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  Jag gave Rock a quick nod. “Is Marisol making progress?”

  Rock’s grim expression told the story before his words. “The girl won’t respond.”

  Marisol had sent word through Des that she needed to speak to Jag. He assumed this was why. In the past, any human Marisol had healed had responded well. She’d done her job, wiped the person’s memory and returned them to their home.

  Somehow, it didn’t surprise Jag that this new visitor wasn’t so easily cured. Nothing about these two sisters fit the norm.

  Jag looked at the closed door where Karen waited and then to the separate one where Marisol and the injured sister were. As much as he wanted to deal with Karen and get it over with, he should talk with Marisol first. Decision made, Jag gave Rock a nod and entered the room.

  He found Marisol sitting beside the bed of the injured woman, her long raven hair spilling forward, her hand hovering over the woman’s chest, a light spilling from her palm into Eva’s chest. Jag stood back, watching, hoping for results. Giving Marisol the peace to do her work.

  Jag’s attention went to the pale woman on the bed…Darkness formed half moons beneath her eyes. No doubt, a beast had been feeding on her, taking her life force and using her body for pleasure. The threat to Eva was not the physical damage done by the bites. It was the state of limbo her soul was left in. Jag had been drained dry, his soul ripped from his body. With Eva, the beast was playing with her. Draining her slowly. Leaving her soul stuck between two worlds.

  Biting the victim was a Darklands way of marking the woman. Eva had been claimed, first as an amusement, then most likely for death. Rarely did the Darklands convert a female. They preferred using women for pleasure. Humans who were easily controlled and then disposed of.

  Her injury seemed to indicate these women were being hunted, not doing the hunting. But the picture was too uncertain, too full of questions. Willingly or not, these women were somehow connected with a Darkland plot to destroy the Knights. It was the only explanation.

  Eva tossed her head from side to side, moaning as she murmured incoherent words. Aggressive, angry words. Almost as if she fought the Healer’s efforts. Unlike the other humans they’d healed, Eva didn’t act as if she wanted to come back to this world.

  A frustrated sound slipped from Marisol’s lips, and she dropped her hand. She fixed Jag in her emerald-green stare. Eyes so green they looked unnatural. So pure they made Jag feel his every ounce of darkness within.

  “She won’t respond,” Marisol said.

  Jag leaned against the wall, one booted foot against the surface, arms crossed in front of his chest. “You’ve had tough cases before.”

  “Never like this,” Marisol argued. “She…” Her words trailed off as the Healer’s gaze slid back to Eva.

  “She what?”

  Marisol seemed to reluctantly look at him. “It’s like someone is pulling her away from me. I’ve never experienced that before. Someone…very powerful.” She inhaled and let it out. “I tried to reach Salvador, but he won’t answer.”

  For Marisol to call on Salvador, she had to be worried. “Do what you can,” Jag said, knowing she couldn’t transport to Salvador until he allowed her to do so. Until Salvador answered her call, Marisol was without his guidance.

  “I will,” Marisol said, nodding, her expression showing the same distress her voice did. “I’m sorry, Jag. I’m really trying.”

  Her desire to serve a greater cause never ceased to humble him. Marisol knew her purpose and lived it. He didn’t know her past, nor did he know how she’d become what she was. But he didn’t have to. She’d only been with him a few years, but Jag trusted her more than he did a few of the Knights who’d been with him far longer.

  Jag forced himself to stare into those eyes of hers, so full of pureness and good. Windows into her soul, showing her to be so much different from himself. “If anyone can do it, you can,” he told her, meaning it from deep inside. “I know you can.”

  She studied him a moment and then inhaled. “Thank you, Jag. Your confidence means the world to me. I’m going to consult the Book of Knowledge. Somewhere in it, perhaps, I will find a solution.”

  Every Healer brought with them a book with pages only they could read. Pages blank to the common eye. Jag pushed off the wall. “Do what you must. Have Rock stay with her. I’ll see what I can find out from the sister.”

