Drowning In The Dark: #4 The Veil Series

by Pippa Dacosta

  “Jenna’ll be okay. She just needs to rest for a bit.”

  I glanced up and saw Ryder offer up a fist. Stefan bumped his fist against Ryder’s, and his lips hooked into a crooked smile. He watched Ryder disappear into Jenna’s room, his expression warm with fondness. I bowed my head, hiding my smile, and pretended to be busy tying up Val.

  “We should mark Jenna,” Stefan said.

  I stood over my brother and brushed my hands together then gave him a kick. That was better. Just takin’ out the trash. “Mark her?” I turned to find Stefan inside my personal comfort zone.

  “Yeah, like your friend the vet, although maybe not as abundant as his markings. It’ll stop Val ever getting to her again, at least elementally, and give her time to heal.”

  It was a good idea. “What are we going to do with him?”

  “Interrogate him.” Stefan must have seen me blanch. “You don’t have to watch.”

  “Screw that. I’ve been terrified of Val my whole life. I want to be the one asking the questions. I wanna see him squirm…” My words trailed off as I realized Stefan was studying me, not with confusion, but admiration. “We make a good team.” I tucked my thumbs into my pockets. “The three of us.” For a moment, his eyes lit up, and a genuine smile warmed his face, but as soon as hope flared, it fled, and his expression hardened. He turned away, and the cold rushed in. With a sigh, I said, “Let’s tie this bastard to a chair and get on with it. We only have a few hours left until dark.”

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Val’s eyes weren’t simply gray. Up close, they were a symphony of silver, platinum, and slate, flecked with the occasional filing of crimson. Simply put, his eyes were mesmerizing. Despite being tied to a chair, he still threw off an aura of arrogance. I’d thought he’d wake hissing and spitting like a wet cat, but he’d slid his gaze around Jenna’s living room and accepted the situation with too much composure for my liking.

  “How does it feel to be trapped in a human body?” I stood within reach, arms crossed, and looked down my nose at him. Stefan hung back, near the edges of the room where we’d shoved all the furniture, his icy touch like a hand on my shoulder. He wouldn’t leave me alone with Val, citing my tendency to lash out when angry. Ryder was with Jenna, using a permanent marker to color her skin with symbols. It was a temporary fix, but would suffice for now. He’d be back any minute, and then both he and Stefan would interrogate Val.

  “You know the answer, sweet sister-mine. You’ve been trapped in human flesh all your finite life.”

  “Didn’t see this coming, did you, you arrogant bastard?”

  “This will accomplish nothing. The princes will not wait for my return. The half bloods will arrive no matter what you do with me. I’ll escape. My future is not confined in this room.”

  “So we should kill you now then?”

  “Kill me?” He recoiled, offended. “I have not lived for millennia to be bested by a half-blood whore and her puppet prince.”

  “I killed Levi.”

  Val’s lips twitched. “No, for that you had help from a remarkable half-blood youngling, who has since died.”

  “She lives.”

  A sneer tugged his upper lip back, and those eyes darkened. “Impossible. Your mortal man killed her. I witnessed it.”

  Interesting that he hadn’t seen Dawn in his future. “A ruse, so the likes of you stopped hunting her.” His steady gaze jumped and reassessed the room around us. “That’s right, asshole. We have an immortal killer on our side, not to mention the Prince of Wrath, the Prince of Greed—who commands all the demons in Boston—and lil’ ol’ me.”

  Ryder emerged from the bedroom. “Don’t forget the mortal man. I have guns, lots of them, a truck load of the drug polluting your veins, and some very nasty anti-elemental rounds that’ll make short work of your air-brushed skin. Plus, I’m part of a small army of mortals that would like nothing more than to shove your pretty head onto a stake.”

  Finally, Val looked up at me with disdain. “Your words are worthless. I need only one half-blood to level this city. I have five.”

  “Without your direction, I’ll bet they’re lost. I’ve seen the Institute half bloods. They’re nothing like Stefan or me. Machines.”

  “Mine are not nearly as docile. They will come for me.”

  I smiled. “Soon, I hope.” If we could force them to act before the princes were ready, then perhaps we had an advantage. “Did I also mention the King of Hell is here?”

  “The king is dead,” he snarled.

