by Claudy Conn
* * *
Shamon dreaded what he had to do. He had no choice. She had made up her mind to kill the pretty little Reigate girl and have Julian Talbot once and for all. Nothing would stop her from this plan. She wasn’t doing this because of her need for blood. He could make no excuse for her. If there was something he could to do to stop her he would, but he was nothing…
He could not believe how heady with delight she was. She was as giddy as a young child anticipating a long-awaited gift.
It was monstrous. She was a monster. And he was a monster because he adored her and obeyed her … and his heart was breaking!
He made his way to the stables, where he found Otis lingering over a chicken leg. Yes, he thought, Otis would do. Otis would do anything for a coin…anything, and then he knew his lady would make certain he didn’t talk about it. He would receive his purse. He would do the deed, and then he would pay for it with his life. Lamia DuLaine was always very thorough.
At moments like these, Shamon wished he had never been born.
* * *
They took the last fence to Reigate and joyfully cantered down the long, much-used dirt bridle path towards the rear of the stables. Maxine pulled up short and suddenly dismounted. She looked up at the big, handsome man astride his dark gelding and licked her lips. “Well now, we are home—on Reigate land, my oh so beautiful man…”
“Beautiful is not a description for a man.” He grimaced as his eyebrow went up and he jumped nimbly to the ground. He was on her in a second. He held the reins now for both their horses as he swept her against him with one strong arm and held her tightly. “Do you ken, my hungry little woman?”
“Oh…how then should I describe you?” She was teasing him, unbuttoning her riding Spencer, looking saucily up and into his fire-glinting blue eyes. She could see she had already aroused him and was thrilled with the knowledge.
He was in heat for her. This was insane, here in the open…but he couldn’t stop himself. “You should think me…dangerous, for if you keep looking at me like that…” He stopped and sucked in his breath, and then he felt it dragged out of his lungs as he watched her free her breasts from her low-cut white bodice. They were full and firm, and he bent his head to lick her nipples. He pulled her towards a clump of trees where wild berry bushes were in bloom. He dropped her hand to tether the horses, and then he turned to throw his riding coat to the ground and pulled her down on top of it. “Is this what you want, Maxie girl? Here and now?”
“Here and now, later and tomorrow, this is what I want.”
He had her beneath him. “Tell me so I can make no mistake…what do you want…how do you want it?”
“You—what was that word you taught me…ah, yes—fucking me…I want you inside me, on top of me, beneath me, every way you can drive into me. I want that huge hulking thing on my lips, in my mouth, on my breasts…” She couldn’t say more as his mouth found hers and his tongue gave her a preview of what was to come.
* * *
Lamia was too involved in her machinations and thus unaware of Julian and Maxie’s upcoming nuptials. She thought of only two things: she wanted Maxine Reigate dead, and she wanted Julian Talbot beside her. Nothing was going to stop her. There was nothing she would not risk; there was nothing she would not give to accomplish these two things.
She sat behind her desk, the thick damask drapes drawn against the afternoon sun. Candles flickered and cast ominous shadows across the room’s dark décor.
Lamia liked the feel of it, but she could see the young man standing nervously in front of her desk did not. Her eyebrow went up. Perhaps Shamon had not found the right man for the job? Indeed, perhaps it wasn’t wise to have chosen someone from her own house of servants.
She didn’t like the vibe she was receiving from him. He was nothing more than a peasant, but he seemed wary, careful, as though he sensed a power that had nothing to do with her wealth and position.
She was always struck by the ability of the peasants to sense danger. It was fascinating really. After all, she was smiling, was she not? She was being gracious and pleasant, and still the lad stood before her attempting to avoid any direct eye contact. It was not awe or respect for her position. It was abject fear. He was afraid of something he sensed about her.
She turned to stare hard at Shamon. He was standing in the darkest corner of the room, looking guilty and unhappy. Now what was wrong with him? What was Reigate to him that he should look so miserable? She was naught! Why should he care if she lived or died? He should not worry about such things. At any rate, she didn’t care if this bothered Shamon. This was non-negotiable.
