When Owen’s face appeared in the doorway, I was actually disappointed, which I knew was ridiculous. Regardless, I was equally glad to have Jaxon back with us. He was holding up a set of keys and grinning widely, which surprised me, but I wasted no time rushing for him.
When I got within reaching distance, he tensed, almost seeming afraid of me, but I ignored it and launched myself at him, wrapping my legs around his waist. “Did anyone see you?” I asked as I squeezed around his neck.
Warm hands pressed against my back. “Uh, I don’t think so.”
“Good.” I leaned in, considering giving him a kiss, but decided to wait until Nixie turned him back to his normal sexy self.
Owen might be attractive, but he wasn’t Jaxon, and I couldn’t kiss that face even if it was my man under the skin.
“What the fuck, Cara?” Jaxon’s voice snarled from the doorway, and my heart stopped.
Moving my gaze from the Owen I was currently wrapped around to the one in the door, I realized I’d made an epic mistake. Prying myself off of the real Owen, I felt my face turn beet red. “Jaxon, that wasn’t what it looked like.”
“Then what the hell was it?”
“I thought… You looked like… He had the… Shit.” I gave up trying to explain and instead flung myself at the appropriate not-Owen in hopes of easing the raging beast within him that I could see swirling behind his eyes. Though, I wasn’t going to apologize, because I’d done nothing wrong.
But I had no problem trying to appease Jaxon to a certain extent, so we could all get out of the prison together. It wasn’t Owen’s fault that Jaxon had stolen his identity.
After a solid minute of holding on to Jaxon, he finally relaxed underneath my touch. “I have the keys, but it looks like you don’t need them.”
“Anyone care to fill me in on what the hell is going on?” Owen demanded.
Blake pulled him aside and did just that as Owen began removing the magic blockers from him.
Glancing up at Jaxon, I reached for his hand. “We definitely need that key as well. Get me out of these things.”
“You got it, Flower. So long as I never see you pressed against another man like that again.”
“Scout’s honor. Unless I’m trying to kick someone’s ass, then I make no promises of what kind of position I might find myself in.”
His head shook. “You’re insufferable.”
“But you like me anyway.” I smirked.
He grunted, but I saw the twinkle in his eyes as he finished getting the bands off of me. He definitely liked me.
“Nixie, can you change me back?” he asked.
She huffed. “So there can be two of you instead of two of the furball? That’s a hard pass. Especially because I can’t change myself without potentially losing access to my power for a day or two. I need to conserve.”
Jaxon’s chest began to rumble, and I was glad that even though he didn’t look the same, he at least sounded the same which should have been the first clue earlier that the first Owen wasn’t my Jaxon. Oh well, hindsight and all.
Placing a hand on his chest, I tried to placate him. “Easy, boy. I promise a full night of just us if you leave my fairy friend unscathed. You know this would wipe her clean. We just have to deal with it for now.”
Mason, Blake, and Spencer were all free of their cuffs as well by the time we finished sorting appearances out. Owen still seemed confused as hell, but he had a plan, and I was ready to hear it.
“So, I actually came to tell you the warden is gone,” Owen said casually.
“Where the hell did he go?” Jaxon snapped.
“Apparently, he pissed off your friend Greggor and had some damage control to do. I don’t think he’ll be gone long, but he took Alex and a few others and said they’d be back tomorrow. I was specifically told to go back to my cell, but I don’t like being told what to do by idiots.” Owen shrugged.
“Are you telling us that all of the people who want to torture and kill us are not even on the prison grounds right now?” I asked.
“Yep.”
I glanced around at the others. “Why are we still standing here? Let’s get out of here and prepare for our own attack.”
Spencer shook his head. “We can’t leave. If we don’t end this now and they know we’re coming, it will be all that much harder. We need to wait until they come back and hit them as soon as they walk through the door.”
Mason grinned. “I’m in. It’s about damn time we showed the warden we are done being his puppets.”
