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  “How did you escape?”

  “I didn’t, Karen. Don’t you get it?” he challenged. “I didn’t.”

  “And they’re still after you.”

  “Right,” he said, his lips thinning. “And they’re trying to use you to bring me down.”

  “Why me?” she asked. “I don’t understand any of this.”

  He ignored her question. “I’ll have you taken to your sister. You can move about the house as you please. I’ll send the housekeeper up to show you around and make sure you eat.” With that he started for the door. When he reached for the doorknob, he stilled, keeping his back to her as he spoke. “I can’t be near you, Karen. Stay away.”

  Chapter 9

  Adrian lifted his body, thrusting deeper inside the human female atop him. The windowless room, part of a facility buried deep beneath the earth, flickered with candlelight.

  Black silk sheets covered Adrian’s massive oak-framed bed and caressed his back. His newest servant, the nurse he’d captured and would soon convert, rode him, her wet core stroking his erection. He didn’t remember her name. Alice. Sherry. Something like that. He didn’t know, nor did he care. Humans were simply toys, lesser beings who served the greater beings like himself.

  With a low moan, his servant sat up, slowing her movements as if she savored each slide of his erection inside her body. Palming her voluptuous breasts, she bit her bottom lip, and tilted her head back, lost in the pleasure Adrian delivered. The beast in him, primal and sexual, consumed humans, taking their satisfaction without acknowledging or allowing resistance. The beast fed off the power to take. To control. To devour.

  His servant straddled him, wild with desire. Grinding the V of her body against him, matching his upward movement with a downward one. Sounds of pleasure slid from her lips, her body jerking and swaying like the animal in heat, desperate for release.

  Adrian eyed his newest prize, enjoying the visual delight she presented. Her nipples, so plump and tight, peeked through her fingers and he wanted to taste them. To lap at them with his tongue. The thought thickened his cock, delivering what she wanted. What she needed…more. More of what only he, the ultimate beast, could deliver: absolute satisfaction.

  All she had to do was give herself to him. And she had.

  At first, she’d fought him, a crazed female ready for blood. He’d enjoyed it immensely. Breaking them always turned him on. But now, hours later, she’d forgotten her missing friend, the one he’d captured for bait. She’d forgotten the minute his tongue had touched her clit.

  One long lick along the silky folds of her core and she’d shuddered into submission.

  And now, his little nurse was panting and rocking, not an ounce of restraint in sight. With enjoyment he checked himself, not sliding into his primal side. Enjoying the show she delivered. He bored easily, disposing of his submissives when they no longer incited his interest. His lust. He’d thought to use the nurse for a night or two and then kill her. Now he wasn’t so sure. She had potential, this one, her sexual nature making her a perfect playmate for a beast. He needed his sex and he needed it often. If she was this hot before he claimed her human side, he could only imagine how she’d respond when he did.

  The thought pleased him and his hands went to her waist. He pulled her down harder against his hips, bucking upward, the pounding of their bodies driving him toward release. She cried out, arched her back, hands going behind her to brace herself on his upper thighs.

  He pumped and pumped, driven now by the sight she made. Nothing but lust and burning satisfaction controlled him and his actions.

  Hunger ate at him and Adrian sat up, wrapping one arm around her back and pulling the warmth of her human body against his colder one. He loved the feel of a living human in his arms. It made him feel so…alive.

  He pinched one of her nipples and she made a sound, a mixture of pain laced with pleasure. Her head lifted so she could look at him, her brunette hair wild as it framed her heart-shaped face and draped her shoulders.

  He pinched the erect peak again and she rewarded him with a yelp. A smile on his mouth, he bent his head, finding the nipple with his lips and teeth and then licking away the ache, stroking it with wet caresses. This time, she purred for him. Again, his teeth scraped, then nipped and she gasped.

  But he didn’t soothe her with his tongue as he had before. Not yet. Adrian lifted his gaze to hers. “Does it hurt?”

  “Yes,” she whispered with a shuddered breath.