  “Yeah, that’s not exactly true.”

  His throat worked as he swallowed. “Lies. The king died centuries ago. Our queen killed him.”

  “You know that thing about Akil the princes fear? A big secret, maybe a back-up plan?” I watched Val’s face betray shock, fear, then anger. Satisfaction warmed me. “Maybe you’d like to reconsider taking this world? Seems like a lot of effort for something you don’t even want, Val.”

  He tugged uselessly on the restraints around his wrists and whipped his head up, snarling at me. “This is not how it happens. I witnessed our victory in your flesh.”

  “Is that what you told Asmodeus? Our father? Is that why the princes persist? Because you’re so damn certain you’re right, that it’s a foregone conclusion? You saw the Mother of Destruction lay waste to this world for you?” I crouched down so I could meet him at eye level. “Hate to disappoint the family, brother-mine, but that ain’t gonna happen.”

  He drilled his gaze into me, as though scoring my soul. “I should have killed you before you drew your first breath, cut your throat the way I did your mother’s. I would have, had I not seen greatness in you. Had I kept what I saw to myself, I’d have killed you long ago. All these years, I have despised sharing father’s blood with you. He had the Prince of Greed watch over you after I sold you to the vilest elementals I could find. I had hoped your succession of owners would destroy you, but fate twisted you, shaped you, into the thing you are today. You will be destruction, sister. That is your destiny.” He jerked back and glared at Stefan. “And you, pretender-prince, will help her attain her true potential.” He smiled, and I didn’t like the look of it. “So tragic. Enjoy your final hours, Winter King.”

  Stefan was a blur. He shoved me aside, clutched Val by his leathers and practically lifted him off the floor, chair and all. “Tell me everything.” Val laughed, prompting Stefan’s power to flood into the room.

  “Let me touch your flesh, and I will tell you how you will die. I see you only through the eyes of others, but I have witnessed enough.”

  “Do I kill anyone?” Stefan’s voice fractured. Val’s gaze flicked to me. “Tell me!”

  “Stefan…” I moved into his field of vision. “You don’t want to know. It will drive you insane trying to second-guess yourself. Please…”

  He turned his frosty glare on me and then dropped Val. I expected him to pull back, but instead he gripped my brother around the throat and leaned into him. “Tell me.”

  Val’s eyes widened. He threw his head back and jerked in the chair. Oh, shit. My brother was witnessing Stefan’s future.

  “Stefan, goddamnit… Don’t. Please.”

  He skewered me with his gaze. “I have to know.”

  “No, you don’t. You can’t trust what he says, and I meant what I said. We’re human too. We control our own fates. Please, this is a mistake.”

  “I need to know if I kill you, Muse,” he hissed.

  Ryder shot Val in the chest. Stefan stumbled back and turned his demon-stare on Ryder, and before I could think about my actions, I was between the two of them yet again. At least this time, Stefan didn’t stab me.

  “Fuck, Muse, would you stop leaping in front of me?” Ryder growled, stepping around me.

  Stefan stole a few backward steps and bumped against the wall, where he steadied himself. He looked like he’d be okay for a few minutes, and his power was receding. I turned my attention to Val slumped in the chair, bleeding thr
ough his leathers. He’d live. Unfortunately. How much of Stefan’s future would he have seen? I faced Stefan and met his dejected gaze. I knew why he’d returned: to get the answer to that question. Would he kill me? He dropped his head back and cast his gaze upward, muttering something about fate under his breath.

  Ryder tucked his gun back in his pants. “Right, listen up. Gag Valenti. We need to get him somewhere secure. The gun range at my place will do. Fewer residents, just in case the half bloods show up and get frisky. Muse, find out about the King of Hell. If what you said is true, we need him now, and find out what Akil’s up to while you’re at it.”

  “I’ll call him.”

  “No, go see him. I don’t trust that slippery bastard. He needs someone watching him to make sure he’s not playing both sides.”

  “I’m going with her.” Stefan’s tone left no room for disagreement.

  Ryder nodded. “We have two hours until dark. If the half bloods come for Val, what the fuck are we going to do?”

  “Get P-C-Thirty-Four in them, and they’re as good as human. They won’t have been on this side of the veil before. They’ll be disoriented. If anything comes through your door, shoot first, ask questions later.”

