed one.”
Kara’s head perked up. “A Shadow Rising?”
Tyre folded his arms, looking more like a cocky lord than a man who scoured brains for a living. “The ancient scrolls speak of the Sons of the Sky clawing up from their graves with the powers of their fathers. But Lord Aiden is correct. In all the millennia that a Shadow Rising has been attempted, it has never once succeeded. It’s well known to be a fanciful tale.” He laughed. “The man who foretold it went to meet the Maker centuries ago. His silver wings are nothing but garden soil now.”
Kara’s nostrils flared, and it took all her strength not to bare her teeth at these men. “Fuck you all.” She swept past Aiden and his men and jogged down the hall.
“Kara!” Aiden called after her, but she didn’t stop.
A pained squeak escaped her lungs as she trotted past Julian’s bedroom and made her way down the stairs. She fled the house and ran through the grass as fast as her booted feet could carry her. The bright sun beat down on her head and made her eyes water. At home, the night was dark and bleak, with beloved warriors probably being bandaged and carried away at this very moment, but here, it was another perfect day. The tropical beauty clashed with the misery in her soul.