  “But you like it, don’t you?”

  She cupped her breast, offering him her nipples again. “Yes.”

  He gave her what she wanted, suckling her rosy nipple deep into his mouth. But not for long. Adrian buried his face in her neck, pressing their bodies together and rocking. For several minutes, they moved together, toward satisfaction and release. Rising to the ultimate completion.

  The instant her body clenched, biting at him with orgasm, he felt his own pump from his body, as well. He sunk his teeth into her shoulder, tasting the crimson pleasure of her blood as he spilled himself in the wet recesses of her body. She stiffened, gasping at the sting of his cuspids burning through her flesh. But only moments later, she sighed with bliss and called his name…Adrian.

  And, that easily, her conversion began.

  When he withdrew his teeth, he ran a finger across her wounds, sealing them, but not completely wiping them from view. He preferred his victims see the proof he’d claimed their lives, their very existence.

  A knock sounded on the door, and he shoved the nurse off of him. When she protested, he sent her a mental command, ordering her to sleep. She sank onto the mattress, obeying as he knew she would, her soul, her mind, her very being, already sliding in between the living and the dead. Into his control.

  “Come in,” Adrian called.

  The double doors opened, light spilling into the dimly lit room from the hallway. Beneath the ground, it always felt like night, but the beasts saw almost as well in the darkness as in the light.

  Adrian’s next in charge appeared in the entryway, shrinking it with his broad shoulders and muscular frame. Years before he’d been called Drake. Adrian simply called him Segundo or “second.” It kept things in perspective. His Segundo would never be the “first.” That was his role with Cain and no one else’s. The last Darkland that tried to take his place lost his head.

  Adrian waved a hand at the lamp on the nightstand, using one of his many magical abilities to illuminate the room in a dim glow, the act a subtle reminder of his higher rank and skill.

  “Where the hell have you been, Segundo?” Adrian demanded, sitting up, unconcerned about his nakedness. “I’ve been trying to reach you for hours.”

  Segundo stepped inside the room, shutting the door and then taking a military stance, hand crossed in front of his chest, legs in a V. His chiseled, harsh features showed no reaction, his square jaw set and unmoving.

  For a mere instant, Segundo’s eyes flickered to the naked woman on the bed and then returned to Adrian. “The recruitment mission ran into difficulty.”

  “What the hell does that mean? What can go wrong with a simple recruitment mission?” Adrian’s question came out an intentional demand, harsh and lethal. He felt the fury inside building. He sat up on the edge of the bed, not looking at his second as he waited for the answer. Instead he inhaled, fighting the urge to cross the distance and jack Segundo against the wall. Nothing was going to screw with his plans to take down Jag. Nothing.

  And the damn silence was pissing him off. When he asked a question, he damn sure expected an answer. And he felt the uneasiness in his second. Adrian didn’t have to look at the other beast, to feel the tension. The anger.

  “Well?” Adrian asked, yanking open the nightstand and withdrawing a small Mexican cigar. He shoved it between his lips and lit it.

  Finally Segundo spoke, his words tight and low. “A battle with the Knights means substantial loss of manpower.”

  Adrian drew deep on his
cigar and then glanced at Segundo, taking his time to respond. Letting Segundo squirm.

  His second came off as cold and callous to those around him. The scar that zigzagged down his right cheek along with his military-style buzz-cut haircut only serving to intensify the blackness of his deep-set eyes. But Segundo didn’t even come close to matching how cold Adrian could be. His second would be smart to remember as much.

  “So you thought you’d recruit to fill those losses today?” Adrian asked.

  “Exactly,” Segundo replied. “Preparing for the worst.”

  Adrian narrowed his eyes on the other beast, keeping his voice low. Lethal. “I expected preparation to be done—” he raised his voice “—in goddamn advance! And there better not be a worst case. This better go so great that we are celebrating.” His voice lowered and his tone took on an edge of menace. “Got that?”

  The other beast cut his gaze to the floor as if hiding his reaction. “Yes, master,” he mumbled.

