by Lara Adrian
His involvement with Leni being no exception.
Before he could change his mind, he started tapping the digits that would connect him to the Darkhaven’s secured line.
It hadn’t even begun to ring when Leni’s scream ripped through the morning quiet of the house downstairs.
CHAPTER 15
“Riley!” Leni raced into the kitchen, her heart slamming against her ribs. “Rye, this isn’t funny. Where are you?”
Moving at a dead run, she nearly crashed into Knox. He came off the last step of the back stairwell as if he’d materialized rather than moved. He approached her looking grim with concern, dressed only in jeans and a dark T-shirt.
“What’s wrong?”
“Riley. He’s gone.”
“What do you mean, gone?”
“I mean he’s not anywhere in the house.” She gestured wildly, panic clawing up the back of her throat. “I should’ve checked on him as soon as I woke up. I should’ve made sure I saw him before I got in the shower.” The words tumbled out of her, her voice choked with guilt. The only thing heavier was the terror churning in her stomach. “Oh, God. Today of all days, I shouldn’t have let down my guard for a second.”
Saturday. Travis Parrish’s release day.
The day she’d been dreading for years was finally here and she’d lost Riley the instant her back was turned.
“Hey.” Knox’s strong hands settled on her shoulders, his stormy blue eyes trying to reach her through her rising alarm. “It’s going to be okay. Slow down, Leni. Tell me what happened.”
She withdrew from his touch, bristling at the tenderness no matter how much she wanted comforting and reassurance.
“I overslept.” It came out like an accusation, sharp with anger. She didn’t blame Knox for her distraction as much as she blamed herself, but worry for Riley made every word grate over her tongue. “I just went in to get him up for breakfast after my shower, but he’s not in his room. The blanket is missing off the bed. Fred’s gone too.”
Knox gave a measured nod as he listened. “He can’t have gone far, Leni. He must be around here somewhere.”
“What if he’s not?” she snapped. “What if they took him while I was sleeping? Or last night, while we were—”
Sick with guilt, she could hardly finish the thought. Her morning had started off like a dream. She had awakened with a smile that she couldn’t seem to erase from her lips, her body aching in all the right places after the incredible night she’d spent in Knox’s arms.
All of that giddy joy and blissful fatigue evaporated in an instant. Ice-cold fear replaced it when she found Riley missing a minute ago. Her veins were still freezing with worry. Her throat was still raw from her scream, her heart still on the verge of exploding.
“Everything’s going to be okay,” Knox stated firmly. “The Parrishes didn’t take him. They’re just men, Leni, not ghosts. I promise you, no one came into this house last night or this morning. I would’ve heard them. I would have smelled them.”
She stared up at him, miserable. “And yet Riley’s gone.”
Although she hadn’t meant to fault Knox for her failure, his jaw tightened as if she’d struck him. She paced away from him, heartsick and furious with herself.
This was all her fault. She had let herself enjoy a few hours of pleasure, of normalcy, and this was the price. Riley’s safety.
Her gaze flicked to the door leading out to the backyard. She drew in a breath.
“It’s unlocked.” She swung a look at Knox. “The deadbolt. It’s open.”
She had been so swamped with panic she hadn’t noticed the detail until now. She glanced at the small pile of footwear cluttering the mat beside the back entry and realized Riley’s favorite pair of yellow rain boots were gone.
“He’s outside.”
The realization snuffed some of her alarm, though not all of it. She wouldn’t be able to relax until she had Riley in her arms. She dashed out in her slippers, no patience to fumble with her own boots or a coat. Dressed in the loose jeans and light sweater she threw on after her shower, she scrambled off the stoop and down into the thick blanket of snow that spread out behind the house and into the surrounding forest.
Morning sunlight nearly blinded her, beaming from a cloudless blue sky and sparkling off the pristine snow cover like diamonds. She followed a pair of kid-sized boot prints that made a meandering path toward the trees.
“Riley!” Her shout echoed in the tall pines. “Riley, where are you?”
A sudden gust of cold wind buffeted her from behind. It passed by her, a blur of energy and motion too fast for her eyes to track, especially in the harsh glare of the sun’s rays.
But when she glanced down she saw there were now two sets of prints in the snow. Riley’s distracted amble into the woods, and an arrow-straight path left by Knox’s bare feet.
Oh, God. He’d come out into the daylight to look for Riley?
Her heart lurched at the thought. More than a few minutes of ultraviolet light was lethal to the Breed, especially a Gen One like Knox. Yet he’d just run straight into the brightest part of morning. For Riley.
For her.
Leni raced into the forest, following the trail of footprints. Out of breath, her heartbeat hammering, she felt as though she’d run more than a mile when she finally spotted Knox’s hulking form up ahead near the ravine.
He held Riley in his strong arms.
“Oh, thank God.”
The little boy was dressed like a superhero, the blue coverlet from his bed tied around his neck like a cape. Red long john pajamas and yellow rain boots completed the makeshift costume. His teddy bear dangled from one hand as Knox carried the boy and Fred up from bracken-tangled incline above the river.
