And yet, some small voice of reason refused to be silent. “This isn’t why we’re here.”
She hoped the words would call to Jack, help him back into control, but he laughed instead. It was a soft, wicked sound that stroked things low in her body. “Since when do the fey avoid temptation?”
“Temptation is dangerous,” she countered. “You told me that yourself.”
His eyes flashed again. “Am I dangerous?”
The question made her catch her breath. Lark leaned her head back, pressing it into the bark of the tree so she could tilt her chin up and meet his brilliant eyes. He was so close, their noses touched. Speaking nearly brought them into another kiss. “I think I like your demon, Jack.”
His fingers fastened on the lapels of her coat. In a moment, he’d pushed it off her shoulders, letting it fall to the grass below. Her shirt followed, leaving only her tank top. Lark shivered when Jack’s mouth found her bare shoulder. His hips rolled against her, the hard bulge in his jeans proving just how much his demon liked her back.
Jack pulled Lark tight to him, and she reached up to wind her arms around his neck. His hands cupped her cheeks, running his thumbs along the fine ridge of her jaw. She could feel the pulse in her neck flutter against the pressure of his fingers, as if alerted to his predator’s touch.
The immense power lurking just beneath Jack’s skin was oceanic in its depth and mystery. Lark was all but immortal, but she was still young even by human years. Jack had been a vampire for centuries, and the demon within him was more ancient still. All that time had honed his power, distilling it to frightening purity. She could sense the demon’s presence as she never had before, a swirl of power that could engulf her with the slightest effort of will. The vibration of it was erotic all on its own, but it was also terrifying.
His mouth found her neck, leaving nips as he tasted her flesh. “I want you.”
The words shuddered through her with tectonic force. There was so much need in his voice, so much loneliness. Lark was glad of the tree at her back holding her up. It was the voice of an angel condemned to darkness, wanting to be loved for his own sake.
The tension between Jack and his demon, of dark and light, sparked in the air around them. Asteriel had gained the upper hand tonight, and Lark knew with the thin shred of logic left to her that her next move could change everything.
“Trust me,” he whispered, his voice a rasp of need.
She was overwhelmed, terrified, but she understood this dark side was part of Jack. After all, she had exposed it with her blade. Now, when the demon was near the surface, she had a chance to heal that wound. She could beg for forgiveness, but that was for herself. With sudden clarity, Lark knew that her energy was much better spent showing compassion.
She ran her hands under his shirt, feeling the smooth skin pulled taut over furrows of abdominal muscle. Those muscles flexed as he pulled off his shirt and jacket, the gesture showing the flare of his shoulders as he lifted his arms. He grabbed her by the waist, lifting her feet from the ground as if she weighed no more than a leaf. Lark wrapped her legs around his middle and found his lips again, drinking in the shattering presence of him.
His hands roamed up her ribs, skimming off her tank top so he could claim every inch. Eventually, he found the silk of her bra and pulled down the gossamer fabric, exposing her breasts. His mouth closed over her nipple, wet and greedy, the pull of it shooting sensation deep into her core. She rocked against him, mindless with exquisite, pleasurable distress. Her hands raked through his hair, then fell to his shoulders, then slowly ran down his arms, caressing him until she cupped his hands where they held her waist.
He released her nipple, leaving it peaked and wet in the cold air. Demon brightness lurked in his eyes. “What do you want?”
The question was gentle, though filled with darkest heat. It went straight to the molten lust in her belly. She could only manage one word. “More.”
Though they had made love before, all of Jack—even the part he hid—was present now. The moment felt new and forbidden as he lowered his barriers a little further than he ever had before.
He unhooked the front catch of the bra, letting her breasts fall free. The garment fluttered to the ground as he palmed her flesh, kneading and sucking until she was blinded by tears of pure need. “More,” she whispered.
“Like what?” he replied, the rumble of his words more felt than heard.