Blake nodded in agreement, but it was Jaxon who I observed longest. It was hard to tell what he was thinking since he was wearing Owen’s face, but I knew something wasn’t okay with him.
“When are they supposed to be back?” he asked.
“Not sure, but if they’re going against Greggor, I doubt it will be soon. Probably later tonight or the following morning,” Owen replied, and I realized I had no idea what time or even day it was at that point.
We’d been at the vampire compound after midnight, but a lot had happened since then and it was apparently a new day already.
“I’d offer to track them, but again, if I change back, I’ll be useless. Instead, we can set up watch teams a couple miles out, so we have a small heads up when they arrive back,” Nixie said.
Mason nudged her. “I’ll take the first watch with Nixie. Spencer and Blake can take second watch, then the two of you can take a third if it goes that long.”
Owen grunted. “What am I supposed to do?”
Mason didn’t respond, and I wondered if this was when the fight would break out. The guys all despised Owen. Did it matter that the shifter had tried to help us? Probably not. He still had secrets, and that didn’t do a damn thing for us.
Finally, Jaxon stepped forward. “You can do whatever you want. I won’t stop you from trying to help, but I won’t put my life, or any of the other lives in this room, into your hands. We still don’t know you or your reasons for wanting to end Warden Gillian, which means we don’t trust you.”
Owen eyed him. “Fair enough. I’ll see you guys around then.” And just like that, he walked away.
Giving the lion a bit of a head start, we split into two groups and left sublevel two. After climbing the stairs a couple of floors, we exited out of a door just beyond the warden’s and relaxed a little when nobody was in the hallway.
“We’re going to head out on foot a couple of miles. Keep your phones on and we’ll call if or when we see anything,” Mason said.
Blake nodded toward Spencer. “Instead of going back to our room, why don’t we take care of that thing we were talking about earlier?”
Spencer’s eyes creased in confusion. “What thing?”
Mason and Nixie laughed on their way out the door, while the rest of us were confused. “You know, the thing,” Blake urged.
Oh, gods. I knew what he was doing.
I opened my mouth to stop him, but Spencer finally got it. “Oh, yeah. The thing. Probably a great idea. Let’s go.”
Without another word, they made themselves scarce while I stood in the empty hallway with Jaxon. While that was nice of them, it didn’t matter. I wasn’t touching Jaxon with Owen’s face. It was wrong on too many levels.
Then, the back door swung open and Nixie, still appearing as Jaxon, came running back in. “This might be helpful.” She flung a handful of fairy dust on Jaxon, then snapped her fingers three times before blowing in his face.
Slowly, his normal features came into view, and I let out a sigh of relief.
“What the hell was all of that about?” Jaxon asked as Nixie disappeared.
Grinning, I tugged on his hand. “Come on and I’ll show you.”
He’d hardly touched me since our moment in the bathroom, and I was already trembling in anticipation as I pulled him along to the lair. The others had given us this time alone, time that was probably better spent strategizing or sleeping, but I didn’t care.
After entering the lair
, I pushed Jaxon toward his room and clarity finally appeared on his face as I started to unbuckle the top of my outfit.
His hands grabbed my wrists, stopping me about halfway down. “We shouldn’t be doing this right now.”
“I don’t like living with regrets, Jaxon. The warden has upped his game. We have no promises of tomorrow. Do you really want to wait?”
As my words registered with him, I saw the exact moment he realized I was right. We’d had our ups and downs, but I wasn’t willing to go into a fight with the warden, who had a keen liking to dark magic, without knowing I’d had all of Jaxon.
“I wanted days with you for the first time, but I’ll take hours if that’s all we have.” His hold on me tightened, and he kicked his bedroom door closed. I wasn’t sure his room was going to survive the storm I could see simmering beneath the surface of Jaxon’s eyes, but I was ready for it to be unleashed, regardless.
