Darkness Burning Read online

  The kiss he gave her was hard, a branding of lips that softened to a gentler molding as her trembling slowed.

  “I’m shattered. Utterly wiped,” she said, smiling tiredly when at last he lifted his lips.

  Their bodies still connected, Alex didn’t respond. Instead, he slid his hands down her damp belly, past the moist curls, raised the thin hood over the bulging, engorged knot of her clitoris, and circled it with two fingers.

  Gabriella groaned. “No more. Can’t breathe.”

  He rubbed harder, and her pussy clasped around his cock, a reflexive contraction of muscle—a sexy little caress that encouraged him to continue to slowly circle. “Let’s talk now.”

  Gabriella gasped. “You’re insane…Can’t think.”

  “Then don’t. Go with your instinct, instead of weighing all the outcomes.” He tapped her clit, then toggled it again.

  She wriggled, trying to grind down on his cock. “We have all the time in the world here. You said so yourself.”

  “This doesn’t have to be the end of us, Gabi. But we do need to conclude our bargain.”

  Gabriella’s head fell back against his shoulder. “The only bargain I’ve made was to capture or kill you. They aren’t fussy how you’re rendered to them.”

  “Do they know what I am?”

  “Only that you’re a daywalking vampire. I’m sure that bitch Inanna has her suspicions. The others are less sure.”

  “So they don’t know for sure that I’m Born. Only that I’m not confined to roaming at night.”

  “That’s what I said,” she bit out. She cupped his balls again, tugging with just enough strength that he wasn’t alarmed but rather grew aroused again.

  He cupped her breasts and squeezed them hard.

  Gabriella’s breath hissed between her teeth. “What do you want from me? Time to escape?”

  “For you to turn a blind eye.”

  “I can’t do that. My clan agreed to this hunt. They have no more love of a daywalker than your coven-sisters.”

  “There is more at stake than just my continued existence.”

  “All I have is your word on that.”

  “I can give you a glimpse into our future. Show you a window into the darkness.”

  Her head slid along his shoulder as she tilted her face to meet his gaze. Her expression was open, hopeful for a reprieve in their private battle.

  He could use that.

  Gabriella nuzzled his cheek. “Show me.”

  CHAPTER 11

  Alex kissed her shoulder, then gently lifted her from his lap. They both drew deep, ragged breaths as his cock slid free from her hot, silken sheath. He stood and grabbed a napkin from the bureau, then handed it to Gabriella, who grimaced but quickly wiped away the moisture gleaming on her thighs.

  “Are you taking me somewhere else? Should I dress?”

  Alex shook his head and held out his hand.

  Gabriella approached him warily, but she slid her hand inside his, not hesitating when he pulled her close and turned them both toward the bureau and the mirror hanging above it.

  She glanced up, a question in her eyes.

  “When I was very little, still a boy,” he began softly, “before I came into my powers, Simon gave me a crystal and told me that if ever I was in danger, I should hold it in my hand and wish myself away.”

  Her head tilted, her gaze sliding slyly toward his abandoned pants.

  Alex lifted her chin with a finger to bring her gaze back to his. “The spell he used to craft the key to this room answers only to my touch.”

  She wrinkled her nose, then smiled innocently. “Of course it does. Tell me the rest of your fairy tale.”

  “I came here often, bringing things for my comfort. Weapons and games. Food and drink. One day, Simon asked for me to bring him here. He brought that mirror and hung it. He told me if ever I wanted to see my future, I was to touch the frame—never the glass—and wait. It would appear.”

  “No ‘Mirror, mirror on the wall’ incantation?” she asked, her tone lazy and amused.

  Alex lifted an eyebrow. “It has its own enchantment. Mirrors are a specialty of Simon’s.” He turned her face back toward the glass. “Touch the frame.”

  Alex kept his attention on Gabi’s face, watching the mirror from the corner of his eye. He knew well enough what she would see and preferred reading her reactions so that he might gauge the impact of what she saw.

  She lifted her hand slowly, gave him a darting, narrowed glance, then touched her fingers to the bottom of the frame.

  The mirror’s surface began to shimmer, their reflections blurring, darkening, then disappearing.

  Gabi gasped and jerked back her hand.

  The mirror blinked, and then returned their reflections again.

  “Don’t be afraid. Touch only the frame and you’ll be fine.”

  “What happens if I touch the glass?” she asked, tension creeping into her voice.

  Alex shrugged. “I don’t know. I never tried.”

  Gabi shook her head. “How does a kid with a magic mirror never give it a try?”

