Bond with Me

by Anne Marsh

  Moving aside the ancient curtain, he stared out into the night. This far out into the countryside, the no-man’s-land that stretched between cities was dark. Here, there was just the faint mazhykical haze surrounding the slim crescent of the moon. The stars were eerily bright without artificial lights of any kind, just a thick, black blanket of darkness.

  Yeah, that was a new sensation as well. He’d never thought of the darkness as more than a convenient tool, another weapon in his arsenal because there were many ways to kill another under the cover of darkness.

  There was a rustle behind him, almost inaudible, but he knew.

  “Go to bed.” He didn’t turn around. Hell, he always knew when she was near and the instant, sensual knowledge had his blood heating, his cock thickening. Her soul called to his own damned soul, a siren’s call of welcoming light and warmth. He didn’t want to feel this way.

  Like sex, darkness was simpler.

  He had others watching the perimeter he’d established earlier that evening. She was safe enough for the moment, he decided, resisting the urge to turn around and wrap her in his arms. She was angry, he reminded himself. She wouldn’t welcome intimacy, not now, when he’d held out on her.

  “Are you coming to bed?” So she’d reached out to him, despite their fight. He’d done what was right—he’d kept her safe—so why did he feel as if he was pushing her away? So what if he’d never felt this way before—hell, he hadn’t felt for millennia. He’d been living on borrowed emotions and none of them, none of them, had prepared him for this. He was on the edge of an unfamiliar precipice and he never—never—lost control. He wasn’t going to start now.

  “No,” he growled. “You go back.” He should check that perimeter one more time. Nothing, no one, was getting to Mischka Baran.

  “Right.” Still, she didn’t leave, standing there with her bare feet on the wooden floor. It was too cold for her to be barefoot. He should have swept her up and brought her back inside to the bed’s cozy warmth. But he didn’t. “Brends.” Her voice was hesitant. “Is everything okay?”

  No. Things were distinctly not okay. She’d stood his world on end and now believed words would make everything all right again. Instead, he swiped irritably at the back of his neck. Damn itch. It felt like something was burrowing beneath his skin. Damn out-of-doors.

  “Go to bed, love.” He could hear the dark promise of his own voice. They both knew what would happen when he finally gave in to his desires and went to her.

  He liked the dark. There were fewer mirrors, fewer lights—fewer reflections. His face was a living reflection of his Fall, as if he needed the visual reminder. He’d gambled—and lost. Fuck Michael. He’d carved out his own path, and thanks to Mischka Baran and the killer on her trail, he was one step closer to regaining what he’d lost.

  Hours later, when he couldn’t fight his need to be near her any longer and stood over the bed, the soft rhythm of her breathing greeted him. She was asleep.

  Silently, he stripped off his clothes, sliding the heavy weight of the duster and his boots down onto the ground. The cloud of dust he kicked up spoke clearer than words about the abandoned nature of the summerhouse in which they’d set up base camp. No one, human or otherwise, had been here in years. They were the first.

  Nevertheless, he left his weapons close at hand; the countryside around them seemed still, but he hadn’t survived this long without caution. When he slid in next to his bond mate, his weight made hers slide softly against him. He adjusted her, tucking her into his side. One arm over her, free to go for the gun if necessary. The last thing he did was slide the blade beneath the pillow.

  He dreamed of the Fall.

  The battle was over.

  Brends flew through the sky and oh, God, every inch of him hurt. Pain was his new best friend, a sharp, red burn that didn’t ease when he closed his eyes. The air bent and folded around him, rippled as he flew, but he knew that the world hadn’t changed.

  He had.

  If he was lucky, he’d reach the hidden base camp in the mountains, but the steady drip of the blood down his side was a warning. Pick up the pace. Time was a luxury he no longer possessed.