Releasing her grip on his waist, she braced herself on his shoulders and slithered down his front until her feet touched the ground. Then she found the front of his jeans and began working on the fastenings. Jack inhaled sharply as he sprang free into her hand. She drew her palm slowly up his length, making him growl low in his chest. The sound alone nearly broke her.
Lark released him and stepped away, undoing her own jeans and shimmying them over her hips. She stepped out of them, toeing off her boots. It wasn’t the best striptease ever, but the time for coyness was long past.
In a quick, sinuous movement, he pulled her down to the grass. Jack knelt, one hand on either side of her head, and straddled her legs, blocking out the stars overhead. Raw desire set Lark’s pulse pounding. The scent of the night, of Jack’s skin and the wild mountains filled her like an intoxicating drug. Wherever their skin brushed, she could feel the prickle of his power, bringing every hair on her body to attention. So much magic—dangerous magic—sent her senses reeling. A rush of heat crept over her, making her slick and ready.
“Is this what you want?” he murmured, tasting the soft skin at the hollow of her collarbone with tongue and lips.
He raised himself, looked down at her. His face was lost in shadow but for the brightness of his eyes. She reached up, tracing by touch the lines of old scars that crisscrossed his chest. Souvenirs from his mortal days, no doubt. Her light touch made him shiver, hardening his nipples into peaks. Then she let her hand drift until she found his velvety hardness. “This is what I want. Now.”
“Good.” He pushed her knees apart, urgency making him rough.
She guided him as he pushed inside, growling herself as his size filled her. Her nails dug into his shoulders, the instinct to brace herself warring with the desire to pull him closer. Her grip only made him move harder, his first thrust a lesson in how much his control had slipped. Alarm surged, but only for an instant. Her fey wildness responded eagerly, welcoming this new roughness. Her muscles clenched around him, the delicious agony in every nerve turning her vision to starbursts.
The ragged thrusts settled into a rhythm, each hard and greedy, as if he was devouring her very essence through the act of desire. She cried out exclamations of surprise and need, but she had gone far beyond proper words. A storm gathered within her, one of wetness and heat and pulsing flesh. Spasms quickened deep inside her as his rhythm broke and he began to pound relentlessly. Hard. Fast. Harder. Faster. The raw frenzy savaged her will and remade the remnants into helpless, mindless need.
Lark surrendered, tears streaming as release hit without mercy, blanking every nerve in exquisite torment. It was perfect.
Chapter 22
Hours later, Jack led them away from the river and down a steep path through the trees. They were obviously heading into a valley, though she couldn’t tell yet how deep it was. “Are we anywhere near the Derrondine Pass?” Lark asked. After crossing the mountain and the river, she had all but lost her bearings.
“We’re in the pass right now. The site where we did the ritual to close the gates to the Dark Fey kingdom is straight ahead.” Jack pointed to a line of tall pines about twenty yards away.
Lark barely noticed the massive trunks, and Jack was the reason why. Every man had his demons when it came to relationships, but Jack’s was literal—and yet his dark side had proved it could give pleasure with an artful and generous tenderness. Trying to think after that was like trying to see afte
r staring into the sun.
The demon was hidden now, nothing of those star-bright eyes remaining in Jack’s gaze. Still, memories clouded Lark’s perceptions. Jack had been dark and dangerous before, but now every thought of him scorched her.
She took a deep breath, calming her racing thoughts. “If we’re so close to the ritual site, why can’t I feel it? It should reek of magic.”
“The craftsmanship of the spell was careful, so that no energy was wasted. We wanted the spell to last.” He took her hand and guided her down the path, holding branches out of her way. “There are no leaks to betray its presence.”
They’d made it to the edge of the trees, and the view opened up before Lark. The scene was beautiful, but not what she’d expected. The trees sheltered an alpine valley filled by a lake, the water a mirror image of the starry sky. It was still—only the slightest ripple revealing the presence of a breeze. She could smell the snows that fed it and shivered. “Where are the gates?”
