Dark Flight (The Shadow Slayers)

by Cassi Carver

  Kara cocked her head. “If you didn’t what?”

  He spun her once again, this time around a lady whose dance with three men seemed to be slipping rapidly into something more like clothed group sex. “If I didn’t…want you for my own in truth.”

  Kara swallowed. Part of her felt like pulling away, but the other part gripped him tighter. So much had happened since the day she’d met Gavin, and their lives were still way too complicated…but what if things could be different? What if she allowed herself just a moment of solace in his arms? “You still do?”

  “Want you?” he asked. She merely nodded. “I always have, princess. From the day we met—you and only you.”

  The bodies around them were quickly losing the formal attire they’d had on when Kara arrived, and the band was picking up the beat, their songs becoming frenetic and pulsating. It looked like the Demiáre who resided with Nefren were much like other Demiáre she’d seen—hot-blooded, willing and ready.

  The sounds and smells were almost too much for Kara, so she tucked her forehead against Gavin’s shoulder—not that his heady scent made her control any better. He put his arms around her back, and his heavy thigh worked its way between her legs. She tried with everything in her not to grind against it, but she lost the battle.

  When she cracked open her eyelids, the landscape had altered even more. Nefren must have turned up the heat because it was the perfect temperature now for all the half-naked and completely buck-naked bodies gyrating in pairs or groups in the courtyard.

  Apparently she didn’t need to worry about Engus’s attention anymore, because he’d decided another brown-haired woman would be the recipient of his ardor for the night. He had the woman bent over and as Kara watched, his long shaft disappeared between the full, round globes of the woman’s ass, just to reemerge again when he cocked it back.

  Nefren seemed to be enjoying his status as well. One woman had her hand down the front of his pants while he suckled another’s large breasts.

  Kara closed her eyes again and fought the chills that had broken out across her skin. She swiped at her forehead with the back of her hand, but Gavin never missed a beat. His thigh was doing things to her resolve. Very bad things. “I’m not sure we should be here, Gavin. Seeing this…scenting it…feeling the energy…it does something to me like I don’t experience on the surface.”

  He dropped his lips to her ear and his breath tickled and delighted her senses. “This is who you are, Kara. You don’t have to apologize for how you were made. Not in this place.”

  His hand slid down her side and cupped her ass through her tight denim capris, bringing her even more firmly onto his thigh. He punctuated his gentle thrust with a wet tongue on the curl of her earlobe.

  “Fuck…” she whispered, melting into him, her insides on fire with the desire to feel his cock deep within her. “Not here. Please not here. If you touch me again, I’m going to drop your pants and fuck you till you make me come.” His response was a low growl in his chest that liquefied her bones.

  She glanced again at the couples, and the erotic vision blew her mind. She could imagine herself as every lady she saw…one being taken by two men, another’s head bobbing frantically in a warrior’s lap as he grimaced in ecstasy that seemed to border on pain. “And if you turn me into one of them,” she said, “I’ll never forgive you.”

  She’d had her share of fantasies, imagining what it would be like to be with Gavin and Julian both…but that wasn’t the same as what she saw here. If things had been different when Julian woke and they’d started a life together, just the three of them, it would have been love. This spectacle, as tingly as it made Kara feel below the belt, didn’t amount to much more than scratching a species itch. Still, having Gavin so close and eager, she wasn’t sure she would mind getting scratched if Gavin’s claws were doing the work.

  He angled his head toward the heavens and took a deep breath. “I know, princess. I don’t want this for you.” Then he cupped his huge hand on her cheek and met her eyes. “The first time I take you, I don’t want another soul to distract you from how I will worship your body. I’ve waited too long for anything other than your full and undivided attention.”

  His mouth might have been saying that he didn’t have plans to take her at the moment, but when it came to her body, the damage had been done. Her thong clung to her sex, so damp she worried it would show through her pants. She was slick and ready, eager to welcome him in.