  With those words, Jag turned toward the hallway, toward the path to his dream woman. He could no longer put off this confrontation. The time had come to talk.

  And as he reached for her doorknob, deep in his soul, Jag knew, once he walked into her room, once he faced her, life as he knew it would never be the same.

  Marisol watched as Jag left the room, feeling heaviness in her heart. Whatever test Salvador had spoken of, whatever evil was coming, had arrived. She glanced down at the woman on the bed, knowing she was a part of some dark master plan of the enemies.

  What she didn’t understand was why evil wanted this particular woman so badly. And it did. Marisol had felt a dark force pulling the soul of this woman even as she had tried to rescue it.

  Worse, the human felt drawn to this dark presence. As if she thought it held her salvation. As if Marisol was the enemy.

  “Jag said you needed me.”

  Marisol looked up to find Rock in the doorway. Tall with light brown hair and a young, athletic body, he didn’t look a day over twenty-five, yet, she knew him to be fifty.

  Rock.

  Her friend. Her temptation.

  His words replayed in her mind. Jag said you needed me. Her stomach fluttered. Wanted was more like it. Only she was supposed to be above the temptations of the flesh. Yet, it went beyond such a thing. Her heart called to Rock, as did his to hers. She felt it. Even saw it in his eyes when he looked at her. Heard it in his voice when they talked. And they did that a lot. Long hours of talking when everyone slept. Or they had. She’d pulled back, knowing she was crossing a line.

  There could be no future for a Knight and a Healer. The very fact that she wished there was proved her weakness. She was unworthy to be called Healer.

  After all, she was here to prove she could move to the next level of service. To prove she could aid in the battle against those who destroyed her family, the Darklands, and still remain pure. She was here to heal and guide, to support, while also making up for the vengeance she had once sought against another.

  In other words, she had no room for failure.

  “Marisol?”

  Blinking, Marisol realized she’d drifted into her own, painful reverie. She refocused on Rock. “Yes.” Hesitation. “I’m sorry. I do need…assistance.” Marisol pushed to her feet, cutting her eyes from Rock’s warm hazel stare. She hated it when he looked at her like he was now. So concerned. So caring. It made it hard to stay distant from him. Already she’d crossed too many lines with him. Now, in the face of evil, having just felt it in the fight for this woman’s soul, she knew she had to put distance between them. “Can you stay with the woman while I do a little research?”

  “Of course.” A moment of silence. “You are troubled.”

  She still couldn’t look at him. Marisol started toward the door, wishing she didn’t have to pass him. Wishing she could run out of the room and not look into his eyes again.

  But she couldn’t. She knew this even before she came shoulder to shoulder with him and felt his hand lightly shackle her arm. Goose bumps covered her skin at the touch, her body reacting in ways it shouldn’t. Inwardly she screamed at her own weakness. She didn’t want to fail her test. She didn’t want to let down those who depended on her.

  “Marisol?” he asked, concern in his voice. “Are you okay?” Slowly she let her gaze lift to his, trying to prepare herself for the jolt of awareness she knew would come. And when their eyes locked, she felt the impact clear to her toes.

  “Let go, Rock,” she said, her voice holding an intentional chill, and hating what she had to do. Hating pushing him away, but kn
owing it was necessary. “I have a job to do and so do you.”

  A wounded look flashed across his face before he wiped his expression clean. It tore at her gut. Marisol knew his past. Knew how much pain he felt inside. The Knights, all of them, needed so much more than she could offer. Their souls were dark with the pain of the past, needing a kind of healing she couldn’t offer.

  But it was Rock’s soul, his deep ache and loneliness that reached out to her like no other. She didn’t understand why, only that it felt like she was meant to experience his hurt.

  Like she was supposed to heal what she had no power over…his loneliness and torment.

  Abruptly Rock dropped his hand, shutting himself off from her as if he’d closed a door. “Right. We have a job to do.”