Jack pointed at the lake. “They’re not literal gates made of metal or stone. We pass through the water to the other side. It looks still, but the undercurrent is wicked.”
“The passage will be difficult,” she said, speaking her fears aloud. “Fey portals try to separate and confuse intruders. It’s part of their defense system.”
Jack slid something from a pocket inside his jacket and held up the handcuffs. “If we use these to lock our wrists together, it can’t separate us.”
Lark narrowed her eyes. “You just like cuffing me, don’t you?”
“I can’t risk losing you.”
The seriousness—and heat—in his tone made Lark’s breath hitch. “Really?”
He responded with a teasing curve of his lips, the look adding a sensual layer behind his practical reply. “We’ll be on your turf once we’re there, and I’ll need your guidance. I’m not fey.”
“I’m not Dark Fey,” she pointed out, but he was right. She understood the complicated and often deadly rules of the fey courts. Without that knowledge, few survived long.
He lowered the handcuffs. “Your call. Last chance to back out.”
Lark swallowed. Entering the Dark Queen’s realm was a mad errand with little chance of success or return. But far more important to Lark was the fact that Jack trusted her.
And she trusted him. All of him. His demon had cradled her in his arms.
Lark held out her left wrist. “We’re in this together.”
* * *
The dive was long and freezing cold. Jack remained awake through the deep dive, but then vampires didn’t need to breathe. Lark lost consciousness just as the magic of the gates pulled them into the realm of the Dark Fey.
As Jack had predicted, the cuffs alone had kept her in his grasp through the crushing blackness. The portal spit them out eventually, dropping them to the dirt and leaves. They should have been dripping wet, but the magic of the gates had kept them dry.
Now Jack sat cross-legged on the forest floor, Lark’s head in his lap. She lay in an exhausted sleep, her face turned up to his. Her mahogany hair fanned about her like a mermaid’s tresses. He was lost in the contemplation of her cheekbone, of the curve of her ear. The fey were exquisitely beautiful, but one never truly noticed just how much until they were still—and with Lark that rarely happened. She was always in motion—laughing or fighting or rushing into the next adventure.
He’d taken the cuffs off. They’d left a welt on both their wrists, but his had already healed. Hers was still red and raw. Jack lifted her hand and kissed her wound, tasting the sweetness of her skin. They needed to move, but he hated to end the moment. He pressed his cheek to her hand, rubbing against her fingers. Everything in him screamed to get Lark far away from this realm and the insanity of what they meant to do, but she was every bit as much an agent as he was. If he admired her courage, he had to let her use it.
He left a kiss in her palm as he lowered her hand, reluctant to let her go. He brushed the hair from her forehead lightly with his fingertips.
“You are extraordinary,” he said softly.
Her eyes flickered open, their dark, soft brown reminding him of darkest coffee. She focused on his face, at the sky above him. Then her expression grew wary as she sat up. “We made it?”
“We are in the kingdom of the Dark Fey,” he replied.
She looked around. “How do you know? It looks just the same as where we were.”
“Not quite.” They got to their feet. It was warmer here, more like April than February. Flowers dotted the forest floor with stars of palest blue. “The nature of the Dark Queen’s influence is subtle, but it is perverse. It’s quite pleasant right here, but I’d stay away from the vegetation farther on. Some of it is mobile and not very friendly. Also, beware the rabbits. They looked hungry, and for once I don’t mind being already dead.”
She shot him a look of alarm as she straightened her clothes. “So what do we do first?”
“Explore?” Jack said. “Since we’ve lost our supplies, we need to find safe provisions.”
Lark would need food and water, but nothing in a fey realm could be trusted, and poison was the least of it. Some foods were spelled to bind one to eternal servitude; others were laced with charms that could turn one to a moose or a mushroom according to the caster’s whim.
“Right,” she said, glancing around. “That looks like a path.”