  How could you lose when you were right? Zer hadn’t lied; Brends knew that for a fact. His brother was straight up. Fight Michael and what Michael stands for and take a stand for a better way of life for your family, for your brothers’ wives and children. He couldn’t ignore that call, not after what had happened to his sister. Last time he’d seen her, before he’d sent her off with that monster, she’d looked up at him with those amber eyes she’d inherited from their mother, and she’d made him swear that he would take no unnecessary chances. Maybe she’d been prescient, or maybe that was just what sisters said to brothers when they went out on a date, but the sword he’d taken through his side made a mockery of that vow now.

  To hell with being careful, he’d decided, when their entire way of life was on the line. There was a traitor in their ranks and so he defended. It was that simple.

  The too-distant mountain dipped sharply in his field of vision and gravity did its thing, jerking his body abruptly downward.

  Bleeding out, he recognized on some dim level, because even his near-immortal body couldn’t halt that remorseless spread of red forever.

  One final wing beat and he was tumbling heavily from the skies, plummeting toward the unfamiliar, foreign ground below. Earth. No. He lived in the Heavens. He lived in that golden landscape, but the dramatic mountains and clouds of his homeland rapidly faded above him and fear rose in the secret place in his soul that coveted peace, not bloody, death-dealing battles. The part that wanted only to return to the mountains and the other angels hidden there for safekeeping while Brends and Zer and the others marched out to rid their world of Michael, because there were some monsters and some crimes that had to be paid for.

  Brends’s stomach cartwheeled. Flying was impossible. His wings were useless, leaden weights on his bare back. He felt them, but couldn’t raise them.

  When the agonizing pain finally tore through him, he screamed. All around him, other falling angels screamed, howling out their own horror.

  His wings were gone. Ripped off as if by some unseen, giant hand. Like an amputation, the pain burned through his body. In every direction the landscape was washed in blood from the thousands of angels who were falling. Others tumbled as helplessly as he through the skies. Thousands and thousands of them. He had never been helpless before and didn’t welcome the sensation now. Dragging up the last dregs of his control, he fought to slow the descent, to regain command of his suddenly heavy, unwieldy body. How did the humans do it? How did they live with their awkward, wingless bodies?

  There were thousands of angels, some small specks in the air, others closer and large enough that Brends could see the despair, the rage and anger written on their faces as well. They really had lost. The news shattered him.

  Michael’s voice filled the air. The ground rushed up faster. “You fought the Heavens. You lost, and now you pay. None of you may return here to the Heavens. You are cast out. Your faces darken and your forms expand, marking you as Goblin, the Fallen, so that humankind can tell which of us are Angels and which are not. You shall be the Goblins, condemned to an immortal lifetime of penance until you find your soul mates, your missing halves. Your lost souls.”

  He could think only, But I’ve done nothing wrong.

  It was you.

  The dream Zer caught his eye. “Remember,” he whispered hoarsely. “Remember what we fight for.” Brends watched helplessly as his bold, brave, fierce leader, the angel who rallied them against Michael’s tyranny when they discovered Brends’s sister raped and callously gutted by Michael, hit the ground.

  Helpless.

  But not forever. Half Changed—half golden and glorious and half dark and swarthy—Brends fought the transformation and his Fall until he landed—hard—and the Heavens disappeared above him, closed off from his sight as the light faded.


  Eighteen

  Unfamiliar beds were a bitch. After a restless hour of watching Brends pace in front of her window, sleep had finally won. He could work through his issues or not, but waiting up all night for him to decide what he wanted was foolish. Maybe tomorrow would be better.

  Maybe tomorrow Mischka wouldn’t feel so raw.

  Too bad the nightmare paying her a visit hadn’t gotten the memo.

  Her dream body was large and strong. She flew and the air vibrated with each powerful wing beat. A silver-winged angel, its face almost unholy in the sheer perfection of its symmetry, shrieked silently as the unfamiliar blade in her right hand rose and then fell. A crimson band appeared around its neck and then its head toppled, horrifyingly, to the ground, leaving behind a bloody stump, glaring reproaches.

  And then she fell, her body a deadweight that sank through the air. Why was she falling? Why did it feel as if her body had been pulled apart? She’d never dreamed of falling before, but now she couldn’t stop. And she knew it was bad. She was so strong, but the blood choked her and the ground rushed rapidly up. She knew that hard surface.

