by Zoe Forward
Oh. My. God. He was real. And exactly as she’d envisioned him in every one of those fantasies and… as she’d seen him the other night. That alley encounter might have been real. Her mind instant replayed the highlight reel of her nighttime fantasies, shooting her core temperature from zero to full throttle.
Turn it off. That was the dream world. This is N-O-T. Her body declined to comply as a slow burn trekked from her breasts to between her legs. You’re not his type. All those angles and tats broadcasted hardcore alpha, a predator that likely buzzed S-M clubs for kicks.
You are a professional. Act like it. She focused on the clinical.
He didn’t have the steady rise-and-fall breaths of a happy unconscious. His chest heaved like he was running a six-minute mile. Massive bruising and numerous wounds covered every inch of visible skin on that hands-down amazingly muscular body, which was visible down to his…yeah, that duvet barely hid things below the V of sparse hair below his navel. Her imagination kicked into overdrive. Would he be the same down there in reality, as impressive, as large?
Focus, girl, she ordered herself.
Who or what tortured him?
Without touching him, she detected an elusive, yet potent evil churning beneath the surface.
“Who are you? You can’t be in here.”
Kira jumped, startled to realize she and Ashor were not alone.
A tall, striking blonde with shoulder length, salon-styled hair and cruel eyes sat in a chair next to Ashor. A bloody cloth dangled from her right hand and a bottle of peroxide in her left. The woman radiated lust mixed with a vague evil evocative of a Hashishin.
Instantly protective, Kira demanded, “Get away from him. Get out.” She fist-locked the woman’s arm and yanked her up. With an effective shove, she pushed her away from Ashor and out the door, slamming it at her back.
Kira crept back toward the bed, wondering how to proceed. Telepathy time.
Ashor, can you hear me? I’m here. What do I do?
She closed her eyes and listened.
Get this daemon out of me. Hurry.
I can’t deal with a daemon!
Wild panic hit. She backpedaled until the wall hugged her back. A daemon? As in, he was possessed by a mindless, sadistic fiend with one objective: kill humans? One swipe of a single dagger-sharp talon could decapitate, eviscerate, or perforate leading to death. Would it control Ashor’s body and try to kill her? Her mind ordered her to hightail it away from this room. This was way beyond her healing abilities. She wasn’t a warrior.
You can do this. It fights to control me, but doesn’t yet. His voice resonated with confidence, even if there was an edge of urgency.
She held her position with back firm against the wall, eyeing the bed. Waiting. No daemon jumped from Ashor’s body to attack her. Maybe this was a classic case of demon possession like in the movies.
Ashor, wouldn’t a holy person be better for this? Send it back to hell with holy water, prayer, and all that jazz.
That’s fictional crap.
So, I’m supposed to like pull it out or something?
Yes.
Right. Pull it out. This certainly wasn’t a topic covered in med school.
He thinks you can do something, she told herself on her trek back to the bed. She perched on the edge, careful to maintain a moderate cushion of air between their bodies as if that would protect her. How did one go about pulling out a daemon? Would it turn on her once she got it free of him?
Staring at him distracted her. Again. Men like this only existed as CGI-ed screen magic. What areas of his naturally tanned, bare skin she could see beneath the wounds appeared to be covered in stylized tattoos, like Eric. Those had not been in her dreams.
She recalled her first impression of this magnificent man as an insecure eighteen-year-old all those years ago. His innate power and refusal to surrender despite weeks of torture awed her.
Without a doubt, he was dying. The healer in her needed to alleviate his pain and resolve the physical injuries she sensed inside and out. Instinctively, she knew that wouldn’t cut it. With a flagging sense of self-preservation, she recognized the world needed this guy, not as a man, but as a magus. And it was up to her to keep him in it.
She lifted a tentative finger to trace the blue tattoo overlying a thin scar beneath his left eye that extended down over his cheekbone. The mark didn’t mar, but made his face more fascinating.
I’m going to try. Please, hold on just a little longer.