It was more of a deer track, but it would do. They set out with Lark leading the way. She would detect magical traps before he did.
They did not have to go far before the landscape changed. It was as if the ordinary world had spilled over near the gates and all traces of what was normal dwindled deeper into the Dark Queen’s territory. Spotted toadstools sprouted thickly from the forest floor, some growing nearly as high as Jack’s knee, and the air was heavy and oppressive, scented with a white trumpet vine that smelled like decay.
“There are spells here,” Lark announced. “I’ve been disabling them as we go, but if they had their way we’d be wandering in circles until we dropped from exhaustion.”
Jack wasn’t surprised. “Then, this road must be going somewhere, if they don’t want us to reach the end.”
“There.” Lark pointed. “I can see the edge of the forest up ahead. And I think that’s where we want to go.”
Jack saw the castle at once. It was a pale blue shadow on the horizon, its outline like something from a picture book. There were turrets and towers, a drawbridge and moat. Jack, who had lived in his fair share of castles, studied the fortifications with a practiced eye. Whoever had built it knew their business.
A few minutes later, they stood with the last of the trees behind them, and a rolling meadow stretched between them and the castle gates. Jack glanced at the brooding purple sky, thick with clouds so low they brushed the castle’s highest tower. It was either twilight or about to storm or neither. This wasn’t true sunlight, because it had no effect on his vampire physiology.
“What do you think?” Jack asked, his gaze settling back to the castle. “If I were an evil overlord, I’d hold my prisoners there.”
“Incoming!” Lark whipped around, her weapon out and ready. Jack instantly drew his, scanning the trees for movement. Every few feet the air shimmered, as if from waves of heat, and a handful of figures materialized. Jack recognized two of them at once: Egon and Drusella Blackthorn.
“Maybe we can help by extending an invitation.” Drusella held a long spear with a leaf-shaped blade of bronze—a traditional fairy weapon, but it looked odd in her hands. An assault rifle was far more her style.
Jack snarled, fangs out and coiling to launch himself. All of the fey took heed and stepped back. All but the Blackthorns. Drusella thrust the spear forward to keep him at bay. Jack snatched at it, but succeeded only in knocking the weapon aside. Drusella was fast.
>
“Hold!” Egon commanded in a deep voice. “There is no need to fight. Her Majesty would be delighted to entertain you.”
Jack and Drusella stepped apart, but not before Drusella got in one last jab. Egon awarded his sister a quelling look. “It’s not every century we get visitors. When you emerged from the lake, the queen was impressed by your courage in coming here.”
It wasn’t a huge surprise that the portal was watched, so Jack got straight to the point. “You have hostages. We have come to get them back.”
Egon raised his eyebrows. “That’s a conversation best had with the queen.”
“Maybe.” Jack eyed the cluster of other warriors—a half dozen figures with bows and arrows. Primitive, but a good shot was every bit as deadly as a rifle. “She needs to work on her people skills.”
Jack drew closer to Lark, careful not to foul her aim but ready to hurl himself in the path of any weapon that flew her way. Then he pulled his Walther.
Egon gave him a withering look and drew a heavy sword from a sheath slung across his back. “You can put those guns away. Firearms don’t work here. Something to do with the amount of magic in the air.”
Unease crawled through Jack as he aimed at the ground and pulled the trigger. It gave a click, but nothing more. He tried again with the same result. Disgusted, he thrust the gun back in its holster. “And here I left my crossbow on the nightstand.”
With a derisive lift of his eyebrows, Egon turned and led the way to the castle. The others followed, herding Lark and Jack along at spear point.
* * *
To Lark, the Dark Fey kingdom felt out of tune, and the disharmony grew as they approached the castle. The Light Court was almost arcane in its love of ritual and protocol, but they embraced the forests and wilds. Here nature was twisted, from the bruised clouds to the meadow of dead grass.
Possessed by the Fallen Page 17