  She’d fallen before.

  She’d fallen this way before.

  She fought the sticky webs of sleep, but the ground kept on rising to meet her, and avoiding the inevitable impact wasn’t going to be possible. Could you die in your sleep? Fractured images flashed past the eyes she squeezed shut, because really, she didn’t need to see the impact. Dark images of violence and taunting faces. An upraised sword that burst into flame. The harsh melody of an unfamiliar language.

  Sorting out what was going on was important. The images were dark, taunting. Someone had killed someone she cared for a great deal. Michael. The rage was sudden, sure. Her dream self believed the accusation. Michael was guilty.

  Not her dream. With a great effort, she wrenched herself awake and sat up in the bed.

  Beside her, Brends slept.

  Dreaming.

  His body twitched, the rapid movement of his eyelids and the sharp rise and fall of chest betraying him.

  She couldn’t shake that dream. Mischka was sure Brends hadn’t meant for her to watch his dreams. Maybe he didn’t know what the bond was capable of. And maybe he was watching her dreams. That thought made her uncomfortable. Privacy was important. Privacy was good.

  Still, lying here next to Brends, watching him sleep, felt pretty good. She thought about it for a minute. Being here felt more than good. His breathing was evening out now, becoming deep and steady. Maybe he was dreaming about something better.

  She shouldn’t care so much.

  Pushing herself up on one elbow, she stared down at Brends. He was her lover. Somehow, that seemed more surreal than anything. A flash of amusement had her smiling. Apparently, when she decided to spend the night with someone, she did it with style. One gorgeous, six-foot-plus fallen angel in a luxury lakeside summerhouse. No seedy motels for her.

  Brends’s dark hair spilled over the pillows and his bare shoulders. Part of her wanted to sift the silky strands through her fingers and then explore the intriguing shadow of his collarbone. Taste the dark skin and see if sin indeed had a flavor.

  Sex on the brain. Not good. Apparently, one night wrapped in the male’s decadent five-hundred-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets and she was willing to take their relationship to a whole new level. They’d bonded, but they had a thirty-day future. Not a forever future.

  Brends had made it pretty clear that he wasn’t a happily-ever-after kind of a guy. So it was beyond stupid to read anything into what had happened between them.

  Maybe this was just a bonding thing. Maybe it happened to everyone.

  Yeah, who was she kidding?

  Eventually, he was going to trample all over her heart on his way to the door. Those wicked dark lashes lifted sensually, his fingers stroking softly along her bare skin as his eyes opened. “Come here, baby,” he whispered as if he had known all along that she was watching, trying to unravel the puzzle that was Brends Duranov. As if he could see straight through to her soul. His hunger beat at her in waves, and she wanted nothing more than to ease that terrible hunger.

  Nineteen

  Brends came awake and he was in heaven. Or as close to it as one of the Fallen could ever get. Mischka leaned over him in a sheer white chemise. God, yeah. The dark shadows of her nipple had his mouth watering. His cock was harder than it had ever been.

  She was perfect.

  “Show me,” she whispered.

  He cupped a hand behind her neck, urging her face down to his. She smelled so good. Warm and feminine. “I’ll show you whatever you want, baby.” He meant it, too. Whatever she wanted, he’d provide.

  Then she said the last thing he’d expected her to say. “Show me your beast,” she demanded. “That side of you that”—she hesitated—“came out when we found that last girl.”

  Yeah, he’d lost it there, had utterly lost it. He’d transformed and let the beast out to play. And he’d been far too close to losing control completely. He wasn’t sure that his brothers would have been able to talk him down if Mischka hadn’t been there. She’d done what they couldn’t do, had calmed the beast and the man until he was able to regain control.

  So why the hell would she want a repeat? “No,” he said.

  Her eyes narrowed. “What happened to fulfilling my every desire, Brends?”

  This wasn’t about sex, was it? She couldn’t possibly want his beast in her body. On top of her. So this request had to be about something else.

  He just had to figure it out.

