by Misty Evans
I still care…
I opened my mouth to tell Rad I loved him, but the words died in my throat as he slammed into me over and over. Pain and pleasure mixed together as he worked me across the floor.
Listen to my music
Listen to its heart
Listen to the whisper
Hiding in the dark
Finally, he groaned deep in his chest and we both came in a searing tidal wave of carnality and decadence. He locked his golden eyes with mine and I saw heaven reflected inside them.
Chapter Fourteen
In the aftermath, we lay boneless, entangled in each other and remnants of Rad’s chaotic inspiration. The song coming from the speakers ended and the wind stopped, papers fluttering down on us like confetti.
Cole, rubbing sleep from his eyes, strolled in, stopped and planted his eyes on the ceiling. “You two are worse than rabbits on Red Bull.”
“Sorry we woke you,” I said, not feeling one bit sorry. My nerve endings danced and hummed a sweet melody, the words of Rad’s love song playing over and over in my head. Rad’s emotions ebbed and flowed around me and I might have floated away on them if his solid body hadn’t been anchoring me to the floor.
Cole turned on his heel, and as he left, scratched the back of his head with the end of his gun. “Thought we were having a freakin’ earthquake the way the castle was shaking.”
Rad’s stomach jiggled against mine, a laugh starting low and spreading to both of us. It felt good to laugh amidst all the shit coming down. Good to just lay there in his arms.
He trailed his fingers across one of my cheeks, the defiance gone from his eyes. His nostrils flared and his pupils dilated. I knew what was coming before he said it. I could see the craving in the golden orbs. Feel the hunger building inside him. “I can smell your blood.”
What was it like to be consumed with such a ravenous appetite? To know your life depended on the blood of another? I tried to imagine it, but it went against every cell in my body. After breaking free from Maria’s hold on me at seventeen, I vowed never to let anyone, supernatural or human, have that kind of influence over me again. “No feeding.”
Rad lowered his hand, grabbed my wrist and brought it to his lips. He kissed the healing cut from the previous night’s feeding where I’d slashed my wrist for him. Kissed the older scars that were nothing but silvery lines on my skin. A shiver ran down my spine.
“What’s this about you dying?” he murmured against my wrist. His lips pressed their way to the palm of my hand. “Is that why your blood smells different?”
So he noticed too. “Cole said my iron is low and that’s what’s causing me to smell off. Dru thinks it’s some type of withdrawal from Nudra’s blood. I’ve gone nearly six weeks since Nudra injected me and my body’s having a weird reaction. We don’t really know what’s going on, only that it’s screwing up my system.”
“Screwing it up enough to kill you?”
“That’s one of the theories.”
Rad frowned, shifted off me and helped me stand. My legs shook, but I still felt light and satisfied. Without a word, he walked me upstairs to my bathroom and drew me into the shower.
We stood together under the rainfall shower head, sharing the soap and enjoying a few minutes of tenderness. A rarity in our relationship. Rad asked questions about my blood disorder. I answered as best I could.
Once done with the shower, the boneless feeling from earlier clung to my limbs and I closed my eyes as Rad skillfully dried me with a soft, fluffy blue towel. He turned the towel on himself, buffing his skin with it. “What does Cole think of Dru’s offer?”
Rad and Cole were usually at each other’s throats, but seemed to respect each other nonetheless. “That he’s only making it to force me into having sex with him.”
“Hunh.”
“That’s it? Hunh? The idea of me being a vamp’s sex slave doesn’t bother you?”
He dried his hair with the towel, tossed it on the floor. “It would bother me if I thought you’d accept the offer.”
“I may have to in order to save you and Arman.”
His hair stuck out in disarray. He headed for my walk-in closet. I followed, admiring his fit body, but my attention kept landing on the Noctifector tattoo between his shoulder blades. The peace filling my chest for the past hour dissolved in a rush as if the elaborate knife embedded in Rad’s skin had come to life and cut it out of me. “Becoming Dru’s blood slave won’t save any of us.”
