Dark and Deadly: Eight Bad Boys of Paranormal Romance

by Ashley Jennifer

  “Payne, listen to me,” she whispered, focusing on him. She trusted this man. He had warned her not to push him and that he might kill her if she did, and she had still recklessly shoved him over the edge.

  Red blazed in the centre of his eyes, surrounded by shimmering gold and blue. He dropped her hip and slid his arm beneath her. She bit her lip to stifle her need to cry out when he grabbed her hair and tugged her head back. He stared down at her through those mesmerising eyes, his body moving against hers, giving her pleasure laced with pain and fear. She tried to stifle her desire, tried not to feel aroused as he thrust into her, deep and fast, bringing her towards another climax.

  His lips parted.

  No fangs. Did that mean he was more in control than she thought? Could she bring him back before things went too far?

  She opened her mouth and he claimed her lips, kissing her so fiercely that she couldn’t breathe and couldn’t think. She could only feel and submit to him. As she relaxed, his grip on her wrists loosened but not enough for her to get free. She forgot her need to struggle and lost herself again, swamped by the delicious sensations racing through her, evoked by the feel of him moving inside her and kissing the breath from her lungs.

  He reared back, slamming deep into her, and she cried out as she came again, her body throbbing around his. His lips curved into a dark smile, revealing fangs this time, and he stared down at her, possessing her with his hungry heavy-lidded eyes that spoke of intense pleasure and satisfaction.

  His grip on her wrists tightened again.

  Elissa panicked.

  She hadn’t cast her spell.

  She focused on the words, getting the first few out, but then he shattered her chances by striking hard and sinking his fangs into her throat. His body shuddered against hers and a third climax came upon her so swiftly that it rocked her to her core, causing her to tremble along with him. She breathed hard, struggling to catch her breath, hazy from head to toe as he drank from her throat, his body buried deep within hers.

  No.

  Panic welled up again and she bucked against him, feeling him throbbing within her.

  “No!” she shrieked and he stilled, frozen against her, inside her.

  He was still for long minutes. She could feel her blood leaking from her, spilling from between his lips.

  He disappeared and she shook as she pushed herself up onto her elbow to see where he had gone, her right hand covering the ragged marks on her throat.

  Payne stalked around the room, grabbing his clothes and dressing. He was shaking too, trembling so badly that it took him several attempts to get his underwear on. He growled, a noise born of frustration and pain, turned and slammed his fist into the wall above the fireplace. The green plaster cracked and fell away, revealing stone beneath. Blood trickled down from his knuckles and she swore she could feel his pain and his panic, his fear as he stood there with his fist against the wall, his back heaving with his breaths.

  “Payne?” she whispered, unsure what she was going to say. He didn’t look at her. “Payne? I should have stopped... I shouldn’t have pushed you.”

  He shoved away from the wall and pulled his shirt on, not bothering to heal his hand or lick the blood away. It soaked through the sleeve of his grey shirt and dripped to the floor as he tugged his jeans on and buttoned them. He wiped the back of his clean hand across his bloodied mouth, the action rough and vicious.

  She cast a small spell, one to help her feel him more clearly.

  He stopped and stared at her, his eyes brimming with hurt and remorse, and self-loathing. “It wasn’t your fault... I... I... can’t do this. I can’t look at you... I never meant for this... I never wanted to hurt you... I only wanted... I just... I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t,” she said and moved to kneel on the bed, reaching for him. She didn’t want him to teleport out of her life because she had failed to keep her end of the bargain. She had said she would use a spell to stop him and she knew it was the only reason he had agreed to make love with her, and then she had pushed him over the edge. She hated what had happened to her, knew that he was partly to blame too, but she didn’t want him blaming himself and only himself. They had entered into this together and she could have stopped him. She should have stopped herself. “Talk to me... please, Payne?”

  He looked lost again, as uncertain as she felt. His eyebrows furrowed and he swallowed hard, his eyes holding hers and overflowing with pain and fear. His hands shook at his sides, visibly trembling, and she knew that he could see her shaking too, that she looked as confused, afraid and broken as he did.

  “Elissa...”

  Someone knocked at the door. He stared at her for a few seconds and then shoved his fingers through his hair, went to the door and opened it.

  “Arnaud wishes to see you now.” A male voice drifted into the room and Elissa gathered the green covers around herself, feeling cold to the bone. She wanted Payne to look at her and tell her that everything was going to be all right and they could work through this, they could deal with it together. She had the terrible feeling that he would leave her without a word or a look instead.

  Payne glanced at her, sorrow in his beautiful grey eyes, all trace of gold, blue and red gone from them now.

  She held her hand out to him, afraid to hope that he would take it.

  Her heart lifted when he turned away from the open door and crossed the room to her. He pressed one knee into the mattress, took her hand and leaned over her. He dropped a kiss on her forehead and lingered there, his lips pressing against her skin and his hand shaking in hers.

  “Don’t go anywhere... please? Give me a second chance... please, Elissa?” he whispered hoarsely against her skin and she nodded, raised her hand and managed to stroke his cheek before he pulled away.

