Darkest Temptation

by Sharie Kohler

  He’d been born what he was, felt its stigma since childhood. But her? She had run full force into it tonight. It was enough to drive anyone over the edge. Yet here she was… so strong, so alluring to his long-dead heart.

  She spoke, her voice as tremulous as a feather drifting on air. “What’s your name?”

  He rose quickly to his feet, as if distance would cure him of his hunger for her. “Luc.”

  “Luc,” she repeated. “What’s going to happen to me?” With her eyes she really asked, What are you going to do with me?

  The sudden image of spreading her thighs and pumping himself inside her slammed into him as hard as a rock. He gave his head a fierce shake. Moonrise. He was a victim of the moon’s curse. Nothing more. He’d be better in the morning. Better three days from now, no longer such a slave to the hunger. To thoughts of possessing her.

  He craved relief. A quick lay. Only not with her.

  Even in this darkened cell of a room, he could feel the moon’s full power, its strength urging him to release the base impulses he had managed to control these many years.

  A quick drive into the city and he would return home sated. Safe. At least from her. Then, in a month’s time, he would finish it. Finish her. When she was fully turned, her humanity nowhere in evidence, he would not hesitate to destroy her.

  Pocketing the key, he stood over her for some moments without answering. Turning on his heel, he left her alone. Safe in her prison. For now.

  Chapter Four

  The stink assailed him as soon as he drove outside the gate. Lycan blood. Nearby. Luc inhaled deeper, identifying the origin. Days-old blood. A mortal wore it. A man. A hunter. The odor lingered beneath the moon’s glow, the scent weaving through the air in tendrils of death. Ancient evil.

  Parking his Aston Martin down the hill, he moved stealthily through the night, more shadow than man. Man. Hell, he had never been that.

  His first impulse was to kill this hunter, as he was clearly stalking Luc. This hunter wasn’t some misguided soul with noble intentions. Luc could feel the rot of his soul as he cut through the breezeless night. This one was zealous, relentless.

  Then an idea formed, teasing at the edge of Luc’s dark thoughts. Moving with the speed of hurricane winds, he appeared at the driver’s door before the hunter could react.

  Luc crashed his fist through the glass and snatched the man by the throat. Fingers tight around his narrow neck, he pulled him through the window, flinging him on his back to the asphalt.

  “Please!” The hunter waved his hands wildly. “I mean no harm.”

  “No harm?” Luc leaned low, hovering over the hunter’s face. “Is that why you sent that girl after me?”

  “She’s a gift, a present,” he babbled. “You don’t like her? I can find another one—”

  “Enough!” Luc roared, knowing just what kind of man he dealt with. He didn’t doubt some hunters were driven by a higher purpose—to see lycans eradicated from the world. But something far from altruism drove this guy. “I’ll have the truth or rip out your heart. It makes no difference to me. Why are you after me?”

  “I…” He paused, wetting his lips. “Rumor has it you’re running all the packs in L.A.”

  “Well, your information is wrong.” Luc tightened his grip and hauled the hunter to his feet, slamming him against the side of the car. Shattered glass crunched beneath his feet as he stepped closer. The hunter’s small weasel eyes bulged.

  Luc flicked a glance skyward to the gleaming moon. If he were a lycan, he’d be in full shift now instead of battling the moon’s call, the beast in him simmering just beneath the surface. “Do I look like a lycan to you?”

  The hunter scanned his face with rapid ferocity. “N-no.” His brow creased. “But you’re not human. You’re too strong. What in hell are you?”

  “Someone you’ve vastly underestimated.”

  Comprehension washed over his face. “Jesus. You can’t be.” He shook his head, straggly hair falling in his face. “Dovenatus don’t exist. It’s just a myth…”

  Luc twisted his lips savagely. “Wrong again. And that’s going to cost you.”

  He reached around and pulled the guy’s wallet from his pocket, scanning the name and address. “Listen well, Curtis. You’ve got one chance to live.” Luc jerked his head toward his house. “It’s simple. Find that girl’s alpha and you live. Got it?”