Did he know something about demon and vampire blood the rest of us didn’t? “Why is that?”
He dug through a black nylon duffel bag on the floor and drew out a pair of wrecked designer jeans, tugging them over his legs. Zipping the fly, he looked at me from under his bangs. “The minute he touches you, I’ll kill him.” He set his hands on his waist. “And then we’re back to square one, needing a new blood donor.”
Alrighty, then. I sauntered over, stood on my toes and wrapped my arms around his neck. “Jealousy is a sin.”
Rad grabbed me by the waist and jerked me closer. My breasts smashed into his chest, my toes skimming the floor. “If I was Dru, I’d make the same offer and then do whatever it took to make you mine. This reeks of a trap, Kali. I’d lay my life on the line to keep you from dying, but I won’t share you with a vampire. There has to be another way.”
I teased his lips with mine. “Damon taught me years ago that there’s always more than one solution to any problem. I just have to figure out an alternative.”
“When you have those stomach pains, is it only when Dru’s around?”
“Yes.” Come to think of it, that was weird too. “There were vamps at the club last night before Dru got there and I didn’t have any reaction to them or Maddy when I was with her after we left the club.”
“There you go. Maybe it’s not a vampire thing as much as a Dru thing. He’s trying to manipulate you.”
The thought left me queasy. I disentangled from Rad, paced away. “But why? Why go to all this trouble to force me into being his blood slave. He can have any female he wants, supe or human. What’s the big deal about me?”
Rad’s gaze did a slow perusal of my body, mouth quirking to one side. “You’re unique. The Nocts know it. Damon knows it. Dru knows it. Hell, even Queen Maria knew it all those years ago.”
Maria. I’d almost succeeded in putting her out of my mind. “She’s back. I think.”
The smirk disappeared. “Back? How? You killed her.”
“I did.” Locating a bra and underwear, I put them on, then dressed in black jeans and a black long-sleeved T-shirt while Rad gave me a perplexed stare. “She’s back as a ghost. At first, I wasn’t sure if it was well and truly her. I mean, I killed her in the old way, marking her body before destroying it, making sure her spirit was locked away and there was no one in the vicinity for it to escape into. It doesn’t make sense.” I shook my head. “But after this morning, there’s no doubt in my mind, she’s back.”
He located a T-shirt in his duffel, jerked it on. “What happened this morning?”
We walked out of the closet and into my bedroom. “Cole and I were in the parking lot at the Institute. Dru was there with his bodyguard and we were talking. All of a sudden, the air got thick and this ghost appeared in front of me. She spoke my name and brought my demon to life. It was Maria, Rad. The only thing that makes me doubt my sureness about that fact is that she sparkled.”
He lifted both brows under his bangs.
“I know. Weird. Glowed is maybe a better term for it. I’ve only seen that type of glow one other time. When we went to see Lucifer.”
“Angel light?”
I nodded. “Remember that soft light his body emanated?”
Rad suddenly avoided my eyes, brushing past me to look out the clear floor-to-ceiling window. The snow from that morning had stopped, and the fresh fallen snow in the cemetery below had already taken on a gray cast. “Kali, I need to tell you something.”
My stomach did a hop and a skip.
“Conversations that start with those words never end well for me.”
My attempt at humor fell flat. He hooked his thumbs in his pockets, stared with unseeing eyes at the gray and white world below. “When we, you know, screw around? You glow when you…” He glanced across the room at me. “When you...you know.”
“Yeah, right,” I scoffed, but his face was serious.
Too serious.
The floor seemed to fall out from under my feet. I sat down hard on the pile of blankets, crumpling papers with my ass. “Are you sure?”
He strolled over and dropped onto his knees in front of me. Took my hands in his. “You glow, Kali. When you climax. Even when we were kids back in Maria’s court. The first time we did it and you lit up like that, you scared the shit out of me, but it was more beautiful than anything I’d ever seen. I’ve never seen anything like it since.”
“Except with Lucifer.”
His hands were warm and firm and holding me steady. “Remember what Lucifer said? About you and your origin?”