  He smiled tightly, turned around and walked out of the door, closing it behind him.

  Elissa sat in the middle of the bed, cold and afraid, feeling her connection to the earth slowly severing. What had she done? She swallowed and tears filled her eyes. She closed them, causing the hot drops to spill down her cheeks, and drew her knees to her chest, her ears ringing and head spinning as she thought about what had happened and felt herself weakening.

  Her coven would know what she had done. They would feel themselves weakening too. It wouldn’t be long before they hunted her down. Would Payne protect her when they came? Would he still see her as his mate now? She prayed to the earth and the sky that he would, because she had just turned her back on her world and she wouldn’t survive what was to come without him at her side, protecting her as fiercely as he had that day they had met.

  The air shifted.

  Someone had teleported into the room.

  “Payne?” she said, sure that he had returned to her, unable to remain away when he could probably feel her jumbled emotions through the connection between their blood, and that he would reassure her now that everything was going to be fine. She opened her eyes and lifted her head, and stared at the male before her. Dark blond hair, stony grey eyes, but this wasn’t the man her heart was pining for. Her voice turned cold and anger curled through her, causing her magic to stir and awaken. “Arnaud.”

  If he was here, did that mean he had lured Payne away, ensuring she would be alone?

  “When my aide told me of my grandson suddenly showing up with a woman he claimed was his mate, and he described you both to me, I had thought perhaps it would be you,” he said in a glacial tone and neatened the cuffs of his dark red shirt, his eyes on them, as though he couldn’t bring himself to look at her.

  Elissa tucked the covers around her, shielding her nudity from his eyes, and glared at him. Magic rose to her fingertips, darker than any spell she had ever dared to call before. She had thrown her life away. She might as well use the black arts now that her coven was already coming to kill her. Any punishment they chose to inflict upon her for using forbidden magic couldn’t be worse than death.

  “What do you want?” she said, trying
her hardest to sound unafraid when she was shaking right down to her bones.

  Arnaud straightened, his broad frame and height imposing when she was sitting. His grey gaze raked over her and the gold and cobalt in it brightened, swirling iridescently like Payne’s eyes had so many times when he had been looking at her. Unlike Payne, this man didn’t fill her with a desire to blush when he gazed upon her. He filled her with fear and disgust.

  “You smell like sex... like my grandson. Don’t tell me the little witch didn’t heed the cautionary tale of her sister and allowed a demon to climax while inside her?”

  Her skin crawled as he lowered his gaze to her hips and she moved her hands there, revealing the orbs of black that lazily drifted around them.

  He smiled and raised his eyes to meet hers.

  “What do you want?” she repeated.

  “I would like to know what you are doing with my grandson.” He looked genuinely concerned and then darkness crossed his face, his eyes brightening at the same time. “And why you are here?”

  “Payne promised to help me bring Luca home.” It wasn’t a lie, not wholly. Payne had promised to help her bring what she had wanted home, but he didn’t know that the item she had come to retrieve was in fact her nephew, and a relation of his.

  Arnaud snorted. “The boy is mine.”

  “I swore to raise him and protect him... he is mine.” She moved to kneel, bringing herself closer to eye-level with him, unwilling to let him intimidate her.

  “Why did you allow my grandson to violate you?” He stared at her, eyes narrowing, glowing now. Why wouldn’t he let that one go? She refused to blush as she wanted to and set her jaw, showing him that he wouldn’t get an answer to that question. “Did you do it so he would help you... or perhaps you wished to bear the child of a demon too?”

  He took a step towards her, his gaze locked on her, assessing her.

  Elissa trembled and said the one thing that sprang into her mind. “He is my mate.”

  Arnaud threw his head back and laughed. Not the reaction she had hoped to gain from him. He snapped his head down and stared straight into her eyes.

  “You believe that, don’t you? Poor child. No spawn of mine would tie themselves to a witch. Has he told you that you are his mate now and forever, that he will never be with another?”

  She shook her head, cold creeping in again.

  “He will leave you. He strung you along and made you believe you were special, and now he has you as his plaything... and when he grows bored of you, he will move on... and you will be left at the mercy of your coven.”

  She knew he was playing on her fears and she told herself not to listen, but her heart didn’t heed her. It ached at the thought that he might be right and Payne would leave her as soon as he had the ring from his grandfather. She had given him no reason to stay with her. She had provoked him at every turn, using him to get her here, so she could take Luca home. She was no better than everyone else who had manipulated him or hurt him.

  “You know I am right. I see it in your eyes. Come, child, console yourself.” He opened his arms to her and she felt the pull, a deep need to go to him and nestle in his arms. She wanted to cry in his embrace and let him comfort her. “I will make you forget my grandson.”

  Elissa moved to the edge of the bed, nodding in agreement. She wanted to forget Payne and all the hurt he had caused her. She wanted Arnaud to take her in his arms and hold her close to him, making love to her until she no longer remembered his bastard grandson.

  Arnaud took her hand and lifted it to his lips, pressing a long kiss to the back of it. She shivered, a hot rush racing through her blood, and stared up into his beautiful eyes.

  “Give yourself to me and I will give you his true name, and you can take your revenge.”