  Curtis’s eyes drifted toward the gated house. “But I thought it was you. How am I supposed to find—”

  “Now that you know you’re wrong, do what you do. You’re a hunter with NODEAL, right? You hunt lycans. So hunt.”

  Curtis gave a single nod of his head.

  Luc continued, anger churning in him as he thought of the woman chained to his basement wall. “Use your fucking resources. Put together a team. I don’t care how you do it, just find the bastard or I’m coming after you and your whole damn branch. Understand?”

  Curtis nodded fiercely.

  “One month.” Luc flung him away. “Go.”

  Luc watched as the hunter scrambled into his car and sped away. Turning, Luc made his way back to his own car, knowing he needed to take care of one more thing before returning to his house.

  The full moon followed him as he drove toward the lights of the city, to the beckoning throng of humanity, where he could find release from the urgent needs that moonrise had ignited in him. He was no fool. If he didn’t find relief, he would return and follow her scent to the room below. He would take her. The beast would demand it.

  A month with her in his house would be bad enough. But tonight, with the moon at its zenith, the pull a deep burn in his blood… she was not safe from his appetites.

  He would find some dissolute soul hungry for the coarseness of a sordid tryst and leave Lily alone until he found the courage to destroy her.

  * * *

  Lily struggled against the manacles, fighting the steel that cut her tender flesh. Her mind raced. She thought of Mom. Maureen. The rat-faced hunter who expected her to kill Luc. Luc. A hybrid.

  “What the hell is that, anyway?” She was still trying to wrap her head around lycans… around what they were… and the fact that she was now one of them.

  Lily fell back on the mattress with a curse. Until a few hours ago, she had never known werewolves existed. Now she did. Now she was turning into one of them. She might not know all of what that entailed, but clearly an out-of-control libido was part of the deal. Great. Probably why her play at seduction had not gone as planned. She wasn’t supposed to enjoy it. That enjoyment had distracted her.

  Maureen had teased her about hooking up with a guy tonight. A one-night stand will be good for you. A little pick-me-up. Somehow making out with some hot half-breed werewolf had escaped Lily as a possibility. Maureen would laugh if—

  The thought ended abruptly, before completion. Maureen would never do anything again.

  Hot tears burned at the backs of her eyes. She slid to her back, the chains rattling as her arms fell limply to her sides, dead weights. Her skin tingled, crawled. Her gaze drifted. A thin ribbon of moonlight floated from a single narrow window set high on the wall, finding her, stroking her with a tender hand.

  A great tiredness swept over her. A sudden lethargy she couldn’t fight. Her achy eyes closed, the lids too heavy. She tried to stay awake, to think, to plan a way out of this mess. What is happening to me? She managed one weak blink. No use. Her body could no longer move, her eyes no longer stay open. Darkness rolled in.

  * * *

  Luc cut through the crowd, his arm hard around the woman’s waist. She tripped on a step and he pulled her up.

  “Hey, you’re in a hurry,” she gasped, her breath a giggly rasp over the club’s heavy pounding thrum.

  He stepped outside, senses alive, alert on the night. Striding across the street, he kept a firm hand on her as the beast in him coiled tighter and tighter, ready to spring unleashed.

  She gasped in approval at the sight of his car. �
�This is yours?”

  Unlocking the door, he pulled the front seat forward. A coy smile on her painted lips, she slid into the back. He followed, pressing her down onto the black leather upholstery, his body wedging between her ready thighs, his need hard and consuming, tightening his balls. He felt the dangerous pull at the back of his skull and swallowed down a growl. If he wasn’t careful, he’d turn right here. Something he hadn’t done in years.

  He bunched fistfuls of skirt and yanked the fabric up the woman’s waist.

  She laughed. “Hey, aren’t you eager?”

  Moonlight bathed her through the back window, giving her tanned skin a pearl hue. Her flesh felt warm and toasty beneath his hands, the scent slightly acrid from her frequent visits to the tanning bed.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Luc.”

  “Hmm, Luc. I like your accent.”

