Blackstorm (Nightwraith Book 2)

by Gaja J. Kos

  “Then why are you angry with me?” My voice was weak, too weak. But I hated that he was pissed. Hated it because in that moment, when I thought Alexander was going to kill him, I felt like I was going to lose a part of my life, too.

  Alin rose up from the couch, looming over me but not touching.

  “Because I didn’t want to see you hurt, Lana. When you materialized in front of that fucking sword—I couldn’t think. I couldn’t even fucking breathe.” He thrust a hand in his hair, ruffling the bloodied, matted strands. “I care for you, all right? I fucking care. You’re stubborn and reckless and drive me crazy, but I fucking care.”

  Stunned by his confession, I didn’t know what to say.

  And I didn’t have to.

  Alin covered the distance between us, his arms enveloping me in their warmth and tugging me close. The touch of his power slithered across my skin, as did his warmth, the hunger I felt caressing my senses echoed in the brightness of his emerald gaze.

  “Alin,” I whispered.

  His breath danced across my lips, and the next thing I knew, I was lost in the whirlwind of his taste, swept away as his mouth captured mine.

  Chapter 18

  The kiss was gentle, almost fragile, as if he were afraid to take what I wanted to give him so freely. And yet there was nothing innocent about it, nothing that would lessen the surge of desire rippling off his skin in entrancing waves I wanted nothing more than to lose myself in forever. His muscles flexed and bunched as he held me close, as his tongue explored my mouth, slowly, carefully, each stoke met by a shiver that echoed all the way to his fingers resting on my spine.

  For a moment, I forgot about the world around us, forgot that there even was anything else in the universe besides our bodies, our powers, brushing against each other with a kind of magnetic attraction I’d never felt before.

  The taste of him became my religion, the warm press of his lips against mine more vital than breath.

  His fingers traveled lower, curving around my butt with barely leashed strength. I moaned into his kiss, and Alin responded, flattening my body against the hardness of his.

  It was then that a thread of reality slithered into the cocoon our powers formed.

  Blood.

  I eased back, my eyes meeting the fierceness of his emerald gaze before I looked lower, finally noting the gashes blooming across his chest. They had been nearly invisible before, but now that the crimson had soaked through his torn shirt, stretching the material and making the cuts visible through the holes in the fabric, I recognized them for what they were.

  Fingernail marks.

  The wounds were jagged, deep—caused by a zombie’s altered strength. I swallowed, breathing steadily to stop my head from spinning.

  From the kiss.

  From knowing how close to death Alin had come today.

  “I need to take care of these,” I said softly, meeting his gaze once more. “Where do you store your medical supplies?”

  “I’ll get them.” His voice was husky, perhaps even a little strained. “Wait for me next door. There’s a shower in there if you’d like to clean up in the meantime. I’ll come back as soon as I let Ilya know what happened.” He hesitated. “Someone needs to pick up our fallen.”

  I bit my lip and nodded, then watched the elegant rippling of his broad back as he strode into the main section of the lair. I caught a faint glimpse of the throne room as the door closed shut behind him, then walked over to the chamber he’d indicated before.

  It wasn’t until I put my hand on the sleek, dark gold handle that I realized I was shaking. I loosened a breath, reminding myself that we were safe. For now.

  Only I wasn’t entirely sure it even was the near-death encounter that sent tremors running down my limbs.

  I shoved the thought away and pressed down on the handle, then eased open the door… My heartbeat cranked up a notch.

  Because the room Alin sent me to—it was nothing less than his master bedroom.

  Somehow I managed to get myself under control by the time Alin returned with a small box of supplies in his hand. Like me, he was freshly showered, but the main difference between us was that he was wrapped in nothing but a towel.

  My cheeks burned as I noticed the muscular columns of his thighs, the narrow waist and chiseled abdomen—right until my gaze fell on the wounds riddling his chest. I didn’t even dare to think how badly he would have been hurt if he didn’t have demon blood running through his veins, making him somewhat harder to injure.

  He placed the box on the bedside table, then lay down on the pitch-black sheets, both arms tucked behind his head.

  “Looks like we reversed our roles, huh?” I asked as I unscrewed a bottle of rubbing alcohol, knowing that if I didn’t keep myself busy, I just might lose every rational thought still holding on to dear life in my mind.

  Shit, Alin wasn’t just handsome… He was—I had no words for what he was, although perfect did come to mind. He had that Old World appeal, locked in the form of a warrior. A god, perhaps. Every inch of him screamed of the power he carried, yet there was an edge of something far more carnal there, too.

  And the combination knocked the breath from my lungs.

  I focused on my task, pouring the alcohol on a cotton pad to disinfect the wound before I covered it with ointment. As I prepped a clean, narrow strip of bandage to secure the gash, he stirred.

  “You know, no one’s ever cared for me like this.”

  My fingers stumbled at his voice. At how raw it sounded, even when he tried to make the words light. I sucked in a breath and carefully flattened the edges of the bandage across his skin, not daring to meet his eyes. I wasn’t certain if I could take it right now.

  “Surely I can’t be the first person to clean out your wounds,” I said rather weakly, hoping the small smile on my face wasn’t trembling as much as my insides were.