Laying her hand flat over the stylized triangular symbol on his chest, she allowed her energy to flow into his body. An evil entity was everywhere. Initially it shifted away from her. Then, it lashed out. The impression of decay permeated her senses. Hundreds of snake fangs pierced her arms. With a scream she jumped away.
She swiped her arms for several seconds before realizing there was no injury or lasting pain. All illusion.
Ashor’s face had gone vampire pasty. His chest barely moved. His breathing stopped. Oh God. In her mind she yelled, Don’t die.
Before her mind could dwell on the snakes and the fact she was going after a daemon, she leaned in for a second go. This time, she successfully reached beyond the decay to grip it. A stinging, cold pain infused every molecule in her body. Muscles from her neck to her toes cramped simultaneously as if squeezed and twisted. She whimpered as her body bowed against the pain. Determined not give into the evil’s threat, she envisioned yanking it free of Ashor’s body. Reluctantly, it let go.
What was she supposed to do with the swirling evil red mist between her hands? Panic swelled.
Now what, Ashor? Are you still with me?
His voice rumbled faintly in her mind. Command it to leave the Human Realm.
The bedroom door flew open and crashed violently against the wall. She glimpsed Ethan and Eric in her peripheral. Thank God. They could back her up, if she failed. A scream detonated from her when a leering face formed in the mist. She flung the mist away from her and yelled, “Leave this realm and don’t return!”
The mist exploded in a display of dazzling red light against the bedroom wall, releasing a massive energy surge. The blast shook the walls and threw both magi backward into the hallway. She gripped the sheets against the energy’s backward momentum, barely holding herself on the bed.
Instinctively she knew all the guys would be okay, and gave in to the descending blackness.
Chapter Eight
Ashor glanced around his bedroom, mometarily disoriented. Holy shit, she did it.
Each breath forced complaining muscles to move. The feeling wasn’t new. He spent most of his life in a state of pulverized crap. The difference was at the moment his lifeblood wasn’t leaching out of one too many holes some sadistic daemon had torn in his hide.
“What the hell?” Ethan announced as he entered, scimitar drawn, with Eric hot on his heels. Ethan reached out cautiously as if to move Kira who lay half on and half off the bed.
“Don’t touch her.” Ashor ordered. He glared at Ethan and growled, “Get out. Both of you.”
Ethan exchanged a shocked glance with Eric before swiftly evac-ing.
Ashor glanced at the woman who had just saved him from a meet-and-greet with the gods in their realm. She lay on her stomach beside him, but was too still. Had she killed herself in her attempt to help him?
Not happening.
“Kira, don’t you dare die on me now.” He pulled her on top of him and shook her.
Nothing.
Seconds later he released his pent-up breath as he felt her chest move. Not dead. Just unconscious. She wasn’t allowed to die. Not for him.
Her warm, soft body on his…skin-to-skin prevented by no more than microns of the soft fabric she wore. The realization hit him with a jolt. Her position allowed a full view of the tops of those spectacular, compressed, pale orbs. His smoldering, back-burner desire flared into something brutal and relentless.
He took in the familiar flare of her hips, which he’d appreciated at l
east a hundred times in those dreams. Fantasies that tempted, but never fulfilled. Visions that seemed to be replays of previous lives. If not, then the two of them certainly got their kicks from historical costumes.
With a single finger, he pushed a drifting ebony curl off her face. From that point of contact, every cell in his body electrified. He groaned aloud. His nostrils flared, and he leaned in to inhale her scent along the slender line of her neck. A rich scent evocative of spring rain filled his nose, resurrecting memories from a short period of time when he’d been a happy, innocent child in Greece. That was a few years before his stepfather started drinking and making his life hell. Memories crashed in from a time when he had protected his younger half-brother and took the brunt of those thrashings.
He hadn’t thought of his half-brother in decades. Back then he’d realized too late that the guy was as shallow as an ashtray. The two-faced bastard gutted him and left him for dead in a jealous fit over a girl—one his brother had no more plans for than a one-time screw. He, himself, had barely even noticed the woman, but apparently she had taken an interest in him. The akhrian had appeared, and the evils of the world became his occupation.