  With a mental picture, Adrian clothed himself. Black leather pants. Black T-shirt. Black boots. He stood, feeling the power running through his body. The power of anger, of anticipation, of thirst for Jag’s destruction. Of the rewards Cain would give him for destroying the mighty leader of the Knights.

  Segundo lifted his eyes. “Master—”

  When Segundo opened his mouth to explain, it was the last straw. Adrian would have thought Segundo would know better than to make excuses by now.

  Segundo managed two more words before Adrian acted. Those words, “My intention—”

  Adrian bit the cigar between his teeth and held his palms up, stop-sign fashion. Segundo flew in the air and hit the door, his body pinned to the wooden surface, his muscles and even his vocal cords frozen. Adrian allowed him to breathe.

  But just barely.

  It had been far too long since he’d last reminded his second of just how potent his master’s powers. Now, before they put their plans in play with the Knights of White, Adrian wanted Segundo to remember. To know just how painful Adrian would make his failure. He wanted Segundo to feel fear.

  With a blink, Adrian flashed out of the room and reappeared in front of Segundo. He took a puff off his cigar and then withdrew it from his lips. “I love these damn things,” he said looking at the thin brown smoke between his fingers and inhaling the musty smell. “But I have some Cubans stored away to celebrate the destruction of Jag.”

  For several seconds, he stared at the face of his second. He respected Segundo more than most around him. This beast was one who lusted after power and control as Adrian himself did. Honorable qualities—as long as they were kept in check. Adrian eyed the scar on Segundo’s face and then smiled.

  Without warning, he shoved his lit cigar into the old wound. A wound born of Segundo’s human days. Segundo’s shock and pain ripped through Adrian’s body, delivering a rush of pure pleasure and Adrian laughed with the high of it.

  He pushed harder on the smoke, grounding it into the raw, now open skin. “Mess up my plans,” Adrian said, “and I’ll burn every inch of your body.”

  He pinned Segundo in a stare, searching his eyes, to be sure his second understood fully. When he was certain he’d made his point, Adrian stepped backward, tossing the cigar in the air. A second later it vanished.

  Adrian held his palms up again and Segundo fell to the ground.

  “Get up,” Adrian said, feeling Segundo’s anger and defeat charge the air. He motioned toward the bed where the naked servant lay. “Use the girl. She’s a hot little bitch, eager to please. Work this out of your system because I won’t deal with this on the battlefield.” Adrian sneered. “Just not here.” He hated intruders in his space. “We leave in three hours.”

  And then, he flashed the beast and the human woman out of his room.

  Marisol entered the miniature cathedral-like structure nestled deep in the trees to the west of the main house. She had inherited it from the Healer who had served the Knights before her.

  The Healer no one talked about, not even Salvador. A little detail that bothered her in a deep way. Had her predecessor met destruction—or salvation?

  Resolved to control her own destiny, she stepped inside the octagon-shaped room she called “The Green Room” because everything inside was some shade of green. The walls, curtains, even the carpet. A color symbolic of rebirth and rejuvenation.

  It was here Marisol often found solitude. Not an easy thing to come by with the Knights, and their big bodies and bigger attitudes at every turn.

  Taking in the sight of the room, Marisol already felt calmer. She padded across the carpet to a small chest sitting beside the only real piece of furniture in the room, an oversize chair.

  Marisol couldn’t get to Salvador, so she had to face facts. She was on her own, her duty as her guide. Already, a human’s soul threatened to slip away. And she couldn’t let it happen. She could not fail.

  On many occasions, she called souls back to humans, but this time was different. A powerful darkness held Eva’s soul in its control. A darkness she had to stop.

  With The Book of Knowledge in hand, Marisol sank into the familiar comfort of the chair. She pressed her palm against its surface, feeling an odd but familiar sense of power from holding it. She felt its weight where it rested on her lap, heavy with the wisdom it held. Wisdom passed on from Healer after Healer, century after century.

