The tall man with brilliant green eyes smiled and held his hand out.
I ignored it. “I said—”
A fog settled over my brain. My thoughts jumbled as if my brain had been scrambled. Then my arm rose on its own and I shook the man’s hand.
He gave me a warm smile. “Welcome to the Brotherhood, Vaughn. We were hoping you’d join us soon.”
I heard the words but couldn’t process them. All I could do was nod.
“If you’re ready, I’d be pleased to take you to headquarters.”
There was a nagging somewhere in the back of my mind. I was forgetting something important. But it wouldn’t come. “Yes,” I heard myself say.
“Excellent.” The man, dressed in a black jacket and jeans, positioned himself next to me, grabbed my hand, and then took a step forward.
The world turned gray as air rushed over my skin. I blinked, and my surroundings morphed again. We stood on a sidewalk in front of a large white antebellum home with a white picket fence.
“Welcome home,” my escort said.
I glanced from him to the house. The yard was lush and green with an old majestic oak taking up residence on the left side of the lawn. I had a sense of belonging, and I never wanted to leave. Without hesitation, I followed my escort up the walk and into the large house.
Seven figures all dressed the same were lined up in the large foyer. The one in the middle, the oldest, lifted his gaze and said in a formal tone, “Vaughn Paxton, welcome to the Brotherhood.”
I didn’t know what the Brotherhood was, but there was a feeling deep in my gut that this was where I was supposed to be. It felt right. Like something important was happening. Without being told, I was sure that man was the leader. I nodded, waiting for instruction.
The leader turned and walked through double doors. The other brothers surrounded me, and as a unit, we all followed him into a grand ballroom. The leader stood waiting for us in the middle of the room. The other seven men fanned out, forming a half circle around him.
“Vaughn, please take your place in the middle of the circle.”
Stuck in a trancelike state, I did as I was told. The moment my feet stilled, the confusion lifted and my memories came rushing back in. Matisse. She needed my help.
Rage filled me. I’d been spelled or possessed or something. Otherwise, I would’ve never left Matisse. Who were these people? Why was I here? I didn’t even want to find out. With single-minded determination, I spun and took off toward the exit. Only when I got to the edge of the circle, I slammed into an invisible wall and bounced back.
“What the fuck is—”
More memories flooded my brain. Only they weren’t mine. They were like a movie reel of past events. Demons were everywhere. And angels. And witches like Matisse. Battles were being fought. Angels fell. Others were kidnapped and forced into Hell until they fell. It was an all-out war full of chaos. Demons ruled and did unspeakable acts to witches and humans.
The despair and heartache rushed through me, seized me, gutted me. Created an intense need to do something. Anything to help the poor souls who were being destroyed.
Then the reel changed, and another group of witches appeared. They were locked up in some facet of Hell, waiting. Most of them were resigned. A few were angry, and still others were just plain broken. A fierce desire to help them overtook me, but there was nothing I could do about a memory.
The fact that they were trapped was bad enough, but then a group of lesser demons descended on them, and the reason for their entrapment was clear. They were sex slaves. Utter disgust rolled through me. Why was I being shown this? Was this happening right now? The need to protect, to fight for justice, seized me.
“Vaughn Paxton, do you willingly submit to spending the rest of your days as a demon hunter? To devote your life to fighting demons and protecting those who cannot protect themselves?”
My consent was on the tip of my tongue, almost as if it was being forced from me. Yes. I would do that. Nothing could stop me. But then Matisse’s image flashed in my mind. What had happened to her? And why had these people come for me now? Did it have to do with her?
A new reel of what had to be history flickered to life in my mind. The scene of the lesser demons and witches reappeared, only it must have been a different day. The witches appeared to be a few years younger than they had been. The light faded and the demons and witches faded with it, save but two. One demon and one witch.