  Besides, he was the one in charge here, wasn’t he? No chance in hell was he letting her see that side of him again if he could prevent it.

  Her dark eyes stared at him quietly for a moment and then she rolled over on top of him, straddling him. Her thighs parted and, God, she was wickedly bare beneath that chemise. He froze. Hot, damp female flesh pressed against him.

  “I want to see you,” she said again. “That beast, he’s part of you. So I want to see him.”

  He hated the beast. That was not a part of him that he wanted to acknowledge. Maybe his brothers could come to terms with that darker side of their warrior instincts, but that part of him didn’t belong here, not in this bed. Not with her. She mattered, so he was keeping her free and clear of that dark violence. She couldn’t know what she was asking him to do, or she’d change her mind fast enough.

  He’d seen the look on her face earlier that afternoon. If the man didn’t remember, the beast was more than aware. The image was probably burned onto his retinas. Horror. Antipathy. But no shock. That violence hadn’t surprised her. She’d expected it from him. And that just made it worse, really, that she’d suspected what he was capable of and all he’d done was prove her point.

  In living Technicolor.

  He shuddered, but all that flesh, all that Mischka, was getting to him.

  “Do it,” she said in a hard, mean voice that made his cock jump traitorously. So she thought she knew what she wanted. Fine. He’d give it to her and she’d realize just how wrong she’d been. Then he’d Change back, tuck the beast away, and she’d never ask again.

  It would be over. Yeah, the memory would always be between them, but she wouldn’t make this mistake of requesting show-and-tell again. All he had to do was prove that he was the evil beast the rest of world knew he was.

  “Fine,” he growled against her throat. “You want to see me, Mischka, you see me. Just remember that this was your idea.”

  When she nodded, not hesitating, he couldn’t see her eyes, and God, he wanted to. It was better to get this over with. The sooner he let the beast out to play, the sooner this was done. He was in control.

  He Changed.

  This was the darkness that had condemned Brends Duranov. Looking into his eyes, however, all Mischka saw was the man.

  He’d scared the hell out of her before because she hadn’t been prepared. Now, she could concentrate. See him for who and what he was.<
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  The man was gone, so consumed by the beast into which he’d Shifted, it was as if Brends had never existed. The silver eyes burned with a lust and raw heat. Lust. For violence. For the dark. For her.

  His alter ego, his Shifted form, was larger, harder. Darker. The sheer power of his broad shoulders as he punched his way up from the bed overwhelmed her, the sheets tangling around his arms, tearing as the muscles bunched powerfully. His skin continued to darken as he sat up. Drew her toward him purposefully. Nowhere to run, she reminded herself. Nowhere to hide.

  You asked for this.

  The bloodlust destroyed the civilized facade. The raw power remained, but the veneer of civilization had vanished with his human form. Fully transformed, he was seven-plus feet of lethal power with vicious, silver-tipped nails that elongated as she stared helplessly.

  Not helplessly. Her Brends was still in there. He’d sworn he’d never hurt her.

  His silver eyes glowed as they focused on her body and a feral howl tore from his throat.

  The Goblin fell on her, licking at her lips, pushing her backward and pinning her as he demanded entry. He’d warned her that his kind couldn’t feel, but they wanted to. Desperately. Now he was drinking from her soul as though he had an unquenchable thirst, sucking her into an emotional maelstrom.

  She was caged in all that heat and strength, but it wasn’t frightening. It was hot. Dark. She could hear the harsh rasp of his breath as he fought for control, still struggling not to give in to his hunger. Not to take her soul as completely as he’d taken her body. His beast was afraid of hurting her.

  She ran a hand down his back. The muscles jumped beneath her touch, and Brends buried his face against her throat, licking a hot, wicked path across her skin.

  “I like it. I liked what you do to me, Brends.” God, when had her voice grown so husky?

  His jaw clenched, but his cock was there, thrusting between them. Hard. Needy. But he wasn’t forcing himself on her. Just dragging her scent into his lungs, over and over. She could have done the same for hours. He smelled so damn good.