  With resolve to find a solution to save her new patient, Marisol considered her book. The book she’d never had a use for before now, although she had studied from cover to cover, because until now, healing had come as easily as funneling her energy.

  Marisol lifted the cover of the book, determination in her mind. She’d won her spot as Healer, a chance to make good on her past, and she wouldn’t fail. Eva would be saved.

  Chapter 10

  It was an hour later when Jag approached the cathedral. Marisol knew it was him, just as she always did. Magic surrounded his presence, strong and forceful. Untouched, because Jag refused to truly accept all he could be.

  On the outside, a warrior led the Knights. On the inside, she felt his fear. Fear of himself and what he had become. He’d been delivered into his destiny, while she’d chosen hers. Marisol understood his struggles. She also worried they would be his demise.

  She put the book away, a plan formed to heal Eva. Just as she turned toward the door, Jag pushed it open, his expression guarded as always. “Any ideas?”

  “Other than you finding the beast controlling her and killing it?” she asked, but didn’t expect a response. “Maybe. Or at least a way to hold her in this world until we can find another one.”

  Jag gave her a questioning look, one brow arching upward.

  Still, she hesitated, knowing she was treading on choppy water. “I should be able to use her sister’s love as a boost to my powers. That is, if I can get her to believe in the Darklands and in my healing abilities.”

  “She already knows the truth. She just hasn’t accepted it.” His lips thinned. “Make her. She’s with her sister now.”

  This news came as a surprise. Just hours before, she’d expressed her concern over the sister’s confinement only to be cut off cold. These women were victims, but Jag acted as if they were enemies.

  “I should be there, too,” Marisol said, starting for the door but forced to stop again.

  Jag still blocked the entryway. He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Yet, the air crackled with an electric current. With unspoken words.

  “What is it?” Marisol said, feeling his tension, wishing she understood what was going on.

  “Someone has been playing with my dreams.” He hesitated. “Not just mine. Karen’s, too. I need you to find a way to make it stop.”

  Marisol narrowed her eyes on him. “I’m confused. What kind of dreams?”

  A muscle in his jaw jumped. “Just make them stop, Marisol.”

  “I don’t know if I can,” she said. “Salvador—”

  “Isn’t here,” he finish
ed for her. “You are.”

  This was way over her head. She didn’t know enough information to start working this and Jag didn’t seem to want to give any more, either.

  “One more thing,” he said. “I need to know Karen understands what will happen if she runs.”

  Marisol narrowed her eyes on his, searched the black depths of his unreadable stare. She also noted his use of the human woman’s name. “Meaning the Darklands will hunt her down and kill her.”

  “Meaning I’ll go after her.”

  That wasn’t the answer she expected, and she tried to hide the surprise she knew had to register on her face. Who was this woman, and what did she mean to Jag?

  “Because the Darklands will be after her, right? You’ll go after her to save her,” she said, her final statement not meant as a question…yet it was. Why was there a hint of threat in his voice?

  But Jag didn’t answer. He was already walking away.

  Marisol had no option. She needed to talk to Karen.

  Karen paced the bedroom again, needing somewhere, anywhere, to put all the confusion and emotion burning inside.

  Jag’s order to “stay away” replayed in her head, over and over, a loud taunt in the silence in the bedroom. Why did the words bother her so much? And if he wanted her “away,” why’d he bring her here and lock her up in the first place?

  His claim of “monsters” who would hunt her and Eva down and kill them rang with eerie warning in her mind. Karen had seen the marks on her sister’s skin. She’d heard the stories, the ones that claimed Jaguar Ranch to be the home of the monster hunters. She’d come here to heal her sister, to find help and even protection.

  Protecting someone didn’t mean making them a prisoner. She’d gladly leave if only she could.

  But then, there lay a complication, and she knew it. Deep down, Karen wasn’t so sure she really did want to leave. For some reason, coming here had felt the right choice. Being here now, despite the craziness of the event unfolding, felt right, as well. More than right. It felt like the way to save her sister…and maybe herself.