Only instead of being afraid, the witch appeared to like the lesser demon. And he appeared to be in love with her. With these two, there was no forced sex. They were deeply in love. And after they joined for the first time, the witch gave every last bit of her magic and power to the demon, leaving herself on the verge of death.
But the demon, he morphed from a demon to something else. Something more than he was before. Moral. Determined. Honorable. Power radiated from him. He sank to his knees, gathered his witch in his arms, and bolted, determined to use his newfound power to protect her from the life she’d been forced into.
The leader studied me. “That memory is how the first incubus came into being.”
“Incubus?” I said, my tone low. Unease settled over me. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Your witch unleashed your power, Vaughn. You were born an incubus. And by birthright, destined to be part of the Brotherhood, an organization fully dedicated to fighting the existence of demons.” He waved a hand around the room. “Welcome home.”
An incubus. How could that be true? But a voice deep down whispered, How could it not be? The years of having any woman I wanted. The undeniable sex appeal. The way Matisse had called to me.
Matisse. Holy fuck. Her image once again haunted me. I had to see her. I’d been the one who’d broken her. I had to make sure she was all right.
“Do you, Vaughn, accept the induction into the Brotherhood?” the leader asked once more.
I crossed my arms over my chest, and with a will greater than I knew I possessed, I said, “No. I do not accept. Now let me the hell out of here.”
The circle tightened around me and the images became more vivid, more horrid, assaulting me to the point I wanted to gag. With a roar, I sprang forward and grabbed the leader by his shirt, pulling him up close. “What the hell are you doing, old man?”
He stood still, unaffected by my assault.
“Speak up!” I shook him, trying to elicit a response. Any at all.
“Release me, Vaughn.” His tone was mild, unconcerned.
Despite my anger, something unexplainable came over me and I stepped back, but that didn’t stop me from giving the bastard a push.
He swayed, took one unsure step, and then righted himself. “Are you prepared to reject your birthright, to let the innocent suffer, to let the demons corrupt our world? To corrupt you? Your power will be too much to handle without the Brotherhood. Eventually you’ll fall—become a full-blown demon.”
I glared at him. They’d taken me from Matisse when she needed me most. How was that protecting people? “Cut the shit. I’m not buying your Brotherhood bullshit or your demon scare tactics. What is it you want from me exactly?” Humans couldn’t fall. Only angels could. That much I knew. But I wasn’t human, was I? No. He’d said incubus. Anger coiled in my gut. Everything about this was too forced. Too heavy-handed.
He met my eyes, then nodded to one of the brothers. Without a word, the seven of them filed out of the great hall.
The leader held his hand out. “I’m Maximus. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
I ignored his hand and waited.
“Come with me.” Maximus crossed the room and opened a door into what appeared to be his private office.
I glanced back at the foyer. I couldn’t waste any more time here. Matisse was sick.
“She’s being taken care of,” Maximus said.
“Excuse me?”
“Your witch. She’s being taken care of. Soon after you were transported here, her people came for
her. Even if you went back to your place, you wouldn’t find her.”
“How do you know that?” I was about half a second from tearing out of there to find out for myself.
He waved a hand, and a projection lit the ballroom wall. It was a scene in my apartment. The demon hunter and I vanished into thin air, and a moment later, a woman who had to be Matisse’s mom burst through my front door. Another woman followed, and the pair searched my apartment until they found Matisse unconscious on my bed. I watched the silent film as the pair stuffed a variety of herbals down her throat and cast some spell.
Matisse’s eyes fluttered open briefly, and she mouthed something that looked like “Vaughn.”
Relief at seeing her awake did nothing to squelch my desire to find her at any cost. I still needed to see for myself that she was going to be okay.
But the scene morphed and then Matisse was walking up the stairs to a shotgun double style house. Although she was clearly worn out, she was moving under her own steam. The knot in my chest eased, and I was finally able to breathe. “She’s with her family, then?”
Maximus nodded. “She’ll be fine.”
“What happened to her?”