His fingers loosened from my wrists and moved to my shoulders before slamming me against the door. An audible crack sounded, but neither of us seemed to care. Nixie could fix it all later. Hell, hopefully it wouldn’t matter what damage we left behind, and this would be the last time we were in the lair.
Teeth scraped across my neck as one of Jaxon’s hands tangled in my already tousled hair and the other took over undoing the buckles of my top. Once it was as far as it would go, he used both hands to yank the material away from my shoulders, hard enough that the creation ripped in several places before falling to the floor, leaving me in only the pants, boots, and a lacy black bra I hadn’t realized I’d been wearing, thanks to Nixie’s magic.
“The rest of this has to go. Right now,” Jaxon growled in frustration against my ear.
Agreeing with him, I pushed back against his muscled frame before working the rest of the outfit off of my body. My fingers yanked at my pants while I kicked my boots off as swiftly as I could. As soon as I was free of everything but my underwear, I gave Jaxon my full attention again.
There wasn’t a scrap of clothing gracing his body, and I froze. He certainly wasn’t the first supernatural I’d been with, but I had no doubts in my mind that he would be the best. The crimson flicking through his eyes as he prowled toward me guaranteed I was in for the time of my life.
“Flower.” He paused.
“Jaxon.”
I hadn’t realized he was waiting for me to change my mind, but when I didn’t move, his arms came around me and we fell back onto the much-too-small bed. Within a blink, the rest of my clothing disappeared as Jaxon’s lips and deft hands replaced the fabrics.
While his fingers delved deeper into my body, my back arched, and I gave in to the euphoria he was giving. With every move he made, there was a little bit of pain followed by an overwhelming amount of pleasure.
Tugs on my hair, nips at my skin, pressure wherever his hands went. All of it was putting me on sensory overload until I wasn’t sure I could take anymore. He was giving me everything I wanted, but not what I needed most.
As soon as I opened my mouth to tell him so, his mouth slammed down on mine, cutting off any words I wanted to say. When he finally pulled back, I was a quivering mess beneath him, and my seemingly insatiable need was finally met as he positioned himself just where I wanted.
There was a charged moment of silence as he hovered above me, and the connection between us sucked all of the air from my lungs. Jaxon was everything I hadn’t known I wanted. His mind was dark and twisted. He had anger problems. He was half-demon. All things I should run from, but in that exact moment, I knew there wasn’t anyone else I would want to have my back in what we were about to face.
Agonizingly slow, he pushed into me without breaking our eye contact. His hands caressed every inch of my body until he reached my face and leaned in closer. “You are mine,” he murmured against my ear as his hips began moving.
My breath caught as my insides tightened, already ready for the release I knew was going to come too quickly, but also confident it would be followed by several more of the best orgasms of my life.
Grasping his ass, I pressed closer until I had him right where I needed him most. Letting go of all my worries, I lost myself in the moment, focusing only on Jaxon and me. Nothing else mattered, and if this first time was the only time we’d ever get the chance to connect like this, I’d at least have no regrets.
Chapter 17
Several hours later, Jaxon and I finally broke from the sexual utopia we’d been in only to realize that we hadn’t been interrupted. That was either a good thing or a really bad one, and we couldn’t chance the latter.
Regretfully, we put clothes back on and headed toward the common area. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten, and if I was going to be expected to kick some fae ass, then I at least needed my liquid gold.
A note was taped to the door from Blake, informing us that Deacon had found him and Spencer. He’d told them that the warden hadn’t told all of the guards of his plans for us, so we were free to move about the prison until Gillian returned.
Well, that was a positive, because I was getting food and coffee, regardless of what any guards thought. They could all kiss my ass as far as I was concerned. Either way the day ended―with us or Gillian dead―it would be my last in Mandora Supernatural Prison.
Jaxon’s hands ran up my sides. “Ready?”
“Not if you keep touching me that way.”
His chest vibrated against my back. “Come on. We need to check in.”