  He laughed, and his muscles flexed almost mesmerizingly with the movement. I stared pointedly at the bandage, refusing to let my blush grow any worse. Without luck.

  “Before, when I spoke of my court, my business ventures beyond the Shadow World, I hadn’t been completely honest.”

  This time, I did look up. I wanted to ask “Why lie?”, but the wisps of past darkening his emerald eyes caused my words to dry up. I moved on to the next wound.

  “All this”—he nudged his chin at the space around us, although I knew he was referring to what lay in the human realm—“started long before I ascended to the throne. Not as you know it now, but in essence.”

  His confession didn’t surprise me, exactly. It was rare for demon lords to focus on anything but their territories, unless, of course, those activities had started long before their actual rise to power.

  “Were you always rooted in Maribor, or did you move around?”

  He shrugged. “I grew up on its streets, so I stayed.”

  The can of ointment nearly slipped from my grasp. I steadied myself, applied a hefty layer over the wound, then folded my hands into my lap. “What do you mean you grew up on its streets? You weren’t raised in the Shadow World?”

  “My parents cast me out when I was barely old enough to survive on my own. I still believe that was the result they were angling for when they shut the door in my face. But I was already too strong, and I had access to my lair.” A smile touched his lips, but there was nothing warm about it. “They feared I would usurp them once my powers reached their full potential or some other bullshit like that. So they got rid of the problem before it even began.”

  “Shit. I’m sorry.”

  And here I thought my parents and their aspirations were bad. At least their plans included their daughters, not made us out to be some evil they had to ward themselves from.

  “Why live on the streets? Why not try to make a life for yourself in the Shadow World? You could have gone elsewhere…”

  “My lair lies within my—back then, their—territory. My parents set up barriers, preventing me from entering thei
r court in particle or flesh form alike. The magic wasn’t strong, but it was enough to keep a demon kid out. So instead of fighting it, I just tried to survive. The thought of seeking refuge at another court scared the shit out of me, especially with the less than warm relations my parents had with the rest of them, so I took to the streets instead.

  “It didn’t take me long to cross paths with a few low-ranking gangs. Security was far more lax all those centuries ago, as you can imagine, and taking particle form to break into places and get whatever the fuck the thugs wanted was a breeze. I got a small cut after I delivered the goods, as well as an endorsement. My reputation grew, and eventually I started to make a living out of it.

  “But times changed, and so did the demands. They went from larceny to roughing up unpaying clients for loan sharks and stalking gang lords’ potential enemies. I didn’t like it, but I didn’t mind it either. For a short while, I didn’t even bat an eye when the requests started to include flat-out murder.

  “The money was good, and the people dying were scums of the worst kind. Rapists, domestic abusers, murderers. It felt like a dream that I was getting paid to kick their souls straight into the underworld.”

  Oddly, I understood. I wasn’t thrilled, nor could I ever share his enthusiasm, but I could see where he was coming from. I used the small pause to bandage that last wound, my fingers lingering just a little longer on the hard muscles of his chest.

  “It wasn’t until they started slaughtering innocents that I balked.” His green eyes met mine, the fierceness in them staggering. He had blood on his hands, but regardless of what Yelena said of him, he wasn’t a killer without a conscience.

  “What did you do?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

  “I’d already made a name for myself here, so I knew they wouldn’t stop. Besides, I was tied up too deeply in an all-supe gang to start fresh. I wasn’t as powerful then as I am now, and it was either do what they asked or pay the ultimate price. So I fled to the Shadow Word, hoping I could find my place there. I approached different courts, only my reputation preceded me. Either they wanted nothing to do with a killer—the two-faced assholes—or they wanted me to join their ranks and use me for the exact fucking thing my old gang had. Unsurprisingly, the latter were in majority.” A bitter laugh slipped from his lips, and he shook his head. “I told them all to fuck off and came back here. I was done being a pawn, a fucking knife they could use at will. So I worked for the better part of the year on experimenting with my power, testing just how deep I could go…and how much I could achieve.

  “When I was certain I could handle any attack the thugs threw my way, I resurfaced. I stuck to the shadows at first. My history gave me contacts beyond my old gang, and I was fucking determined to make the most of them. Slowly, I built a circle of people that saw what I was capable of doing and followed me because of it. We worked carefully, implementing our presence in minor organizations throughout Maribor, then struck when they were at their weakest. Some we had to kill. Some joined our ranks. And when that was done, I already owned half of the fucking town.

  “The three leading gangs, the assholes that they were, luckily refused to band together in order to bring us down, so we formed a tentative truce. We had our respective territories, and we’d vowed to stay out of each other’s businesses. I used up the time to restructure my own men, to create the base that went on to become what you know now.”

  I nodded, although a bit reserved. A part of me was still uncomfortable with what Alin did, what his gang stood for. Even if I knew there were far worse alternatives out there. But most of all, I could see that, regardless of what he thought of himself, there was still a light within him. Still something kind and loving, even if hardened throughout the centuries. I cocked my head to the side in a soft plea for him to continue.