He cast me a sympathetic glance that only served to piss me off. “Come into my office and I’ll explain.”
Reluctantly, I followed the man because if nothing else, I was going to get answers.
Chapter 13
Matisse
The last thing I remembered was being joined with Vaughn, magic pulsing around us in a heady stream of power. It had been intense, freeing, and I’d been completely in the moment, giving myself over to him. I’d loved it. And when we’d come together, something had exploded inside me and set my magic free.
But then as the elation of incredible sex had started to fade away, my head started swimming and my limbs became weak. I’d reached for Vaughn, but my strength was gone.
Everything had gone black.
I don’t know how long I faded in and out of consciousness, but when I did finally wake, I was still in Vaughn’s bed and my mother was hovering over me.
“Mati?” Her light blue eyes were narrowed and shining with concern.
“Mom?” My voice sounded far away. “What’s going on? Where’s Vaughn?”
She ran a soothing hand over my brow. “He had to go, love. Don’t worry about him right now.”
“Tell the girl the truth, Maven,” Dayla, my aunt, said harshly. “She has a right to know.”
I rubbed my eyes and tried to focus on Dayla, but she was only a blur. “Tell me what?”
“Never mind that now.” My mom’s tone was full of irritation. “There’s plenty of time to fill her in later. It’s not like he’s coming back.”
That made me sit up. The world spun as the sheet fell, leaving me exposed to my mother and aunt. I clutched at the sheet and huddled back down in the bed. “Can someone get me my clothes?”
“They’re right here,” Mom said. “Let’s get you dressed and take you home.”
I was too weak to argue and let my mom help me get dressed for the first time since I was six years old. Before long, they had me tucked in Mom’s Range Rover and then we were flying through the streets of New Orleans on the way back to the Pointe. I stared out the window, clutching my chest. The emptiness claiming my insides was almost too much to bear. Tears burned the backs of my eyes. And I did nothing to stop them from streaming down my face.
When we pulled up in front of Mom’s house, Dayla took one look at me and swore. “Look at what he’s done to her. Tell her everything right now, or I will.” She turned to me. “Matisse, pull yourself together. You need to be strong now.”
Mom sent her a dirty look. “Give her five minutes. Jeez.” Mom took me by the hand and led me to her guest room. “Lie down and I’ll bring you some healing tea.”
I climbed on the bed and curled up into a ball. There was no fight in me. There was nothing.
Sometime later, Mom came back, holding a tray with tea and some soup. “How are you, baby?”
I peered up at her. Mom wasn’t the coddling type. I didn’t think I’d ever heard her call me baby. Not even when I was a little girl. “What is it?”
She set the tray down and blew out a breath. “How long have you known Vaughn?”
“Just a few days. Why?”
She shook her head, her expression skeptical. “That’s all?”
“Yes.”
“It’s even worse than I thought.” She stood and paced the room, her bare feet silent on the wood floors.
I rolled over to my back and stared up at her.
“You’re not going to like this,” she said.
“Well, with a buildup like that…”
She chuckled, then sobered as she sat next to me. “Vaughn is an incubus.”
“Umm… what?” Did she just say what I thought she did? I tried to scramble so I was sitting up, but my arms were too weak and my head too heavy. Giving up, I flopped back down on the bed and hugged a pillow. “I had sex with a demon?” I whispered, utterly horrified.
“Oh, no.” She wrapped her warm hand around my cold one. “He’s a descendant of a demon, which makes him predisposed to be an incubus, but the only way to awaken that side of him is to have sex with a sex witch.”
I frowned, confused. “Having sex with me turned him into an incubus?”
“Yes. But it’s not just the sex. He must have gained your trust somehow.”
Well, he had. I’d opened up to him and shed my guards. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Everything. You had to have given him some of your magic in order to ignite the shift from human to incubus.”
Dread filled all the empty crevices in my chest. I had done that. I’d thought I’d been letting the magic build for myself. That afterward, I’d have plenty of reserves. And instead, he’d stolen it. And then left me for dead.
