Sorcha’s heart slammed against her chest.
It couldn’t be him. She stared at the man before her. No. Not a man. Never that. As long as she’d known Jonah, he’d never been just a man. She trained her face into an impassive expression.
Her gaze scanned the well-carved features of his face. His dark blond hair was cut shorter than the last time she’d seen him. He was just as tall, though, just as lean muscled as she remembered. And despite herself, her stomach knotted and clenched with hot desire.
Here? What was Jonah doing here?
RAVES FOR THE MOON CHASERS NOVELS
“Readers are in for an incredible ride.”
—Romantic Times on To Crave a Blood Moon
“Sparks fly and the attraction sizzles … a delectable escape.”
—Darque Reviews on Kiss of a Dark Moon
“The interplay between these protagonists sets sparks off the page … dark, deadly, and sexy certainly sums up this hero.”
—Romantic Times on Kiss of a Dark Moon
“Adventurous, witty, and fabulously sexy—definitely a must-read.”
—Fresh Fiction on Marked by Moonlight
ALSO BY SHARIE KOHLER
To Crave a Blood Moon
Kiss of a Dark Moon
Marked by Moonlight
Haunted by Your Touch
(with Jeaniene Frost and Shayla Black)
The sale of this book without its cover is unauthorized. If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that it was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed.” Neither the author nor the publisher has received payment for the sale of this “stripped book.”
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2010 by Sharie Kohler
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Interior design by Jacquelynne Hudson
Cover design by Min Choi; art by Craig White.
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN 978-1-4391-0159-9
ISBN 978-1-4391-2703-2 (ebook)
For my editors, Lauren McKenna and
Megan McKeever, on our fifth project together.
You never stop making me work for it.
“Thank you” doesn’t say it enough.
MY SOUL
TO KEEP
PROLOGUE
Rough hands pulled Sorcha awake, abruptly ending the dream that shouldn’t have colored her sleep and made a smile slip over her lips. But it always came. It was always there when she closed her eyes and dropped her guard and let hope creep in. He was there.
Tonight, her mother put a stop to it, tearing her from glimpses of what wasn’t—glimpses of what could never be.
There was no world without her father, tormenting her every breath. There was no world with just Sorcha and Jonah in it. Such a world was a girlish fantasy.
Danae’s hard hand released her shoulder. “Get up. Your father wants to see you.”
Sorcha blinked herself alert. Swiping the tangle of dark hair from her face, she quickly rose, swinging her legs over the egde of the bed. Her father did not like to wait. He didn’t like a lot of things. All of which she sought to avoid.
She smelled the wine on her mother’s breath as she fell into step beside her and was reminded of tonight’s celebration. Her father, Ivo, had claimed yet another pack. Sorcha slept in another strange bed. Ivo had gained more soldiers for his army—almost a hundred lycans swore service to him this day. He would be in a good mood. That was something at least.
Still, she could not stop the cold shiver from scratching down her spine as her mother led her to the room where her father reclined like a great, sated lion on a sofa. Why should he want to see her now? At this hour? Why, when he usually ignored her existence?
A fire crackled in the hearth, casting the room in shades of red and yellow, making the handsome lines of her father’s face appear even more ominous than usual.
Sorcha pulled up hard, hanging back on the threshold at the sight and sound of the beast at the room’s far wall, fighting his chains, his hunger glittering madly in his pewter eyes. His huge tawny-haired frame pulled at the restraints.
She hated this time of the month when the full moon rode the night. When the air was charged and dangerous, thick with death. When her father seemed the scariest, taking pleasure in tormenting the depraved, soulless lycans subject to him … and any other hapless soul to fall into his web.
The silver manacles burned into the creature’s heavily corded wrists, weaving tendrils of smoky ribbons in the air. Ivo was excellent at capitalizing on his prey’s weaknesses. And silver was poison to a lycan.
She moved slowly into the room, her bare feet sliding over the cold rock floor until she reached the edge of the rug. A quick glance around confirmed her worst fear. Jonah was missing. A sick feeling coiled through her. He was probably patrolling, rounding up rebel lycans who resisted Ivo.
She bit her lip. She always felt safer when her father’s second-in-command was around. Even if he served her father, he always treated her with kindness. No surprise he invaded her dreams. He gave her what her own family never did. There was humanity in him. Even if he was of the same species as her parents.
Errand completed, Danae glided past her, dropping down and curling around Sorcha’s father like an elegant cat. Ivo pressed a kiss to her mother’s arm, stroking her like a fine pet. Looking up, he fixed his steely gaze on Sorcha.
“Your mother tells me today is your birthday.”
Sorcha blinked. They’d never cared about her birthday before. A birthday, she’d learned over the years, ceased to matter to hybrid lycans who could live a very long time—if not forever. Even if this was only her thirteenth birthday, the passing of a year had never mattered to them. They never cared about anything except amassing their army of lycans.