  Ryder nodded and drew in a breath. “Muse, we could really use Dawn.”

  “Only Adam knows where they’re keeping her.”

  “I’ll see what Coleman knows. Maybe they have a fix on Adam’s location. You go to Akil. Call me every thirty minutes. We bring the fight to the demons at dusk.”

  Chapter Twenty Three

  After helping Ryder secure Val in the gun range, Stefan and I drove out of Boston, toward Salem. I’d called Akil. He was gathering his troops at Blackstone, his countryside retreat. I told him we were on our way. He seemed surprisingly calm, considering the company I was keeping, which probably meant he had a contingency plan should Stefan go all frosty on arrival.

  Each minute of the ride up passed with excruciating slowness. Tension sat in the car with us like a silent third person, a pissed off third person about the size of Jerry, who could snap at any moment. Silences gnawed on me at the best of times. This silence begged to be shattered—with a sledgehammer.

  Stefan barely moved. I listened to his soft breaths and even fancied I could hear the soft beat of his heart. With his face turned away, he appeared to be watching the scenery pass, but I wasn’t buying it. I glanced over a few times when I was sure he wouldn’t notice. When I’d first met him, he’d been a different man: easy going, with a lust for life that had shown on his luscious smile and intelligent eyes. He’d laughed easily back then. Now, he was cold, like his element. A part of me wanted to grab him and shake some sense into him. As the tension ratcheted up with every mile, I had to work to pace my breathing to stop it from giving my internal wrangling away. Here we were, so close, and we might as well have been half a state away from each other.

  “Fuck it.” I pulled the car onto the shoulder and twisted in my seat. “Just say it already.”

  He arched an eyebrow, “What?”

  “I don’t know. Whatever is in that head of yours. You wanna kill me? Then do it because this silence is driving me batshit crazy. What do you want, Stefan? To fight me? Take it all out on me? To kill me? Huh, is that why you came back? Or do you want to fuck me?” The filter I employed between my brain and mouth appeared to have completely malfunctioned, or the silence really had driven me crazy. Too late, I realized what I’d said and considered clamming up, and then I thought, screw it, might as well say it all. “Maybe both? Fuck me then kill me? You wanna try it on for size? Let’s have it out now because I don’t have patience to tiptoe around you anymore. Look—” I gestured at the window and the empty road ahead. “It’s a miracle. Nothing is trying to kill us. I have all my marbles, mostly. So c’mon, Frosty. Spit it out. There ain’t gonna be a better time to tell it as it is.”

  He unclipped his seatbelt, slowly turned in his seat, and leveraged an arm against the seatback to face me. I had a moment to go over what I’d just said, wondering if I should try to backpedal, and then he lifted his remarkably blue eyes and pitched his lips into a devilish grin. “I want to fight and fuck you. Part of that is my demon’s messed up ideas, but most of it is me. You wanna know crazy? Crazy is thinking I might have a hope in hell with you, and in the same breath, wanting to kill you. The demon in me sees you as a threat. After everything that’s happened between us, my sister—the veil, being trapped in the netherworld, your alliance with the Prince of Greed—you are my enemy.” The smile wavered, but he wasn’t going to stop. “Crazy is all kinds of messed up because I see you with Akil, and I know what you feel for him, I even understand it. But it hurts. It hurts enough that I know, somewhere in all this psychosis, I’m still human. All I had was this damned desire to rage at the world. But the second I saw you eating ice cream with Lacy, I could believe nothing had changed. I wanted everything to be fine.” The smile faded behind a sneer. “I came back to kill you. I told myself it was to stop the princes, but my demon has other ideas. It was simple. Everything was simple.” He pointed a finger. “You make it complicated.” He shrugged. “It’s crazy. I’m crazy. You make me crazy, Muse. You always have.”

  “Oh.”

  “Oh?” He unclipped his belt, which I might have been concerned about had I felt his power churning, but neither element stirred until he reached for the steering wheel, lunged across the seat, and kissed me hard on the lips. I clamped his face in my hands and yanked him close, opening my mouth to let him in while plundering his. Flutters of anxiety snatched my breath, and the heat of desire surged. I dropped a hand, hooked my arm around him, and yanked him close. His element lapped over me—pins and needles—against my skin. I palmed his cheek and forced him to look at me. His blue eyes sparkled like diamonds, the pupils as black as night. Power burned through him. His element simmered beneath my touch like an electrical current.