  Gavin glanced to the black-wing who now had his eyes closed as two women worked on him. “I think Nefren’s permission is implied at this point. Let’s find some fresher air and see if we can locate the next point on the map.”

  “Sure.” Kara’s desire clawed at her from the inside. Her rational self tried to take the reins—but it failed. “Just one more thing before we go.”

  She grasped the long hair covering the brand on the back of Gavin’s neck and brought his lips down hard on hers.

  Chapter Eight

  Gavin had exercised restraint in his life—hell, since the day he’d turned from his father’s ways, he’d been known for his rigid self-control. But never had he needed more willpower to deny his baser instincts than since he’d met Kara. His scalp burned where she grasped his hair tight, but not as much as his lips burned where they met hers.

  It had been so fucking long since he’d been able to taste her. Would it really be wrong to strip her bare and sink into her body as everyone around them was doing?

  When she moaned and grazed her teeth over his tongue, he knew he needed to stop them both, or he was finished. If what she said was true, if she would never forgive him for introducing her to being publicly taken, as many Demiáre females enjoyed, then nothing they could indulge in now would be worth it. Nothing was worth losing her trust.

  “Princess. Enough.” He pulled back, but then quickly surged forward to give her one last kiss. Even to his own ears, he sounded drunk on her kisses.

  Kara blinked and looked around again. If anything, the scene around them was becoming more carnal and frenzied. “We need to get out of here,” she said.

  When her small hands came to his waist, as they always did when she expected to flash, he shook his head. “No. We’ll disturb the energy less if we simply walk away.”

  He grasped Kara by the hand and maneuvered her around the crowd, and weaving in and out of such erotic displays, he began to doubt his ability to do the right thing. Finally, they stepped through the gates of the city into the field, and Gavin exhaled in relief.

  Kara put her hands to her cheeks. “Holy crap. Why is it so much harder to resist here?”

  “Because your subconscious knows that anything is possible in the Shadowland. It feels as unconstrained here as in a lucid dream.” She swayed on her feet, and Gavin grasped her upper arm. “Are you tiring? We need to return to the island.”

  She pulled her arm from his grip and chuckled. “Given what I just experienced, I don’t think that’s what’s wrong with me, Gavin.”

  “Well, we should return anyhow, just to be safe.”

  “Not a chance. And if you’re worried about dawdling, then let’s hurry up and get to the next point before I really do get tired.”

  He felt the tickle in his chest that always preceded a growl, but he cleared his throat instead. If he wanted a female he could keep safe who would actually take his advice, then, as Kara had already pointed out, he’d picked the wrong one. She might make his head hurt sometimes, but his heart didn’t give him a choice.

  Gavin scanned the horizon and saw one of Nefren’s men trailing them. “Wonderful. We have another escort.”

  From a distance, the man almost seemed to have mottled wings, like Gavin’s brother Gable—may he rest in torment. But speckled wings like Gable’s were impossible. Gable had been truly unique in that way.

  “Hey, that’s weird. Do his wings look kind of salt-and-peppery to you?” Kara asked.

  So maybe impossible was the wrong word for it. “I’
m sure it’s just the play of moonlight and shadows.”

  Suddenly Julian’s words came back to him about the brown-haired scout who’d been tracking Kara and how his wings had played tricks on Julian’s eyes. With a snarl, Gavin’s fangs tore through his gums and his claws burst forth. He took to the air with a shout. “Go back to Nefren’s court, and wait for me there! Hurry!”

  “What in the hell is going on?” she called after him, but he would have to trust her to do as instructed, because that scout wasn’t getting away this time. And if the bastard flashed, Gavin would stick to him like lice on quills.

  “You, there!” Gavin bellowed when he was a stone’s throw away from the other man. “What business do you have on Nefren’s land?”

  The mottled-winged warrior glanced to Kara, as though deciding if he should flash to her. “I wouldn’t,” Gavin warned.

  Up close, the strange thing about this man was that he didn’t look much like a man at all. Even though his body was heavily muscled, his features were youthful, as though he hadn’t yet reached maturity. “Who are you, boy?”