  The loss of his touch, of his emotional connection to her, felt like a tear in her heart. Marisol swallowed against the emotion rising to her throat, and forced herself to step forward. Away from Rock. Away from temptation. There was more at risk here than his feelings or her own.

  They were both on this earth to fight a war against evil. And fight they must. Win they must.

  No matter what sacrifices or pain came with the battle.

  Karen paced the bedroom floor, her stomach fluttering with a combination of worry and just plain sickness. She hadn’t slept. Hadn’t eaten. Hadn’t stopped worrying since she’d gotten that telegram from Eva saying Mike was dead.

  A rush of nausea came over her and Karen paused, pressing her palm to her forehead. God. She didn’t have time to feel sick but her body wasn’t cooperating. It wanted rest. If only she’d slept on the plane instead of worrying and working on her article.

  Why wouldn’t they let her see Eva?

  She shouldn’t have come here. She didn’t even know if this Healer treating Eva was a real doctor. She had to get her sister to another hospital. Besides, something wasn’t right here. What exactly had she walked into? How could the man from the airport be here?

  Karen couldn’t quite get her mind around his presence. Of course, her body had grasped the concept quite easily. Even tired, he’d drawn a sizzling reaction. A reaction she felt guilty as heck for. The man had her locked in a room, captive for all practical purposes, forbidding her from seeing her sister, and Karen had managed to get all lusty over him. How sick was that?

  Karen sank onto the bed. She’d reacted to him at the airport, too. That funny familiarity from her dream niggled inside a bit stronger. Her mind played with some distant image, trying to make it vivid and understandable, trying to grasp it. The clouds were thick and hard to clear. She was just so tired. Maybe rest would make her remember how she knew this man. Because to dream of him, she had to know him.

  As her lashes fluttered, Karen told herself to stand back up. To get her blood pumping again. Her body just felt so horribly achy and heavy. Yet, the very thought of falling asleep while terrible things could be happening to her sister brought panic. What if this Healer did more damage than good?

  She had to stay awake. There wasn’t another option.

  Karen balled her fists in the dark brown comforter on top of the mattress. Everything in the room was brown. Brown curtains. Brown blankets. Brown carpet. Brown. Brown. Brown. So incredibly dreary and dark. And so was the future right now. Somehow, Karen realized, she’d taken a bad situation and made it worse. Somehow, once again, she had failed Eva.

  Karen looked skyward. “Mom. Dad.” Her chest tightened painfully and she gave into the need to rest, easing back to lay on the mattress. “I don’t know how to fix this.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I have to save Eva…I…”

  A knocked sounded and Karen jerked up to a sitting position. Before she could find her way to her feet, the door flew open. In strode the man who seemed to hold her destiny in his hands. As he had on their prior two meetings, his powerful presence overwhelmed her, his masculine beauty registering even when she wanted to deny its presence.

  But as he slammed the door behind him, locking the door and turning to face her, the contempt and anger in his deep, dark eyes were what took her breath away. Whatever brought this man here now, it wasn’t an apology.

  From the look in his eye, it appeared he wanted more than a word with her…He wanted blood.

  Chapter 7

  Jag allowed anger to drive his actions as he entered the bedroom, shutting the door behind him, and locking it. Turning to face the woman he now knew as Karen, that anger coursed through his veins. How dare she come in here, taunting him with his wife’s name, with her sacred memory?

  It was bad enough this woman haunted his dreams. Now she dared to taint the name of his only love.

  Unexplainably, as angry as he was, as full of fury, he managed to bite back his imminent explosion. He studied her, this woman who might well be his enemy, exploring her features. Searching for some unnamed something.

  What he found was a look of concern and uncertainty so raw, so real, the power of his emotions shifted. Softened. Began to evolve into something just as powerful, but far more hungry. This woman did things to him he had yet to understand. Perhaps it was magic, certainly black magic if that were the case.

  In her eyes, in her expression, he saw the same kind of honesty he sensed in Marisol. The same pureness. Surely, if it were an act, the animal in him would sense as much.