A crossbreed of good and evil. How could I forget?
Rad squeezed my hands. “In Nudra’s coffin. Remember the light show?”
“But that would mean…”
Rad waited for me to finish. I couldn’t. He did it for me. “You and Maria are both original vices.”
Chapter Fifteen
I scrambled out of the room, went downstairs and ran into Cole. He said something to me, but I didn’t hear the words. My mind swam in muck and fight mode had descended. I needed to hit something. To work out the frustration and good old fashioned rage eating away at me.
My home gym was equipped with lots of steel and mirrors. I hardly ever used it, preferring my workouts to include a fighting partner and finding one always available at the Institute.
Now, I needed that same kind of workout, but my options for partners were two men who’d do nothing but question me rather than go fisticuffs.
I didn’t even take time to wrap my hands, I just busted loose on Bob, my life-like punching bag bolted to the basement floor. He was made of a heavy polystyrene substance that felt like a muscled human when punching him and no matter how much abuse I gave him, he kept on smiling.
In Nudra’s coffin, the first time Rad had tasted my blood after I’d been infected, we’d created a light show that made the coffin glow. The first few times after that, when we fucked, sparks flew. I thought it was all part of our connection because of the blood.
I was wrong.
During our first light show in the coffin, I’d thought I glimpsed heaven. Crazy, right? Heaven is a pipe dream for demons and one I wouldn’t waste time on anyway. If you’re not sinning, you’re not having fun. In fact, being evil at my core, the one place that would truly be hell for me is a place with nothing but goodness in it.
But oh, the seduction of that light. The seduction of heaven still existed, whether I admitted it or not. And if there was one thing I would never let Maria take from me was Rad and that connection.
I fired off punches, kicks and full-body slams. Sweat poured down my back, made my hair hang in strands in front of my eyes. I yelled and grunted and pounded until my body begged, non piú.
I ignored the begging and continued to attack Bob. Poor guy. My knuckles left bloody prints on his chin, my kicks busted off chunks of his body and sent his stuffing flying. The demon inside me roared her pleasure and grabbed his head, ripping it off.
It was at that point when two sets of strong hands grabbed me from behind, hauled me across the room and pinned me against the padded wall. I fought, but Cole and Rad together created a formidable demon wall. Once or twice I broke free from their grasps and got a punch in, but my strength left as fast it as it had come. After one last bout of yelling, I yielded to their restraints and sank to the floor.
“Feel better?” Cole glanced over his shoulder at Bob, or rather, at what was left of my life-size punching bag, and hooked a thumb in his direction. “How come he gets to have all the fun?”
“Because you’re too much of a wimp.”
He smiled, gave Rad a wink. “You hungry?”
“Starved.” And I was. My stomach was as empty as my now spent body.
Cole patted my cheek, motioned for Rad to help him lift me up. “That’s my sweet demon.”
Though exhausted, I had enough adrenaline flowing in my system to shove away their attempts to assist me upstairs. I made it just fine on my own. The last thing I heard before I climbed the stairs to my loft was Cole calling Outback Steakhouse with an order.
I showered again, going through the motions. Same with getting dressed. I bandaged my knuckles, then tore off the tape. Pain was good. Kept me angry.
I sunk into the blankets on my bedroom floor. The pillow smelled like Rad. I buried my nose in it and went to sleep.
Sometime later, I woke to Cole nudging me. The room was shadowed and I could smell grilled steak and greasy fries. My stomach growled.
He handed me my cellphone. “It’s Maddy.”
“Yeah,” I said into the phone. “What’s up?”
Her voice was almost normal. A little snarky, but no more than usual. “What’s up? That’s my line. You bailed on me and Arman last night, so what’s up for tonight? Are we sniffing out the witch or what?”
She knew I hadn’t purposely bailed on her, that I’d been out of commission. I flexed my left hand, saw the knuckles had healed. My body felt stronger after the nap, but my attitude was still a bit prickly. I wanted to say, Gee, Madison. A simple, ‘Hello, Kali. How are you feeling?’ would be nice since I was cold-cocked last night, discovered I’m dying from a sick twist on blood poisoning and realized the entity who turned me into a walking torture machine at your age has come back for round two. And oh, by the way? She’s also one of the seven deadly sins just like me!