Kira made a small noise like a sigh and shifted, but didn’t wake. Her soft exhalations tickled his chest.
He smiled and his chest clamped up tight with a foreign emotion close to…happiness? He hadn’t felt anything similar in so long that the sensation was almost painful. As he scanned her beautiful face with that luminescent skin, something powerful and possessive flared to life deep within.
Her arm fell onto his painfully aroused body. The kem-seki in his mind shifted to the fore. It tempted, pushing his desire to a point of excruciating agony. With careful, deliberate movements, he put her away from him onto the far side of his bed. He would not lose control with her. Ever.
He disregarded the arousal and the deep desire to possess and protect. Their connection was mind blowing. He’d had a hunch before, but connecting with her mind had been like gripping pure, hard-hitting energy. The daemon feared it. Sensing that, he’d refused to let go of the link.
Then there was the fact she’d just single-handedly exorcised and destroyed the daemon. That ranked pretty high on the mind-blowing scale. He’d seen a few akhrians exorcise, but none had the guts to destroy it alone. It was possible none of the previous could or they were just too pansy-ass to give it a go. They had relied on magi for the daemon execution duty. Her skill was remarkable. But then, it always had been.
****
Eleven years ago…
Pitch dark welcomed him as he emerged from unconsciousness. He thrashed against restraints that secured him to a rigid metal table. The struggle was more for pride than effect. All he accomplished was to launch a hammering headache into a full-on mental spin. The spinning would stop. And obviously he wasn’t going anywhere.
Damned Hashishin toxins. They’d been shoving foul potions down his throat and forcing viper bites on him for over a week, experimenting, until they finally discovered a mixture that worked, even if only marginally. The brew tasted like briny seafood and made him react like someone put his life on slow-mo.
Sensing a presence at the door of his prison, he speculated it signaled the start of a new session. How long had he been out? Long enough for the Carver to return? The sadistic prick had sliced him up enough today to be a tennis net. He didn’t really want answers for the Order like he professed. He enjoyed his work too much. There was so much blood on the Carver when he finished that the black serpent tattoo around his fat neck had been barely visible. They were keeping him weak so that he couldn’t heal. He wouldn’t survive another round this soon. And what a relief to finally greet death.
The door dragged loudly against the concrete floor.
A girl’s barely audible voice whispered into his darkness, “You are real. Good. I’m not crazy.”
A girl? He’d never met a female Hashishin. She gave off no malevolent vibes, but then his senses were so dulled from an OD of toxin that he didn’t trust his instincts at the moment. To get a better look, he twisted his body toward the voice. He ignored the burn that indicated he’d reopened too many of today’s lacerations. Blasts of pain shot through him when his still-healing shattered ankles strained against the metal clasps, reminding him of yesterday’s torture. He squinted protesting retinas against the beam of her flashlight and spit matted, black hair from his eyes.
A petite, willowy teenager stood in the dimly lit doorway. She was breathtaking in a budding beauty way. Something shifted in his gut, igniting an unfamiliar possessive instinct.
She whispered, “You’ve got to get out of here.”
With a hiss, his breath released. He hadn’t spoken in weeks, unwilling to give his tormentors the satisfaction of vocalizing a single cry. Without breaking his stare, he whispered in a hoarse voice, “Can’t walk. Impossible to get free.”
“I can help you, but we’ve got to hurry.”
What miracle did she hide beneath the baggy T-shirt and jeans? Beyond that, why would she offer to help him? Warning bells screeched in his mind. New bullshit. Another trap bound to lead to hours of humiliation and pain.
He watched her creep close and even though he didn’t trust her, he recognized this took guts. When her flashlight illuminated her face, her striking eyes distracted his fatigued mind. Each iris had a center of pale green ringed with blue. Long dark eyelashes curled against skin so pale and flawless it practically glowed.