No doubt he was jealous of her desire to be with Talbot. That probably was at the root of his misery. Now this was something she could understand. He was jealous. It explained so much.
At any rate, Shamon would never deny her. She knew it was against his makeup to physically cause the death of another human being. It was not in his nature. She knew this about him. His conscience was governed by what had been a pure soul when she found him dying in a gutter fifteen years ago. He had not even been the sort to rob another to stay alive. Such was Shamon. It was an attractive trait but a tiresome one as well.
She scanned his mind. Instinct had her edgy. Her nature was to be always on the alert. There was no one she should trust. There was not one person she would ever fully trust, not even Shamon. Even Shamon must be watched for signs of dissembling. It was how she had maintained her hedonistic existence all these years. She never trusted anyone.
She saw clearly that Shamon was thinking the stable lad was nothing more than a low life and stupid at that. He had found a dunce, but there was no other to be had so quickly. That was all that was in his mind. Good, fine Shamon. He belonged to her. He worried for her and her alone. She had not really expected to find any treachery in his thoughts. He would do anything she wanted. In the final analysis he was hers.
Even so, she could not rid herself of the sensation that something was about to go wrong, terribly wrong!
Lamia’s eyes shifted to the stable boy’s hands. They were dirty. His fingernails were ragged and filled with grime. He was playing with his aged brown woolen cap. She felt a sense of revulsion. He was a filthy piece of work, but he would serve for the job she had in store for him.
She turned again to Shamon. “Have you explained what we expect?”
“That oi have, m’lady,” Shamon said quietly.
“Very well.” She raked the tall, thin boy with her amber eyes. “What are you called?”
“Jake,” he said without looking at her.
Lamia had waited for him to say something more. There was so much bitterness about him, about the way he held himself, about the way he said his name. However, when he didn’t speak, she shrugged. “Right then.” And then more curtly, she asked, “I suppose you understand what you are expected to do for me?”
“Oi do,” Jake answered gruffly. “Why would ye be wanting to ’urt the Reigate chit…?”
“Never mind—that is not for you to question!” Lamia snapped.
He shrugged. “Blunt is blunt, and I be needing the blunt.”
“That’s right, and you understand that if the fall does not kill her…you will finish the job.”
He hung his head even lower. “Aye, that oi do.”
“Then we understand one another, Jake…don’t we?” Lamia stared at him until he looked up at her and met her cold eyes.
“Aye, we do,” was all he could manage before he looked away.
“Shamon…the purse…?”
Shamon handed him a small leather purse as Lamia said, “This is for now. The remainder you will get when the job had been completed.”
“No,” Jake said. “Oi want it all now—oi’m not coming back ’ere.”
“Absolutely not,” Lamia shouted in some outrage.
“Then oi’ll be on me way,” said Jake, starting for the door.
Lamia eyed him with some surprise. Shamon had thought he was
a dunce, but it would appear there was more to Jake than that.
She stopped him. “Jake…if I were to give you the entire amount now, how then would I know that you would do what is required?”
He turned and grinned wickedly at her. “Oi doubt anyone would go against ye.”
“I shall give you the entire purse. But, Jake, make no mistake, if you fail me in this, I will hunt you down, and you will not die…comfortably. Are we understood?”
“We are,” Jake said, and he had no doubt of this at all.
~ Twenty-three ~
MAXINE PUT ASIDE her journal. She had been recording everything that had happened from the day of her engagement ball right up to the moment. She had not left one thing out. It was important. She wasn’t sure why, but her journal was important.
She looked out her bedroom window. Julian was outside. His black, silky hair was flowing in the light breeze. His strong jaw was set in determined lines. The white cotton shirt he wore hugged his muscular torso as the breeze whipped against the dark leather of his open vest. His dark riding breeches displayed his muscular thighs as he walked in his high riding boots. She sighed to watch him and thought him absolutely magnificent.