Sorcha nodded, distracted. Her gaze drifted to the snarling lycan battling his restraints. She watched him in rapt horror. His muscles and sinews bunched and twisted beneath the hairy dark flesh. The pewter eyes drilled into her through the steam of his smoldering flesh, his hunger reaching out for her. She swallowed tightly, almost imagining those wet teeth sinking into her flesh, tearing her apart …
Her eyes ached from staring at the lycan, but she couldn’t blink, couldn’t look away. As though that split second might be all it took for him to break free to devour her.
“Sorcha,” her father snapped. “Look at me.”
She swung her gaze obediently to her father.
Ivo waved a hand impatiently. “Come closer.”
She inched deeper into the room, watching in disgust as her father fished a piece
of raw meat from a bowl and tossed it to the lycan. The creature lunged for it like a mad dog, shoving the scrap of flesh into his mouth and devouring it without chewing.
Ivo chuckled, watching her more than the pathetic creature chained to the wall, prisoner to his sick amusements. In that moment, she felt little different from the beast. They were both captives to her father’s will, prisoners to his whim.
“Your mother tells me you are now thirteen.”
“Yes.”
“Yet you have not transitioned.” He cocked his head, the firelight gilding his dark hair. “Why is that?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered, the pulse at her neck growing twitchy, an anxious staccato, jumping against her skin. She glanced over her shoulder to the door, longing to escape.
“A little old, aren’t you?”
Sorcha shrugged helplessly.
“I have no use for a daughter who is, in effect, human. If you’re not one of us, you are useless and weak.”
She bit back the retort that she would never be like him even if she did transition. She would make certain of that.
Ivo stared hard at her, his eyes cruel and penetrating, deepening her impulse to flee. The only problem was that she would never make it two feet before he pounced on her.
“Maybe you have not been given the proper impetus, hmm?”
“W-what do you mean?” She swallowed, despising the tremor in her voice. She wanted to be brave, wanted to act as though she wasn’t frightened of her own father, even if it was a lie.
Ivo stood, his hand wandering across the table littered with the remnants of their dinner. His fingers hooked around a slim knife. The blade flashed in the firelight.
“You understand the nature of our race. We are not like our unfortunate brethren.” He gestured to the lycan at the wall. The creature’s ugly snarls dulled to background noise, blending with the howling winds outside. “Our race possesses control, free will. We determine when we will and will not turn.” As if to drive home his point, his face flashed, blurred into sharper lines. His eyes blasted ice, a pale glow twisting where his pupils should be for a mere moment before fading to black again. “That said, intense emotions can push us over the edge. At times …”
She sucked in a sharp breath as he stopped before her and raised his knife, examining it as if he found some truth etched there in the gleaming blade. Something no one but he could see.
“Pain, for example. Pain can prompt a dovenatu to turn.”
Before she could react, before she could think, her father lashed out and brought the knife down in a hissing swipe.
She cried out, jumping away, but too late. She slapped a hand over her bicep. Blood seeped between her fingers, warm and sticky as syrup. The lycan went wild, spitting and snarling, scenting the coppery flow, straining against his chains with no thought to his sizzling flesh.
Sorcha bent at the waist, a pained breath escaping through her clenched teeth at the burning agony of her arm.
Her father circled her with slow steps. “No?” he murmured. “Nothing? Do you feel it? The turning? The heat building inside? The strain in your bones …”
She shook her head fiercely, dark hair tossing wildly, tears warm on her cheeks. “What do you want from me?”
His voice cracked liked thunder in the air. “I want you to be strong. To be a dovenatu.” Hard, punishing fingers circled her arm.
She cried out, dragging her heels as he hauled her toward the ravenous lycan. “Perhaps you need further incentive.”
She shrieked as he thrust her toward the deadly creature.
The lycan strained his thick neck, jaws wide and dripping saliva as he stretched for a taste of her flesh.
Tears blurred her eyes. Pathetic little whimpers choked from her throat. A sound she loathed, but could not stop.
Her father wrapped an arm around her waist, positioning his larger frame behind her. Struggle was useless. Her feet dangled, toes grazing the floor.
“Come, Sorcha, show me your fangs, show me that there’s a reason I should keep you around. Prove to me you are my daughter.”
She moaned, tossing her head from side to side as he forced her hand up, out—closer and closer to the hungering jaws. Her curled fingers shook, spasmed. The lycan’s hot breath fanned her knuckles.
“Father, please,” she begged, her terror thick and terrible.
“I’ve no use for a defunct dovenatu, Sorcha. Turn!” He tugged her hand closer and that was when she knew he was going to do it. This was no test, no game to him. She’d either become what he wanted of her, or he’d see her dead.
Sorcha turned her head, jammed her eyes tightly shut, unwilling to watch as her hand was ripped from her body.
“Let her go!”
Sorcha’s eyes snapped open at the sound of the voice that whispered to her in her dreams. Jonah.