  But it was too late to retreat, to rethink his actions. The beast still roared inside, needing an outlet for the anger of only seconds before. The beast he’d always controlled…until this woman. If she was so innocent, so honest, why did she bring it to the surface?

  He watched her movements, the animal inside him purring with life, his body reacting to the vision she made. To the unintentional, yet, oh, so, seductive curves of her hips in the snug black jeans.

  Her eyes narrowed on his face, and it was clear she searched for his intentions just as he did hers. Slowly she took several steps backward, putting distance between them. “How is my sister?”

  “Who sent you here?” Jag demanded, ignoring her question, while refusing to let his reactions to this woman drown out his agenda.

  “Where’s my sister?” Karen demanded in turn, ignoring his question as he had hers. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. Over the top of those lush, full breasts that fit into his hands like they were made for him. He knew, because he’d seen and touched them so many times before in his dreams. Even knew that her nipples were a perfect rosy pink and that they were so sensitive, he could practically bring her to orgasm just by tasting them.

  His gaze dropped, tracing each line of her body through the clingy material of her shirt. Fire burned in his veins, pushing him to claim her as he had so many times before this moment. In the dreams so ripe with reality.

  He’d never met a woman who could do this to him. It went beyond reason, this need, this reaction. He couldn’t be near her, or talk to her, without wanting her. “You didn’t answer my question,” he countered, wanting to know how this woman found him. Wanting to know a lot of things, actually. Questions flew through his mind.

  She spoke through clenched teeth. “Where is my sister?”

  Her fearlessness should have surprised him, but it didn’t. In his dreams, she’d been brazenly direct. He expected nothing less of her in flesh and blood.

  “You already know your sister’s with our Healer,” he said in a low voice. “But what do you know of me before this night?” That was the real question. One he wasn’t going to find out on his current path.

  “I want to see Eva,” Karen declared as if it would make him oblige her wishes.

  Jag noted the command in her voice, but he also sensed her fear. “You’ll see her soon,” he replied. Silently he added, once I decide if I can trust you.

  “Not soon,” she said, pointing at the ground and taking a step forward. “Now.” Her lips thinned. “I want to see her now. We came here for help, not to be locked up like criminals.”

  His nostrils flared with the scent of woman, sultry and sexual, and it
drew an immediate response from his body. Damn this woman. The one he knew far too well for a stranger. The one he’d lost himself in until he couldn’t see straight. The one who had driven him to complete ecstasy and then, by doing so, delivered him to his darker side. She’d shown him his beast and taken him to the edge of the cliff, one step from the pits of hell.

  A mere hair from snapping, Jag crossed his arms in front of his chest, mimicking her prior position. Trying to keep from claiming her. Knowing his physical surrender could be exactly what she wanted. Maybe she was a part of some master plan to destroy him. In his dreams, she’d certainly pushed him to the worst of places, using pleasure as her tool.

  The thought brought a welcome jolt of reality. “And how do I know you aren’t a criminal?” he asked. “You were trespassing.”

  Her eyes went wide. “I came for help and you locked me up. I call that kidnapping.”

  The fear and desperation in Karen’s voice rang with sincerity. He wanted to believe she was a victim. He really did. But not once in his dreams had she come off as innocent. Not once. To trust her would be a grave mistake, and too many depended on him being cautious. His men. Their cause against evil, their fight for good. And evil, he’d long ago learned, could easily come off as pure as newly fallen snow.

  The name Caron meant pure in Italian. He wondered if this woman knew that.

  New anger formed at the thought of being manipulated and before Jag could stop himself, he closed the distance between them. He didn’t give Karen time to protest, pulling her into his arms and staring down at her. Instantly he knew it was a mistake. He’d only meant to rattle her. To grab hold of the situation and make her tell the truth. He just wanted the truth. But everything inside him called to her. He wanted to take her. To taste her. To claim her right here and now.

  His own inability to resist her hardened his voice, frustration at his lack of control burning inside him. Even her stiffness in his arms upset him. He was a wreck, and she was to blame.