What I said instead was, “I’ll meet you at the occult shop at seven.”
I was too pissy to wait for her reply and hung up. For once, I wanted a friend to talk to. A girlfriend who’s shoulder I could cry on.
Wimp. Facing down demons and evil supernatural creatures went with the territory of being the Bridge Council’s enforcer and a vengeance demon for hire. I’d been doing it for years. Thick skin? Mine was refined steel. Rarely did anything in my line of work get to me.
But tonight, I was blown out. Tired of tackling one shitty situation after another.
Cole watched me with his intense warrior stare. Reached out, helped me up. “She freaked when I told her something at the psycho hospital got the jump on you last night. Shook her up but good.”
“Yeah, I could tell she was real worried about me.”
“She puts on a decent tough girl act.” He grinned. “Like someone else I know.”
I brushed imaginary dust off my pants. “It’s not an act. Not for me. It’s real.”
“Maddy knew if she asked how you were, you’d say fine. That’s what you always say.”
It still stung she hadn’t asked. I wondered when I’d turned into such an emotional needy demon. “I’m going to tackle Dalinda first, then Vicky and Toel.”
“What about the blood problem?”
“What about it?”
“And Maria?”
I had another snarky comeback on the end of my tongue. Instead I told the truth. “I need to tackle a couple of things I can control right now, Cole. Then I’ll figure out what I’m doing about my blood and about Maria.”
Cole understood my need to control something. He also understood what I was facing with Dalinda and Toel. “You can take the succubus, but you’re too weak to face Toel on your own.”
“That’s why I have you,” I said, walking out of the room and ignoring the mess inside my head. “Where’s my steak? You didn’t eat it, did you?”
In the kitchen, he reheated a plate full of steak and fries for me. Standing at the sink, I stared out the kitchen window at the cemetery and cut the rare steak into pieces and inhaled them. Plenty of ghosts out there in the graveya
rd. Usually they hid from me, not wanting me to send their spirit asses to some other plane.
I didn’t bother them and they didn’t bother me, but now I wondered if they could help with Maria. The internet was loaded with information about ghosts, but all of it was from humans. I needed real information from a direct source.
The French fries were limp and greasy. I ate them anyway. About halfway through the pile, Rad wandered in, snatched a fry from my plate. “Got you something.”
He held out a long, skinny package, wrapped in fancy silver and blue paper with an enormous bow on top.
Another early Christmas present. Oh, joy. “What is it?”
“Open it.”
Wiping my greasy fingers on a towel, I accepted the package with a sigh. It was surprisingly heavy and weighted on one end. As I tore off the paper and opened the box underneath, I caught site of black metal. A flashlight?
My annoyance at receiving a Christmas present lifted. At least it was something functional.
“No way,” I said as I slid the sleek tube out of its packaging. “Is this what I think it is?”
When Nudra had me kidnapped, his Mercenary demons had used a stun baton on me that packed enough electrified silver current to take out every supernatural in downtown Chicago. After I’d staked Nudra and become owner of all his assets and estate, I’d searched high and low for one of those batons. Nudra had amassed enough weapons to fill the Department of Defense, from antique swords to modern day surface-to-air missiles, but nowhere in his immense collection did he have a baton like that.
Rad nodded, smiling from ear to ear. “Merry Christmas.”
I played with the on/off switch, tuned into the low-pitched buzz of the baton warming up and grinned at Rad. “Where did you get this?”
One shoulder rose and fell. “Buddy of mine hooked me up with a supplier. There’s only a dozen or so of these in circulation, but he tracked this one down. Got me a deal.”
I looked at Rad, then at Cole, stroking the smooth, cool metal. “Who wants to go first?”
They both jumped back, hands in the air. I made a pouty face. “Come on, I gotta try it out on someone.”