  “You know how wrong this is? How screwed up we both are?” he said, his voice a growl that did peculiar things to my innards. “Ice and fire? I should kill you.”

  “Mmm.” I shoved him back, climbed over the center console, and straddled his lap, pinning him to his seat. “Try it.” I silenced him with a sharp kiss, and he gave himself to me. His hand fisted in my hair, dragging me closer, possessive and demanding. There was no trace of the gentleness that drove me crazy. He owned me with that kiss. I broke away, gasping, body hot and mind a muddle. Reason told me to stop. The rest of me tossed away caution and trampled on it with glee.

  “Muse—”

  I planted a finger on his lips. “Shh, I know what you’re going to say.” It was a bad idea. We didn’t have time. He couldn’t control himself. He hated/loved/wanted to kill me. I couldn’t control myself. Ice and fire don’t mix. The sun was going down, and the half bloods would be here soon and the princes not far behind. Akil was waiting. Adam was missing. My brother was scheming. The netherworld was coming. Screw it all. I wanted him, and he wanted me. In that moment, that was all that mattered. It really was that simple if we allowed it to be. “Close your eyes.”

  He smiled behind my finger and obeyed. I leaned in to taste his lips. His sweet wintery taste tingled on the tip of my tongue. He opened for me, and I slanted my mouth over his, delighting in the way his hunger stoked mine. His hands slid down the curve of my back and spread over my hips. He held me tight, pulling me close. Would it be so bad if we just stopped thinking and felt, just for a little while? I thought. I didn’t care that he might, in one breath hate me, and in another, love me. It really didn’t matter.

  He tasted too good, like an indulgence I shouldn’t give in to. I trailed kisses down his jawline, his neck, and slid my hands up under his shirt. Hard chest muscles barely gave beneath my touch. Smooth, heated skin warmed my hands. I wanted to taste him there, to lick across his chest, swirl my tongue around his nipple, and rake my nails down the ripple of his abs. Sinking my hands over his shoulders, I shoved his coat off, yanking it down his arms. He t
ore himself free, slid his hands around my waist, and pulled me into another hungry, plundering kiss. Lust spritzed my skin with power. Stefan arched me back. His lips and tongue burned a devastating trail of tingling as he roamed lower. Hooking my fingers under my top, I yanked it over my head and gasped as he nipped at the rise of my breast.

  Threading my fingers through his hair, I forced his head back and stared into his dazzling eyes. His ragged breathing, indulgent lips, and hungry eyes speared heated desire through me. Ice dusted his cheek. I kissed it away. Then a ghost-like fractal slid across the skin of his neck. I swirled my tongue and lapped it up, feeling his pulse throb. I rolled my hips against him, and he snatched a sharp gasp and growled low and deep. The sound alone almost had my demon spilling through me. I shoved her back, rocked my hips again, and kissed him hard. He was all mine.

  My cell chirped.

  Stefan’s touch burned but not with pain. His hands skipped, his fingers kneaded, as though he sought to explore every inch of me. Too many clothes thwarted my attempts to feel him. I cracked my elbow against the door and tried to twist aside and clutch at his button fly. The gearshift dug into my thigh. “Dammit.”

  My cell chirped again.

  “Muse…” Stefan cradled my face in his hands. “You need to answer that.”

  “I really don’t.” I nipped at his bottom lip and sucked it between my teeth, freeing a frustrated groan from him. Damn, if I could make him growl, I wouldn’t need much more help to tip me over the edge into ecstasy. Grazing my nails over the entwined scorpion tattoo below his navel, I watched his eyes widen. His hips bucked. Oh yes, he was sensitive there.

  Another shrill ring from my cell.

  He gripped my hips and held me still, attempting to appear serious while a wicked, seductive smile danced on his lips. “The end of the world won’t wait for us.”

  “It would if it knew what we’ve been through.”

  He slid his hand around the small of my back, and drew me in close. I let him pull me down, already sensing his withdrawal from the moment. I’d soon change that. His painfully delicate kiss just about drove me to distraction. Any moment, I’d pin him down, rip his shirt off, and taste every delicious inch of him.