She halted less than an arm’s length from him staring in obvious uncertainty. His gaze followed hers to his grossly swollen right hand, which had been bitten over twenty times by various venomous snakes today. It tremored from pain. Infuriated by its betrayal, he willed it to stop.
Angrily, he glared, daring her to comment on his weakness. Her eyes lost their fear when they connected with his. Yet there was no pity in their depths. They reflected the wisdom of an empathy that confused him.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
“I’m not one of them. I won’t hurt you. You’ll have to trust me.” As she bent toward him, unruly black curls tickled his skin and hid her face from view.
The second her hand touched his bare arm a wave of foreign energy punched through him. His body arched off the table and then relaxed as warmth suffused him. All pain vanished. He felt the insignia at the center of his chest heat.
Whoa. This beautiful creature was healing him?
Way earlier than he wanted, the soothing sensation vanished. She unlatched the metal restraints around his arms, legs, and neck.
In a quick flash, Ashor grabbed her hands. When he rolled over her right arm, his mind stalled. A triangle mark identical to the one on his chest glowed on the smooth skin of her wrist. The sigil disappeared within seconds. Not possible.
Maybe all the Hashishin poison of the past few weeks had fried his brain. Or he was so weak from blood loss that he hallucinated that little light show on her wrist. How could this girl have the mark of the akhrian? She had talent. No doubt. But a girl? That he’d never heard of.
He released her wrist.
“Feel any better?” she asked, stepping away from him.
He nodded. The perpetual pain he’d felt for weeks was diminished. The newest injuries were improved, but not entirely healed. As he stood, the dizziness was back. He staggered to a lean against the metal table and cradled his head in a hand.
“I’m sorry I’m not good enough to fix all of you.”
“You’ve helped.” His grateful gaze met her uncertain smile.
“Hurry.” She clasped his hand and tugged in the direction of the door, forgetting the not-entirely-healed viper strikes.
He yanked the damaged hand out of her grasp with a hiss and bit his lip against pain that almost dropped him to his knees. Blood flooded his mouth.
“Oh, God. I’m so sorry.”
“I’ll be fine,” he gritted out. “Let’s get out of here.”
She led in the direction away from the stair
s, the way he assumed to be the exit. His feet rooted and he turned toward the stairs.
She whispered, “No stairs. There’s a tunnel. It stinks, but it’ll get us out.”
His weakness after weeks of blood loss made their progress slow. For over twenty minutes, she led in silence through a damp tunnel lit only by her flashlight. With less than fifteen feet to the tunnel’s exit, Ashor stumbled past her toward the light of dawn that represented a freedom he thought he’d never see again.
“Stop! It’s not safe yet.” She grabbed his arm and crouched, indicating for him to follow. The click of the flashlight echoed in the tunnel.
As he squatted beside her, he asked, “What’s your name?”
“Kira.”
“Why are you helping me?”
She held a forefinger to her lips and whispered, “Snake.”
A viper slithered past the tunnel’s entrance. The creature was as thick as a fire hose. His entire body tensed as he readied for attack. Slowly, it glided onward. He relaxed.
She pointed at the exit. “Now it’s safe. This is a drainage tunnel. You’ll see a wooded area to the right as you leave. I saw a man with a mark like yours hanging around there.” She placed a fingertip lightly on the center of his bare, bloody chest.
He stared at the delicate, pale finger in wonder as his skin tingled at the contact. “Come with me,” he requested, not entirely certain where that had come from and why he felt she belonged with him. Probably the whole akhrian-mark delirium thing.
“I can’t.”
“They won’t be nice, if they discover what you’ve done.” He closed her small hand in his much larger one.
“They won’t find out it was me.” She pulled her hand from his and pushed on his muscular thigh. “Please, go.”
His jaw loosened, but he stopped its drop to fly-catching position. The moment she’d touched his leg, the question she hadn’t vocalized resonated clearly in his mind. She wanted to know his name. Mind reading was not in his bag of tricks. Telepathy was only possible with his fated woman. Was the God of destiny, Shai, teasing him?