Leni sprinted forward, swamped with relief. “Riley!”
Now that she saw he was safe, it was hard to keep her anger at bay. She had never raised her voice to him or had to discipline him, but he had never given her such a fright before.
That cold fear still leeched into her veins as she caught up to them. Some of it transferred to Knox when she noticed the blistering skin on his bare arms. The UV light was taking a toll already, singeing his face and throat too.
“Knox, you shouldn’t be out here like this. Give Riley to me. I’ll take care of him. You need to go back to the house before you burn up.”
“Don’t worry about me.” His deep voice allowed no argument. And he kept his hold on Riley, all but dismissing the certain agony of his scorched skin. “I’m not going anywhere until I have both of you safe inside.”
Leni held herself together as they hurried back to the house. Once they stepped into the kitchen and Knox set Riley down on the floor, the dam burst on all of her emotions.
She crouched to pull the boy into a fierce hug. A sob caught in her throat as she clung to him. She couldn’t let go. She could hardly speak for the torrent of relief and anger and gratitude spilling over inside her.
His slim little body tensed. “Aunt Leni, are you crying?”
“Yes, I am. And do you know why?” She couldn’t hold back the wet trails that ran down her cheeks as she set him away from her. With her hands clamped on his narrow shoulders, she looked into his confused face. “I thought something very bad had happened to you. You scared me, Riley. You scared me very much.”
“I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “That’s not good enough. Not this time. What have I told you about playing outside?”
He frowned, looking reluctant to add to her upset. “I don’t remember.”
“Yes, you do. Never alone. That’s the rule.” Leni expelled a sharp breath instead of the curse that leapt to the tip of her tongue when she thought of all the awful scenarios that had played through her head from the moment she woke to find him missing. “You do not leave the house by yourself. Especially not now. Not ever. Do you understand?”
“But I wasn’t alone. Fred came with me.” He held up the stuffed bear as if to prove
his point. “And we made a new friend in the woods too, but I don’t know her name ‘cause she ran away when I tried to ask her.”
Leni pinched the bridge of her nose. “I don’t have the energy for this right now, kiddo. I can’t deal with talking toys or imaginary friends. Not today.”
“But Aunt Leni—”
“Enough,” she bit off tightly. “This is real life now. You broke the rules today and I don’t ever want you to do that again. Promise me.”
He nodded, his sweet little face drooping with remorse. “Promise.”
Leni lifted his chin and untied the corners of the small blanket draped over him. Divested of his cape, she took Fred out of his hands and set both items on the floor beside her. Next came his rain boots.
“Go on upstairs to your room now. I’ll be up to talk to you about all of this in a few minutes.”
“What about Fred?”
She shook her head. “He’s staying down here with me.”
“Why can’t I take him?” he whined.
“Because both of you are grounded until I say otherwise.”
“No!” He stomped his stockinged foot. “That’s not fair—”
“I said go.” She jabbed her finger in the direction of the stairwell. “Up to your room, Riley. Right now.”
Her sharp tone clearly took him aback. He whirled away from her on a huff, then ran upstairs in a burst of tears.
Leni let out her breath in a long, heavy sigh. “I’ve never raised my voice to him before. I’ve never had to discipline him.”
“You’re doing it out of love. Every kid should be so lucky,” Knox said, his deep voice devoid of judgment. “He’ll survive.”
“What about you, Knox?” She stood up and pivoted to face him. “Your burns—”
“Are nothing,” he said, shrugging as if the extensive blistering and smoldering skin on his muscled arms and handsome face didn’t faze him in the least.
What must he have endured in his life that agonizing injuries like this meant so little to him?
That he’d risked the exposure to help her and Riley made Leni’s heart squeeze even tighter in her breast. She moved toward him, hating that she was the reason for his pain.
“You shouldn’t have done it,” she murmured. She reached for him, wanting to touch him but uncertain where her fingers could land without adding to his discomfort. She rested her hand lightly over the center of his chest, which had been shielded from the light by the fabric of his T-shirt.
He flinched under her fingertips. “Does this hurt?”
“No.” The word sounded strangled and thick. His heartbeat thudded heavily against her palm. Leni looked up at him and found his blue-gray eyes fixed on her. Embers glittered behind the stormy hue of his irises. “You shouldn’t stand so close to me, Lenora.”
The points of his fangs showed behind his lip as he uttered the tight, low warning.
She didn’t heed it. All she wanted to do was wrap her arms around him and never let go.
“Tell me what I can do to help you. Your skin needs care, Knox.”
God, she could barely stand to look at the severity of his burns. They went beyond anything she’d ever seen before, closer to a prolonged dose of pure radiation than even the worst bout of sunburn. Just standing in close proximity to him she could feel the heat of his burns warming her own skin.
It was easy to think of Knox in human terms the longer she spent in his company, but this was a stark reminder that he was something different. He was more than a man, yet as strong and invincible as he was in so many ways, there were things that could wound him.
There were things that could kill him.
Things as mundane as a few minutes of sunshine.
“I should take you to the county hospital.”