  She wasn’t young. Bottle blond with dark roots rising in her part line. Bleary eyes revealed her night had started long ago. Nothing like the girl he’d left at his house. But that was good. He didn’t want someone like Lily. Someone whose freshness reminded him of everything he’d never known. Everything he could never have.

  He needed a woman like this. Hard and jaded with tired lines edging her face, accustomed to trysts in backseats with strange men.

  A smile pulled at her lips, practiced and full of artifice, accustomed to smoky bars, late nights, and hard men. Precisely the kind of woman he wanted. One who wouldn’t mind a quick tumble, minus the sweet words. One who liked it rough. With the moon bearing down on him, foreplay fell short.

  She rose up to kiss him. His lip curled at her stale breath, and he dodged her mouth.

  “Don’t be like that,” she pouted against his cheek. “Can’t you kiss?” She groped her breasts through her nonexistent top. “Guys usually like these. They cost enough. Can’t you say something nice about them? Maybe play with them a bit? The girls would like that.”

  Ignoring her, he moved a hand to his zipper. Closing his eyes, the sight of Lily filled his head, her breasts, fresh, ripe… not readily available to every guy in L.A. Air hissed between his teeth and his cock swelled at the thought of her.

  “Sorry. I’m low on foreplay tonight,” he bit out, his voice thick and guttural in his mouth. He stilled at the sound, tensing, fighting the swamping sensations. His eyes flew open. Imagining Lily was a bad idea.

  “Never mind. C’mere, big guy.” Her hand closed around him and he shuddered. Not because of the way she worked her palm over him… because it just wasn’t right. He saw only Lily. Tasted her. Smelled her scent swirling around him.

  With the beast prowling for release, howling in need, he flung himself off the woman. “Go,” he snarled. “Get out.”

  “Shithead,” she snapped before vanishing out the door.

  He dragged a deep breath inside himself and collapsed against the leather seat, the back of his hand against his brow as he stared out the window at the moon, live and pulsing in rhythm with his heart. Blood rushed in his veins, and his pulse quickened, fought against his body, urging him to turn, to shift… to seek his release on the female waiting back at his house.

  He should remain where he was. Even if it meant spending the night in the backseat of his car.

  At least he wouldn’t be anywhere near the temptation that resided in the basement of his house. A woman—a lycan—he would have to kill in a month’s time if the hunter failed to deliver her alpha to him.

  She had no hope of battling her urges and resisting the shift. She would turn. A slave to her hunger. A killer. Without remorse. Without a soul.

  For his sake, he should stay away. For both their sakes. Until next month.

  Chapter Five

  Luc told himself he was only checking on her to make certain she had not escaped. His steps fell silently. He ignored his reflection in the stainless steel appliances as he passed. He rarely looked at himself. Had not since his family had turned from him, rejecting him so many years ago. He resembled them, saw their faces in his own. The olive skin. Gypsy-dark looks with gold eyes. His mother. His grandparents. Aunts. Uncles. They were all there in his face. He could do without the reminder.

  Ivo had been his only true family… and even that relationship had not lasted. Not withstood the test of time. No relationship ever could. Not the endless stretch of time that faced him, anyway.

  He eased the door open, wincing at the blackness that greeted him. His eyes adjusted to the dark, instantly finding the still shape lying on the mattress. He could see his way through a subterranean cave. It was part of his gift—his curse.

  A soft whimper scraped the air and he tensed, hearing the pain, sensing it, feeling its echo deep inside himself. Remembering his own time.

  Initiation had begun. Long, torturous hours in which her body… died. And her new self was born. A new Lily.

  Next moonrise, she would answer its call and shift into a beast that fed on mankind. If he did not stop her. If the hunter failed to find her alpha. Luc grimaced. He wasn’t holding much hope for that idiot. The guy had thought Luc a lycan—the alpha of the pack devastating the area.

  His feet slid unerringly to a stop beside the mattress. She lay on her side, her manacled hands curled in front of her. Perspiration speckled her brow. Salty-sweat drops he could smell. Waves of heat emanated from her, like the warmth emitted from a fire.