So much had happened.
She had discovered him yesterday in his room with a set of needles and three bowls of dye. He had just finished tattooing himself. Her eyes had opened wide, and she hurried over to inspect the results of his efforts. “Julian…why didn’t you tell me you were going to do this now? I would have helped you.”
“It would have been too difficult to describe to you. The Realm took me back to a time when my ancestors used such runes, and I was able to study its design.”
“Oh, my love. Did it hurt?”
“Scarcely worth mentioning.” He flicked her nose, and she caught his finger and put it to her lips. A moment later she was licking the length of his finger, sucking it into her mouth in slow degrees, and looking at his face with a most speaking expression. It thrilled her to see the dark passion light up his blue eyes.
Her voice was husky low and softly urging. “So now you have protected yourself from the Dark Magic?”
“Apparently not all…Dark Magic,” he whispered in her ear before nibbling at its lobe, moving lower to nip at the hollow at her neck.
His hands had taken her fine, tight rump and pulled her closer.
“Maxine…Maxine, I need you now,” Mrs. Reigate called from down the hall. She knew just where her daughter was.
Maxie giggled and called out resonantly, “Just a few more moments, Mama…need something old for my wedding.” She looked up at her handsome lover and sighed. “So then, tell me quickly, why have you done this?”
“These runes, in this pattern, are meant to protect me from the shocks that occur when you call upon the dark spells. I have to use such a spell to set a perimeter of wards around Reigate, and only a dark spell will work against DuLaine.” He sighed. “Apparently when one uses Dark Magic without the protection of the runes…one can be consumed by the temptation of the dark power.”
She had been disturbed by this new development. He had said the Realm had whispered the words and showed him by example what he should do. “What if it doesn’t protect you? What would happen?”
“Dark Magic is potent and tempting. It holds out the lure of dark powers, but the ward I will be invoking is the least of all Dark Magic, and I doubt that it would turn on me.” He was grinning now, squeezing her to him once more. “But perhaps you would like me all dark and powerful?”
She slapped him roundly. “I like…I love you just the way you are, and hear me, my buck, if you were any more potent, I would not be able to move, let alone walk!”
He laughed out loud and flicked her nose.
Maxie frowned, for her mind was racing. “Julian…what…what if she feels you doing this…?”
“She won’t,” he had reassured her. “She would only know if she attempted to cross the perimeter that it is warded. And she won’t try that unless she discovers that our wedding is set for tomorrow.” He shook his head and put both his arms around her to hold her to him. “That is why I am doing this. If she finds out and storms this house during our wedding, there will be all hell to pay! That is not how I wish to start our life together.”
“I know. Once she risks herself, she would use everything at her disposal. She would no longer care what anyone would think.” Maxie sighed and then smiled up at his face. “Let me examine this work of art on your arm.”
He grinned and held up the sleeve that he had allowed to roll down when she entered his room. A double set of parallel lines of dark blue and green framed in an unusual banding design tinged with red encircled his biceps, and she made him make a muscle so she could view it at all angles,
“Oooh…I like this…” She took his hand, put it to her breast, put her finger to the tattoo to watch it stretch as his hand cupped and fondled her breast through its velvet material. “Oh yes…I like this quite a bit…”
“Maxine Reigate, your mama waits, so off you go, before we wind up in trouble!”
Maxie laughed as she pushed out of his arms and hurried off. She turned at his doorway to whisper, “Later, my big buck…”
Now she watched her future husband chanting in the ancient Gaelic of Scotland and hurriedly added this piece of information to her journal. This journal had to encompass every aspect of her life. Hers was a story that absolutely needed to be handed down. How she knew this was almost as disturbing as why she knew this. There was the ‘if’ in her story. The ‘if’ in the equation. ‘If’ was the word and the question. It was the thing driving her to write in her journal. What if she didn’t win in her battle against DuLaine? And it was coming—that battle was coming soon….
For the moment she had something else to do.