When we entered the hallway, my body tensed. Even though Deacon had said we were fine for the time being, I didn’t feel safe. Our team was split up, and the more I thought about it, the more I thought it wasn’t our smartest move.
The memory of the hours spent in bed with Jaxon was more than worth it as long as the others hadn’t run into any trouble, though.
“We need to find the others. Grab food for everyone and stay together,” I said.
Jaxon glanced at his phone. “It’s lunch time now, so we can do that. Mason said he and Nixie are still out a few miles and we need to meet them there. Blake and Spencer are doing perimeter rounds and checking in every hour.”
I cringed. Hopefully, they’d all had a chance to rest while we were otherwise occupied.
Entering the common area, my eyes first scanned the room to find the guards. There were three of them. Deacon, another whose name I could never remember, and Rick, who never really said much. He just watched in a creepy way.
Deacon nodded to us, and we continued until I saw Ethan and Gabe. “I need to talk to them. Give me a minute?”
Jaxon hesitated but didn’t disagree with me. He was coming along nicely with his growth.
Sliding into the seat next to Ethan, I smiled at him and Gabe. “So, what’s new?”
Ethan glared at me. “You got us locked in solitary for a day, and they put an extra magic blocker on us. So, the better question is what the hell do you want?”
Oh, gods. I’d never told them. I didn’t warn them of the plan or Nixie’s invention. I also hadn’t expected them to end up in solitary when everything was put into motion.
“I’m so sorry. That’s not how it was supposed to go. Did Nixie screw up?” I asked more to myself than them since they didn’t know who she was.
Ethan’s face softened ever so slightly. “Well, it doesn’t actually work, but I wasn’t going to tell the idiot guards that. I want to know why you did it in the first place. What did we do to you?”
“Nothing. The band was meant to block out the warden from taking your powers. He’s been sucking you dry, not blocking your abilities. The bands stop that from happening. Don’t you feel stronger than you ever have since entering Mandora? Deacon should have told you that this was a good thing. Or maybe he assumed I gave you a heads up, but there wasn’t time for me to do that before we had to leave.”
Gabe threw a piece of bread at Ethan. “See? I told you she didn’t turn on us.”
“Of course I didn’t. You should have kno
wn that.” I gave Ethan a pointed stare.
“Yeah, well, the life I’ve lived has made me believe there is only one person in this world I can truly count on, and that’s myself.”
Ethan was right, and I didn’t blame him for doubting me. “I understand, and I’m sorry I didn’t give you a heads up. I guess it made the show that much more believable, though,” I said, hoping to lighten the mood a little.
Ethan grinned. “I punched Deacon in the face, so it was definitely a show.”
Oh, how I wished I had seen that. I didn’t mind Deacon, but it still would have been entertaining.
“How many of you ended up with the bands? I only gave Deacon a handful of names, and he said he knew of some others we could trust,” I said.
Gabe leaned forward. “There are nine of us. What are we supposed to do now? Because my magic is building and I’m not sure how much longer I can keep it contained.”
Nine wasn’t a lot, but it was more than we had before, so I would take it. “You’ll actually be able to let loose today. Things went from bad to worse last night. Me and the guys are supposed to be locked up right now.”
Ethan grunted. “I hate to break it to you, but you are locked up right now.”
“No, I mean like actually behind bars and on the warden’s shit list. He wants us dead.” I quickly filled them in on what they needed to know. “So, when the psycho gets back, we will be fighting for our lives and freedom. You don’t have to help—we won’t force you to risk your own lives—but when the alarm sounds, we’ll take any assistance we can get if you’re up for it.”
“Shit. I’ll warn the others. You can count on us,” Gabe said, getting up from the table.
Ethan was still acting weird, and I knew he was pissed I hadn’t given him a heads up about the bands, among other things with the warden. “Hey, I get the trust issues and I don’t disagree with your need for caution, but I need you to know I really am sorry. I didn’t mean to get you thrown in solitary and freak you out.”
Capture (Elite Supernatural Trackers Book 2) Page 12