  Elissa froze and pulled back. “No.”

  She shook her head to clear the fog of desire from it.

  “No!” She tried to tug her hand free of his grip. She would never do that to Payne. She would never use his true name against him, never wanted to know it so she couldn’t be tempted to betray him just as his love had.

  Elissa clawed at Arnaud’s hand and froze again. The ring that Payne wanted. The gold band encircled Arnaud’s little finger, the rubies set into it sparkling and taunting her. She could get it for him. She grabbed for it. Arnaud snatched his hand away.

  “You won’t enslave me, little witch.” He shoved her hard onto her back on the bed and was on her before she could move. He grabbed her left wrist and she punched him hard with her other fist as he pulled the blanket off her, baring her to him.

  He forced her knees apart and she wrestled with him, heart pounding and blood rushing. She fought harder but he was stronger than she was. Too strong.

  His free hand went to his trousers.

  “I will enslave you.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Payne stood in the middle of the blue room he had waited in with Elissa the night before when they had first arrived, surrounded by books and the sumptuous antique furniture. The dark-haired male who had escorted him down to the reception room had disappeared, leaving Payne alone to mull over what he had done. He had buttoned as much as he could of his shirt and tucked the rest into his jeans, trying to conceal the fact it had lost half of its buttons. He closed his eyes, hating the instant replay of Elissa’s wicked smile as she tore it open, passion flaring in her eyes. If only things had remained that way, harmless satisfaction of their desires, rather than taking a sharp downward turn.

  Guilt gnawed at his heart and he wanted to head back upstairs to check on Elissa and try to repair the damage he had done, not that it was possible. He had condemned her. He had done his best to resist, had warned her to stop, but she hadn’t listened and he hadn’t been able to keep control of himself.

  He scrubbed a hand over his hair, raking the blond strands back, tugging at them until it hurt. Pain that he deserved but that wasn’t enough. He should suffer a thousand times worse for what he had done tonight, to her. He had tried so hard to claw back control, had almost succeeded once or twice, horrified by what he was doing, by how far gone he had been in that moment. The combination of twin hungers, the constant thrum of sexual energy in the air of the mansion, and Elissa’s actions and his deep need for her had conspired to strip away all sense of control and push him firmly over the edge, beyond any hope of salvation.

  His stomach turned over and over, churning like a tempestuous ocean. How could he have done that to her? He should have forced her to stop somehow, or fought harder against the urges that had consumed him. He should have done something other than destroy her.

  He found no consolation in the fact that she had said she would use a spell to protect herself. He couldn’t shift the blame to her, not this time. It lay at his feet. She had trusted him, had given herself to him despite her fears, and he had ruined her.

  He was a monster.

  And he wasn’t sure whether she would stay as he had asked.

  Part of his heart felt certain that when he returned to their room, he would find that she had left already, unable to bear the sight of him, unwilling to hear what he had to say.

  He still wasn’t sure exactly what that was.

  Deep in his soul, he knew what he wanted to ask of her, but he feared that she would reject him. The thought of her turning on him as others in his life had, scorning him and telling him that he was a monster and she hated him, chilled his blood and froze his breath in his lungs. He struggled for air, his throat closing, and barely stopped himself from teleporting back to their room.

  The door opened and he steadied himself, unwilling to show weakness in front of anyone, especially his grandfather.

  The man in the doorway looked nothing as Payne had expected. He was middle-aged in appearance and had short fair hair, but he didn’t resemble Payne in any way, and he certainly didn’t resemble his mother.

  The male stepped into the room, a forced smile plastered on his handsome face, and held out his hand
. The cuff of his black shirt drew back as he extended his hand towards Payne, revealing the fae markings tracking along the underside of his forearm.

  Payne looked at them.

  He didn’t recognise any of the symbols.

  “You’re not my grandfather.” He stepped back from the male and held his blue gaze. “Where is my grandfather?”

  Before he had finished that question, flashes of Elissa burst into his mind and her panic flooded the lingering connection between them in his blood. His heart thawed and caught fire. His fangs elongated and his eyes switched, his pupils narrowing and stretching as crimson shot through his irises. He snarled at the sight of her with another man.

  His grandfather.

  Elissa was in danger.

  Payne focused on their room and teleported. He landed hard in the middle of the bedroom and his heart turned over when he saw her on the bed, pinned beneath a male. He roared and launched forwards, grabbing the back of the large male’s dark red shirt. Elissa kicked and shrieked, the terrified sound driving Payne deep into a killing rage. He pulled the male off her and threw him across the room, sending him crashing into one of the green velvet armchairs. It tipped back and slammed into the wooden floor.

  He turned his back on Elissa, facing his opponent, and spread his legs, setting his feet shoulder width apart. He growled low in his throat, threatening the male now getting to his feet, keeping his focus and his eyes locked on him so he couldn’t get the jump on Payne.

  Elissa moved behind him, scrabbling across the bed, her sobs punctuating the heavy silence. Her fear filled the whole room and he snarled, mind black with the urge for violence and his rage. His mate was hurt, afraid. He would remove the source of her fear and protect her.