She was going to have to reach out to Daniel. She knew now she was strong enough to do this without the help of the Realm. She knew instinctively that he was strong enough and would hear her call.
She held her journal to her chest and whispered his name. She went to a place in her mind, a Druid place of peace; she pictured him, and then he was there, looking at her, reaching for her.
“Daniel. We haven’t much time. Tomorrow, Julian and I will be wed…but, if something goes wrong, you must come and you must take possession of my journal. It will be needed. This is all-important, Daniel. Don’t let me down. I know you won’t let me down.”
“Consider it a promise, sister, but nothing will happen,” Danny whispered and then was gone.
Satisfied, Maxie breathed a sigh of relief. She turned and rose from her chair near the window. She got the scent of pine and vanilla and something else, something elusive like the breeze off the ocean.
Something was in her room. It was not the Keeper. A flicker of a moment, and she was sure it was Breslyn. She recognized his scent. She stood and stared a moment. “Ah,” she said at last, “there you are.”
He stood there in his full ancient Fae regalia and sighed. “Maxine…you have a problem…”
“Ha…don’t I know it.”
“Yes, but the question remains, what are we going to do about it?”
“Why don’t you just eliminate her?”
“DuLaine?” Breslyn shook his head. “My queen forbids it. She says we may not—says that in spite of what it seems…DuLaine is still human.”
“No, she is not.”
“I quite agree, but I may not disobey the queen to that extent. However, I do intend to help.”
“How?”
“I am not quite sure…”
“Then, at the moment, you are quite useless.”
“That is not fair.”
“This is not about fairness.”
“We are not allowed to interfere with the fates, you see.”
“I do, sort of…so go on…I’ll figure things out on my own.”
“But, perhaps, we may do well to talk things out…” Breslyn frowned.
Maxie’s green eye
s scanned him. She could see he was sincere. “Very well then, Prince, talk and I will listen.”
The prince was unused to having a human woman so aloof to his many charms. Also, this close to her, he realized that her Druid powers had developed over the last month, considerably. He was impressed. He could not resist moving towards her and reaching for her face, taking hold of her sweet visage and whispering in the air, “Know this before all else—I am here because I want you to stay alive, Maxie lass.”
Maxie was all too aware of his seductive fingers stroking her mouth as he touched her face and whispered in her ears.
She stepped away from his entrancing touch. This was a very sexual Fae, all the more so because he seemed to be genuinely concerned. However, he was a Fae, an all-powerful Fae. He could end all this with the DuLaine with the flick of a finger, and yet, he refused. It was very annoying, and her irritation with this sort of behavior took over.
Breslyn was intrigued with her. He had already humanized only his eyes as he was proud of his warrior body and every inch of him wanted Maxine Reigate to take a good look at him. He knew it was wrong on so many levels, but the male in him was taking over all logic and ethics—he liked her and wanted her to like him.
It was obvious to him that she was not at all fascinated with his presence. He stood in all his glory and was pleased to find her staring but still not at all seduced. “Maxie, I can be a great ally even if I cannot participate in the kill.”
Maxie thought this over. “True. But I still think you should be willing to participate in the actual destruction of her power at least. She employs Dark Magic. We do not.”
“But you do,” Breslyn answered. “That is what Julian is doing right now, around the immediate perimeter of Reigate, is it not?”
“Uh—well, I suppose.” Maxie had to think about this. Was that really Dark Magic? Yes, Julian had said that it was. She moved over to a chair by the window and plopped down. “Sometimes…I just want to scream.”
Breslyn was startled. “But you won’t…will you?” Even now, while she sat looking like a dejected kitten, he found himself strangely drawn to her. He liked the way her green eyes spoke, laughed, and filled with anger without saying a word. He liked the way she giggled. Intense life filled all her facial expressions. It was with some regret that he found himself caring, really caring for this child of a woman. She was but a human. In the end only sorrow could come of such feelings. Besides, now, caring for Destinee took up all of his spare time.