  “Things were just starting to look up when I received word of my parents’ deaths. I hadn’t lied when I told you governing the territory in the Shadow World wasn’t something I enjoyed. My life, my men were here, and while I took on the task of presiding over the demons to keep them in check, I had no aspirations to expand my reach across other courts.” Amusement briefly touched the corners of his eyes. “Though I’m well aware they believed otherwise.”

  I raised an eyebrow at his blatant understatement. My mother had all but a complete war plan laid out in case Alin ever made a move. And I was positive the rest were no different.

  “So fighting one turf war was enough?” I asked, somewhat surprised by the easiness of my tone. As if what we were discussing didn’t involve more dead bodies than I could hope to reanimate in my entire life.

  “I got what I wanted. A place in the world. A position of power that made others back off—at least those with half a brain.”

  Unlike Alexander, I thought, but the chill that swept through me at the vision of the necromancer disappeared when Alin covered my hand with his, the fire in his eyes revealing he picked up on the darkness of my thoughts.

  “We’ll get the bastard, Lana. I promise.”

  I gave him a weak smile, and his fingers tightened around my hand.

  “It’s kind of hard to believe being a gang lord is what you wanted,” I said, my tone light. “But I get it. In a way it’s like my bar. Something you created out of necessity. And out of desire.”

  “This organization is not all I desire.”

  I went still. So, so still. My heart jumped into my throat, the memory of our kiss teasing warmth to uncurl from my core. I forced my voice to be as normal as I could, and asked, “What else, then?”

  Something flickered across his face—a hint of hesitation—as if the answer were far more intimate than anything he’d shared so far. He was closing up, and I wasn’t going to push him. He’d already said far more than I ever expected him to.

  So I rose from the bed and gave his wounds another glance. His chest was a bandaged mess, but from the looks of it, the cuts had stopped bleeding. I picked up the pile of used cotton pads and threw them in the bin at the other end of the room, then walked over to the foot of the bed.

  “You should rest.” My words sounded strained, but I ignored the underlying implication. “And I guess so should I. I’ll come back first thing in the morning.”

  I spun around to leave when a single word stopped me mid step.

  “No.”

  I glanced over my shoulder at the demon sprawled across the bed and raised an eyebrow in silent question.

  “Your place isn’t safe, Lana, and I can’t spare the men…”

  “Fine. Set me up in one of the rooms—” My words faltered as he shifted on the bed. As he made room on the bed for me.

  I watched him like a doe on the verge of making a run for it. Only this doe didn’t have that much common sense—or any clear instructions from her instincts. I licked my suddenly dry lips, then walked over and sat on the edge of the mattress.

  Almost painfully slow, I unlaced my sneakers, then peeled off my jeans, not once looking at the demon lord lying behind me. But I felt his gaze on my back, the faint trace of his power that refused to stay beneath the surface of his skin. I’d slept in the same bed with men before without actually sleeping with them, and Alin had made a valid point of me not being safe in my apartment. But somehow the thought of lying under the covers next to him… Gods, I felt like I shaved off at least twelve years of my life and fell in a hormone-driven wilderness once more. Only I knew the comparison was false. Back then, I had never felt the things Alin’s presence woke inside me.

  With shaky breaths, I placed the folded jeans onto the floor, then unhooked my bra from beneath my T-shirt and tugged it from under the fabric, grateful I had gone for something strapless. Pulling the elastic from beneath the sleeves was not something I’d mastered, and more often than not resulted in said elastic snapping under the force of my demonic strength.

  I exhaled, deeply, and placed the bra on top of the jeans then slid under the covers. I tried hard not to look as Alin relieved himself fr
om the towel and slid beneath the sheets. Much to my surprise, I actually succeeded.

  But one thing I did notice was that he hadn’t attempted to make a move on me. In fact, he seemed determined to keep to his side of the bed, even when his massive frame demanded otherwise.

  And that only made my confusion worse.

  While I kept telling myself that I didn’t want anything to happen, we had kissed. Kissed in a way that would have led much further if I hadn’t noticed the wounds and backed off. And yet now, with both of us in bed and him naked, he looked as if he were…shielding me from him.

  Damn it, I knew my mind was running in circles, but I had a very strong suspicion that I didn’t want him to be all nice and considerate right now. It didn’t fit into the mold I’d created for him, into that box that spelled out the limitations of what I could expect. Because this…

  You didn’t do this, even if you cared for someone, not unless—

  I stomped on that thought before it had the chance to bloom, and curled on my side, determined to do what I’d said earlier. Rest.

  The lights went off without me noticing Alin move. I sank deeper into the pillow and focused on what was important. Alexander.

  But as much as I tried, it wasn’t the necromancer’s face that filled my thoughts.

  Focusing on my breathing, I closed my eyes and prayed for sleep to come and knock me out before I drove myself mad. But just as the first whispers of dreams started to crawl on the edges of my mind, Alin’s voice filled the darkness of the bedroom.

  “What I want,” he whispered, “is something I never had. Something my choice of a life will likely never allow to happen.”

  A part of me warned that I didn’t want to know the answer. That I was already in too deep, walking on a knife’s edge between common sense and something far, far more dangerous. Affection.