JONAH STORMED ACROSS THE room with no thought to his actions, no thought to the consequences. In that moment, he did not even care that interfering in Ivo’s games could mean his death. He wrenched Sorcha from Ivo’s grasp, a hairsbreadth from the slavering jaws stretching for her.
She stumbled against him, crying out sharply. He pulled away and looked down. Bile swelled in his throat. He choked it back, gulping in a breath at the sight of the blood coating his palm and fingers—her blood, thick and dark as tar. A dangerous heat stirred at his core, a killing fury aimed at Ivo.
Danae rose, hissing at him, her face instantly flashing into hard animal lines, the centers of her eyes glowing torches. “You forget your place, Jonah!”
A growl erupted from his lips, vibrating from deep in his chest. He was ready to fight, to defend. Unwise perhaps, but he could not stop the impulse … or the urge to tear both Ivo and Danae apart. They were her parents! If they didn’t protect her, who would?
Ivo held up his hand, stalling his mate from pouncing on Jonah.
Jonah’s gaze shot back to Sorcha. Blood pumped freely from the deep gash in her arm. The sweet copper scent flooded him. Her frightened eyes locked on him, and he felt her pull, her need. She always looked at him that way. Her dark eyes devouring him, her heart laid bare in her youthful expressive face—as if he were her only hope in a roiling sea. He hated and relished it, hating the burden but relishing the fact that there was something as sweet and pure as this girl in the cesspit of his life.
“Jonah,” she said, breathing his name, sighing it like a benediction. He grasped her uninjured arm and pulled her behind him.
Ivo chuckled, the sound brittle as dry leaves. “So possessive, so loverlike. How heartening.”
“Are you trying to kill her?” Jonah jerked his head toward the salivating beast at the wall. The lycan’s pewter gaze fixed on Sorcha, the sounds grinding from his teeth desperate and inhuman.
Jonah was well aware of Ivo’s penchant for tormenting the lycans they captured, pitting them against each other—sometimes with live human bait—and then watching the ensuing bloodbath. But he’d never thought he’d play one of his gory games with his own daughter.
Ivo’s chuckle faded. “As good as it is to see you so protective of your future mate, tread carefully when you speak to me.”
Jonah inhaled, chest lifting deeply, nostrils flaring at the aroma of Sorcha’s blood. Ivo had long planned to mate Sorcha with him. It was all part of his agenda to build a master race of dovenatus—a race that could dominate both humans and lycans. With Ivo at the helm, of course.
Ivo settled his gaze back on Sorcha. “You’re spared for now.” Jonah felt her shrink behind him and he hated that her father had that power over her. “But you’d better concentrate on transitioning.”
“It will happen when it happens,” Jonah growled, taking her with him as he moved to the door. “You can’t force it by cutting her with a knife, or scaring her.”
“It had better happen soon,” Ivo spat. “She’ll serve her purpose for me, or I have no use for her.”
Jonah’s flesh crawled at the statement. He glanced down at S
orcha, so young, so very … human. She looked like any other teenage girl with a splotchy face and a body given to chubbiness. She barely reached his shoulder. If she didn’t shed her humanity soon and become one of them, she would perish in the world her father was intent on carving.
“Come on,” he murmured. He had almost cleared the door when Ivo’s ice-cold hand on his neck stopped him. “Go,” Jonah quickly said, pushing her down the corridor. Sorcha obeyed, fleeing, her nightgown swishing at her ankles. Immediately, the tightness in his chest eased. He was relieved to see her gone. Even if he was left to face Ivo’s wrath.
Ivo had moved without a sound, without the faintest stirring of air. A cold reminder of his power, of the years and experience he had on Jonah. Those fingers tightened around Jonah’s neck, crushing, digging into the flesh until he broke Jonah’s skin.
Inhaling deeply, Jonah smelled his blood mingling with the coppery sweetness of Sorcha’s that still clung to the air. But he didn’t flinch. Didn’t show the faintest sign of weakness. Like the animal he was, Ivo would sense that, exploit it. Jonah had already revealed Sorcha to be a weakness. He would give Ivo no more power over him.
Ivo’s fingers pressed harder, digging into bone, testing Jonah’s long-sustained loyalty. Ivo had saved him from the gutters when he was just a boy, newly turned, wild and crazed with the confusion of what he had become.
He clenched his jaw against the clawing pain, resisting the impulse that burned darkly inside him, hungering for Ivo’s blood, begging Jonah to turn around and unleash all his animal fury on the bastard who would dare lay a hand on Sorcha and drive the innocence from her.
“Know this,” Ivo rasped, his voice close, ruffling tendrils of hair at Jonah’s neck. “You live because you amuse me, and I find you useful. Your possessive feelings toward Sorcha please me. Fitting, as she will be your mate. But heed me well. Her life is mine. If I ever want to end it, I will. And you.” Saliva flew from his lips in a hiss of air, landing on Jonah’s neck. “You work for me. You do what I say, and don’t ever forget it.”
My Soul to Keep Page 1