  “Boy? Honestly, old man, I’m getting so sick of being called a boy. If I was living on the surface, I’d be graduated from college by now.”

  Gavin stilled. This lax attitude wasn’t what he’d expected. “I’ll ask you one more time. Who are you?”

  The boy shrugged. “I can’t tell you that. Sorry.”

  “Then maybe you can answer what you want with Kara Reed.”

  “Sure. Call her over, and she and I can talk—one on one.”

  Gavin’s growl vibrated through the air around him. He was a calm man most of the time, but he wouldn’t play games where Kara was concerned. “You are trying my patience, boy.”

  “That’s your version of patience? Wow, you must be seriously uptight.”

  When Gavin flexed his fist, getting ready to lunge and take the smart-ass down a notch, the boy put his hands up. “Now, hold on. I’m not trying to cause trouble here. I just want to talk to the woman you call Kara Reed. Just a few minutes alone. That’s all I’m asking.”

  Gavin was finished with this discussion. The boy could have a few minutes alone in hell with that attitude. He saw it in the boy’s eyes when he decided it was time to go. Too bad this scout had chosen an adversary who was legendary for his ability to track a silver-wing when he flashed.

  The mottled-winged lad winked out of existence, and Gavin threw himself into the stream, letting his energy flow in the same direction. A moment later, he materialized in the middle of his worst nightmare—smack dab in the center of Ailexon’s kingdom. All hail the chief of the fallen angels.

  Kara watched Gavin posturing with the other warrior, exchanging words, but one second they were talking, and the next they were gone. She debated high-tailing it into the gates of Nefren’s city, but before she could even list the pros and cons, Gavin popped up in front of her with skin the wan shade of overcooked spaghetti.

  “What just happened?” she asked, almost scared to know given Gavin’s pallid state.

  “I tracked the scout.”

  “Okay. And…”

  “He’s one of Ailexon’s. Holy mother of Eve. Ailexon knows of you, Kara.”

  She swallowed. “Uh…and that’s bad, right?”

  Gavin cursed under his breath and kicked his boot against the pebble-strewn grass. “We need to leave. Now.”

  Kara cupped her hands over her upper arms, suddenly feeling like the night wasn’t so warm after all. “Don’t overreact. He didn’t look too scary or anything. Matter of fact, now that I think of it, he almost looked like this young guy who’s been coming into the bar recently. Donald…I think it was.”

  He glared at her. “And you are just now telling me this?”

  “I thought he was O.P.A.! And we have the treaty with them, so I wasn’t really worried. And then I thought he wasn’t O.P.A., just some sad, boozy kid. Should I have called the National Guard?”

  “He’s been following you! Julian is going to go ballistic over this.”

  “I think you guys are continuing to overestimate how much Julian cares. He dumped me. Remember?”

  “I know he did. But he was—” Gavin ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “He was…aware of the scout, princess. Julian saw him on your second-to-last visit, and he was concerned.”

  Kara squinted in thought, like her brain needed to kick into low gear to make it up that mental grade. “The second-to-last time? Why didn’t he say anything? If I remember correctly—” and it was a time she would never forget, “—we were ‘together’, you know, and then you came and picked me up. He never said a word or showed any sign that something was wrong.”

  “I’m sure he didn’t want to worry you before he knew if there was something to be worried about.”

  “Wait. Just hold on a second. Did that have anything to do with him telling me that I should stay on the surface where I belong?”

  Gavin shifted on his feet and his guilty expression answered before his lips even formed the words. “Yes,” he finally admitted. “And now that we know for certain Ailexon is involved, I’m even more convinced that Julian was right. You shouldn’t be here.”

  “If you think that, then you’re as big of an ass as he is. The only difference I see between you two right now is that you didn’t feel the need to break my flippin’ heart over it.” How could Julian have done this? How could he have made the decision to hurt Kara instead of simply trusting her with the knowledge that she was being tracked?