The bastard!
When I saw him next, I’d kill him. Rip his heart out and feed it to the gators. No wonder he’d been so hell-bent on saving me from the demon. He needed me for his own devious plans. I’d opened myself up for the first time, and he’d taken advantage of me in the worst way possible. He’d stolen the most important part of me. My magic.
“How do you know this?” I asked her, my voice getting weaker by the moment.
Dayla, whom I hadn’t even known was in the room, came into view. She placed her palm on my cheek and stared into my eyes. “Because, darling. It happened to me once. Incubi need sex witches to complete the change. And they’ll do whatever they have to in order to make it happen. Including breaking your heart.”
She knew. She understood what I’d given up without my knowledge.
“Sleep, my lovely niece. We’ll talk more when you get your strength back.”
I wanted to ask more questions. Wanted to know everything about what had happened and how long it would take to recover, but I couldn’t. My eyes closed and the world faded away.
I spent three and a half weeks on bed rest. The night I’d spent with Vaughn had taken more than my magic. He’d taken away my ability to live any sort of normal life. I slept twenty hours a day for the first week. I couldn’t concentrate on my schoolwork and ended up taking an incomplete in all my classes. I’d have to retake them all.
Plus my power was all but gone. Replenishing it would require sleeping with someone else. That was the last thing I wanted to do. It was almost as if I had PTSD. Even after I built up a little strength, I had no interest in trolling for a sex partner.
The day after I moved back into my apartment, I was sitting on my couch shoveling ice cream in my face when a knock sounded on the door. I didn’t even look up. Whoever it was could just go away.
But no matter how much I ignored the knocking, the person wouldn’t stop. Finally I got up, wrapped a blanket around my shoulders, and flung the door open. “What?”
Chessa stood on my porch, one eyebrow raised in curiosity. “Is this what your life is going t
o be now?”
I stared at her open-mouthed. Then, without a word, I spun and headed back to my couch.
She closed the door and followed me. “You can’t go on acting as if you’re not a witch.”
The coffee-flavored ice cream melted over my tongue. Swallowing, I made a point of shoveling another large spoonful into my mouth.
She shook her head and sat in the chair across from me. “Are you going to let him ruin your life?”
I knew what she was doing. She wanted to get me so pissed that I got my fire back. What she didn’t understand was that my fire was gone. Stolen. I couldn’t help her. “There’s nothing left, Chessa.”
“There is. You just have to see your way through it.”
“Riiight. I’ll get right on that.” I dug into the ice cream, scooping up another large portion. “The only way I’m going to get my magic back is by sleeping with someone. And that’s not going to happen. Never again. Got it? I was used. Violated. And I’ll never put myself in that position again. So go back to the realm and find someone else to help you with the portal, because I’m out.”
She stood and placed her hands on her hips. “You weren’t violated. Not in the way you think.”
I jumped to my feet and got in her face. “You have no idea what you’re talking about, angel.”
Chessa blew out a breath, clearly trying to stay calm. “You can be as mad at me as you want to. I can take it. But I’m here to tell you the whole truth, not Dayla’s distorted view. I’m an angel. We devote our lives to fighting demons. That means I have a little better idea of what goes down, don’t you think?”
I shrugged. Maybe, but what did that have to do with Vaughn?
“Incubi are rare. When they are made—”
“You mean after they steal the magic of a sex witch?” I said dryly.
“Well, that’s one way to look at it. But not all of them know that’s what they’re doing. You can’t know if Vaughn was using you or if you just happened to connect. A man who is predisposed to become an incubus has a sexual energy that’s hard to ignore. Just like a sex witch. Though sex witches know this about themselves and use it to their advantage.”
Demons & Djinn: Nine Paranormal Romance and Urban Fantasy Novels Featuring Demons, Djinn, and other Bad Boys of the Underworld Page 59