He frowned. “They can’t help me.”
“Then I’ll run a cool bath for you in the tub upstairs. I can make some cold compresses—”
“None of those things can help, Leni.”
“Then what will?” She stared up at his blistered, smoldering cheeks and brow. The sparks that had been igniting in his eyes a moment ago intensified as his gaze caught and held hers. The heat radiating off his big body seemed to shift toward something sharper, something verging on dangerous, predatory. “You need blood. Don’t you?”
She didn’t miss the flare of amber that lit his irises in response. But he shook his head. He took a step back from her, then another.
“I need time, that’s all. A few hours and my body will heal itself.”
“A few hours of agony,” she pointed out. She didn’t want to imagine how miserable that duration of suffering would be for him. “How long would it take you to heal if you were able to feed from someone?”
He shrugged. “Less than an hour probably. It doesn’t matter. I can’t risk more exposure now and I’ll be healed before it’s safe for me to head out and find a blood Host anyway.”
Leni nodded, realizing he’d already considered and dismissed the idea. “I could go out and find someone for you.” Even as she said it, a selfish, possessive part of her regretted the offer. But his suffering was harder to bear. She would do anything in her power to ease it. “I’m sure if I gave Milo at the gas station a few dollars he’d be willing to come. Or there’s Carla. She’d be here in a minute if I asked her to help.”
He visibly balked. “Forget it. The worst of this will pass soon enough. I don’t need anyone’s help.”
“Not even mine?” She lifted her hand toward his ravaged face and let it hover there, wanting to give him comfort yet knowing anything she did would only make his pain worse. Except, perhaps, one thing. “What if you fed from me, Knox?”
“Jesus Christ.” He nearly choked. “Don’t ask me that. Don’t even fucking think it.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not going to happen,” he snapped. He scowled at her, and the glow of his eyes surged brighter. “One drop is all it would take to bind me to you. That means forever, Leni. There’s no taking it back, no matter how much either of us will surely want to one day. It’s a shackle that can’t be broken, not ever.”
He made the idea sound ominous and awful. She didn’t want to feel so stung by his description of something she knew was sacred among the Breed.
She understood the bond between Knox and a woman born with a Breedmate symbol on her body would be an eternal one. She knew only death could sever the blood connection between a mated couple.
And yet she was willing to give that to him.
True, she was offering out of concern for his injuries, but there was something deeper behind the feeling. She cared for him. She had accepted him into her life and her confidence. Last night she had accepted him into her bed. She wasn’t sure when he’d infiltrated her heart, but there was no denying it now.
It stunned her to realize that.
It stunned her even more to realize just how much it hurt to hear Knox dismiss the idea of drinking from her as though it was the last thing he would ever consider.
The feel of his fingertips under her chin jolted her. He lifted her gaze to his, his face a ruined mask of torment and pain. “I’m not here to add to your problems, Lenora. Letting things get out of hand between us last night was bad enough. I should’ve had more control. I owe you an apology for that.”
His gentleness now only made his regret for what they’d done together seem that much more evident. She hadn’t considered making love with him to be a mistake, but it was obvious he did. To hear him blame himself for the incredible night they’d shared broke something tender and vulnerable inside her.
She couldn’t let him see the fracture. She had been the one with a lack of control last night. She had been the foolish one—then and now.
She withdrew from his touch and folded her arms in front of her. “Yeah, I guess we both lost sight of reality last night.”
Standing here with Knox, she would have worsened the mistake exponentially by giving him her blood, her bond.
The awful truth was, if he wanted her, she still would.
God, that must make her worse than a fool.
“I need to go look after Riley,” she said, working to keep the hurt out of her expression and her voice. “Thank you for helping me find him and bring him home.”
He gave her less than a nod, a stiff, formal response.
Leni didn’t wait to let him see any more of her humiliation.
Turning away from him, she strode out of the kitchen with a new resolve. From now on, she needed to protect her heart as fiercely as she was willing to protect her nephew’s life.
CHAPTER 16
She avoided him for the rest of the day and the duration of the night.
Thank fuck for that small mercy, even though he’d won it from her by being an unfeeling bastard. Something he seemed to excel at, and not only since he’d met Leni.
He didn’t know how to be anything else. Deep down, he would always be the disciplined laboratory rat, the born-and-bred soldier who’d been taught nothing but logic and combat from the time he was torn from his mother’s womb.
Knox had needed both of those skills yesterday morning, when Leni had stood before him offering her blood to heal him.
Offering her bond, for crissake.
He had been sorely tempted. Not only because of the severity of his UV burns, although they had been hellish enough to warrant some relief. No, the temptation that had leapt to life inside him had little to do with any of the pain or injury he’d endured for most of the day until his body had finally healed itself.
His craving to take Leni’s throat under his fangs had been born of something even more demanding than physical suffering. It had been fueled by desire. Possessive need. A depth of caring that had nearly overcome him when he saw the sincerity of her offer in her eyes.
Her blood—and her eternal bond—had been his for the taking.
Her tender, courageous heart as well.
It humbled him, even now.