  Crouching beside her, he touched her brow and winced at the fiery skin. She rolled to her back, crying out against the manacles impeding her movements. She struggled, possessed, desperate to be free.

  “Don’t,” he commanded, even as the manacles cut into her tender wrists. The skin already glowed raw, an angry red.

  The memory of his own Initiation rose up in his mind to torment him. His grandfather had locked him in the family crypt. In that dark prison, surrounded by the corpses of his ancestors, he had thrashed on the cold earth, only vermin for company as he’d suffered the bleeding-hot death of his humanity. He cast a quick glance around the dark cellar, not so different from his crypt.

  A low keening moan swelled from her lips. A death cry. This girl, Lily, was dying before his eyes. Something shivered through him, and his gut tightened.

  Standing, he turned, determined to walk away, determined to leave her alone to endure. There was nothing he could do to prevent it from happening. He’d endured Initiation without anyone being there for him. He’d suffered it alone. Why not her?

  He froze at the base of the stairs, hands flexing at his sides, stomach clenching at her pained whimpers. He jammed his eyes tight, as if he could block them out. No use. He couldn’t ignore her. Couldn’t hide upstairs. Even in his room, he would still know she was down here. This strange girl who smelled of innocence dying.

  Cursing, he dug the key from his pocket and whirled around. Squatting, he unlocked the manacles and freed her. He rose, holding her close to his chest, adjusting her feverish body in his arms, his jaw set in a savage clench. Her cheek pressed against his chest so trustingly, defenseless, the heat of her burning through the fabric of his shirt.

  With hard strides, he carried her from the basement, taking the servants’ stairs to the second floor, passing countless empty rooms until he reached the master bedroom. He hesitated before entering, knowing he could drop her in one of the guest rooms and leave her there, in a comfortable bed, satisfied he had done the best he could to alleviate her pain.

  But then he remembered what regeneration had felt like. Like dying and being reborn at the same time. He simply couldn’t abandon her to the agony. Couldn’t let her suffer through it alone, as he had.

  She moaned, and the sound cut through him, reaching something buried deep… something forgotten, dark and untouched. Striding into his room, he yanked back the comforter and lowered her onto the great bed he had occupied—alone—for the last fifteen years.

  Stripping her jacket from her shoulders, he tried not to caress the smooth slope of her shoulders. She arched her spine, al
most as though she understood and wanted to help. Her boots followed. He concentrated on the side zipper, not the sexy, supple feel of her calves against his palms. Not the pressing need that throbbed through him, stinging his flesh, pulling at his bones until he feared he had gone too far.

  Tossing each boot on the floor, he settled her in the center of the big bed. He dragged a shaking hand over his tightening scalp, watching her as he hovered above the bed. Sinuous limbs twisted, working the skirt higher, to her hips. His palms tingled, burning to feel her again. She arched her neck off the bed, dark brown strands brushing his pillow. Her body shuddered as the lycan twisted its fiendish path through her, killing the old DNA and regenerating new. A jagged moan ripped from her lips.

  With a curse, he slid in beside her and folded her in his arms. “Shhh,” he said, smoothing a hand over her forehead, pushing back sweaty tendrils as he absorbed some of her scalding heat into himself.

  She clung to him, hands digging into his shoulders as if she would crawl inside him. Unable to resist, eager to feel her skin against his own and knowing it would ease some of her fever, he pulled his shirt over his head. Her whimpers softened as he wrapped himself around her, gritting his teeth to keep his sigh of pleasure inside. Her hands gripped hold of him, the smooth, satiny skin of her palms sliding over his back. Her body writhed, twisted against him, desperate and hungry to both escape her death… and embrace her rebirth.

  Her skirt puddled around her waist and he cursed himself for tearing off her panties earlier. Her rich female scent rose on the air, folding him in a fog of lust. Her movements changed. Became more deliberate, driven from blind, primitive impulse. She clenched her hands around his shoulders and thrust her moist heat against him in a simulation of sex. Air hissed from between his teeth.

  He pressed a palm to her damp forehead and made hushing sounds, willing her to still, to calm, to sleep…

  After a while, she relaxed.