  She shook her head slowly. “I’m not really as foolhardy as you all seem to think. I appreciate the concept of self-preservation. I just think it takes a backseat to self-determination.”

  “I’m trying to respect your decisions, but sometimes I feel it’s a constant battle between giving in to you and keeping you safe. Growing up in San Diego gave you an unrealistic view of your place in the world, as though you would never come up against a thug you couldn’t put in his place. When it comes to power here, princess, you are a small, supremely attractive fish, in a very deep pond. I’m not sure you truly comprehend yet what you’re swimming with.”

  Kara buried her face in her hands. This night had been too flippin’ much for her. She couldn’t even begin to process what it all meant. Not Nefren’s orgies or her carnal reaction to them. Not Gavin’s perpetual need to protect. Not being stalked by young servants of big-time black-wings. And certainly not Julian’s rationalizations for what he’d done.

  If her former lover could crush her under his boot so easily instead of simply asking her to stay home for a while, then maybe he truly wasn’t a man she wanted in her life anyhow.

  “Gavin, I think I’ve reached the point in my life where I need to give and receive brutal honesty, or I might just say screw this whole thing.”

  He nodded. “I understand.”

  “So this is what I need: I need to find the next stop on the map. I need to feel like an important part of saving your son. I need a place in the overall plan, even if just to feel like I haven’t lost you to Rachel. And I need to talk to Julian—but I don’t want to talk to him right now.”

  “Brutal honesty?”

  “Yeah.” She nodded, mockingly punching her fist into her open palm. “Lay it on me.”

  “I need to know you’re safe for my world to keep spinning. You don’t have to earn a place in my child’s life, Kara. I am his father, and you are an integral part of mine. I feel like a monster for what happened to Rachel, even though I was as gentle as I knew how to be and…without being too graphic…she did request my attention. But to cave to Brakken and get her with child and have her be in this position now—I expect to spend decades making that up to her.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she told him.

  “Now is not the time for comfort. Now is the time for truth. Do you want to know what I think of my own father? I long to feel his flesh tearing apart in my bare hands. I abhor him for forcing me to make the decision between you and
the son I’ve always dreamed of. I’m not sure what else I could have done, but it haunts my dreams every night.

  “And as for Julian, I rejoiced to the heavens,” he shouted, his face lifted to the sky, “when he broke off his relationship with you. I didn’t care if his reason was noble or idiotic or sadistic—all I knew was that I wouldn’t have to take you to see him anymore, and it made my heart soar like a falcon untethered from a cruel master’s glove.”

  Kara blinked. “Wow. When you put your mind to it, you’re fairly good at brutal honesty.”

  He met her eyes with a melancholy smile. “And one last thing…I am exhausted. I am discouraged. And I am frightened for your safety. I want to take you home now.”

  In all her years, she’d never known she was such a sucker for an honest speech. Gavin could have confided anything in that moment, and she felt like as long as he was honest, she could handle it. It had been so difficult getting him to open up in the past, and she wanted to reward his effort.

  She stepped close to him and took his hand. “Then what are you waiting for?”

  Chapter Nine

  “Uh… Why are we here?” Kara looked around and sure enough, they stood in the middle of Gavin’s oversized suite. “I thought you said you wanted to take me home?”

  “I did take you home,” he answered. “Would you mind sleeping in your room here on the island for the night? Can I ask you to do this for me, just once, princess, so I can sleep without waiting for your summons, fearing something has happened to you when it comes, or fearing something worse has happened when it doesn’t?”

  Kara frowned and bit her bottom lip. “Is that really what it’s like for you? Do you worry about me that much?”

  Gavin sighed and ran a hand through his hair, making the dark blond pieces stand away from his scalp. “Every hour of every day.”

  “Hmm… Have you thought about a support group of some kind?”

  He laughed, and his smile turned coaxing. “Your room is beautiful, and I’m not sure you’ve even visited it since the night you claimed Jaxon as your own. You’ll find it clean and ready for you whenever you care to visit.”