  Alex met her gaze in the mirror. “Because I’ve seen what’s on the other side.”

  She blinked, her expression sharpening. “It’s that scary?”

  “If you’d summon your courage, you can find out for yourself.”

  Gabi’s eyebrows furrowed. “I’m not afraid. Just cautious. Why should I trust you?”

  “If I’d wanted to harm you, I’d have tightened that collar ’til you choked,” he growled.

  Gabi rubbed her back against his chest. “Alex, I’m a sick little wolf cub. The way you just said that made me wet.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Gabi. Touch the frame.”

  Her chin came up, and she reached to grip the bottom edge of the gilt frame.

  The shimmering cleared, the surface appearing liquid.

  Gabi leaned close to peer into it, but she jerked back when her breaths rippled the surface. Their reflections darkened, becoming vague shadows as the window opened into another room.

  Golden candles from heavy chandeliers and wall sconces barely pierced the dark corners of the large hall stretching before them. The walls of the room were made of precisely hewn gray stone, with keyhole windows that opened into darkness. Wooden tables laden with mounds of food stretched the length of the hall. Benches flanked the tables and were filled with people—women dressed in lavish gowns and jewels, men wearing medieval chausses and tunics. They’d sat down to dinner, but their faces turned time and again toward a dais, where a single gilded table rested. They bent their heads together, talking.

  “They can’t see us?”

  “They don’t even know we observe. And we can’t hear them.”

  “But it’s beautiful,” Gabriella said. “Everyone’s beautiful.”

  “Beautifully garbed, love. A gilded cage. Keep watching.” He’d seen this ritual play out hundreds of times. His belly tightened, and he placed his hands on her shoulders, gripping her firmly.

  Gabriella stiffened, but she kept her gaze locked on the room.

  “Watch the woman in the wine-colored gown,” Alex said softly. “Look closely.”

  The woman sat at the end of one of the tables nearest their “window.” Her dark gown was edged with shimmering embroidery. A bloodred stone hanging from a heavy gold necklace lay between her breasts. The man beside her turned toward her, slipped his finger into the top of her gown, and pulled it down to expose a puckered nipple.

  The woman’s mouth opened around a silent scream. She leaned backward, trying to escape his touch, but he thrust a brawny arm around her back and bent to capture her breast between his teeth. He bit, blood seeping downward to disappear against her dark gown. Although she shoved and pulled at his coarse, black hair, he didn’t budge from her breast.

  Her lips drew back, and then her teeth elongated, every one of them growing, interlocking from top to bottom, until her mouth was overfilled, and she snapped and gnashed i
neffectively as the man held her upper body in his strong grip.

  Her body stretched, her back losing its stiffness, falling toward the floor, but he climbed off the bench to follow her there. Her arms reached outward, then waved as though boneless. They began to change colors, from pale, creamy white, to green, to dull, ashy gray. She cupped her hands, fusing the fingers together, forming two heads that resembled cobras. The heads stabbed toward the man’s back and face, sinking long fangs into his neck as he continued to savage her breast.

  Gabriella’s body shuddered, but her horrified gaze didn’t veer from the couple. As though their struggle was a cue, all around them others began to claw at clothing. Men swept women onto the tables, lifted their skirts, and began to rape. Knives and forks struck flesh, and blood began to spill across the floor.

  Gabi shivered in front of him, her gaze widening.

  “Step a little to the left, love,” Alex whispered. “Watch the door.”

  Reluctantly, she shuffled to the side, her knuckles whitening on the frame she still grasped. Her head turned slowly, her gaze dragging reluctantly from the carnage.

  At this angle the entrance to the hall could be observed. Two short, burly men flanked either side of a set of large wooden doors.

  “Stare at the guards, let your gaze blur just a little and find their auras,” Alex said close to her ear. He did the same, staring at the two men whose frames seemed to waver, a dark shadow detaching from each of them to slump forward to the ground on all fours.

  Their dark, shadowy outlines grew darker, their forms more substantive. Deep, slavering muzzles protruded. Canines the length of daggers curved from their jaws.

  “They’re dogs?” she whispered.

  “Hellhounds. Their screams can drive a man mad. Or so Simon has told me.”

  The door opened, and the dogs leaped around, their bodies tensing and quivering in their excitement, their jaws opening and shutting around silent howls. Wind gusted inside from pitch darkness, carrying leaves and small branches.

  A man entered, so tall he dwarfed the hounds, who tucked their tails between their legs as he held out his hands to them. Grabbing them by the scruffs of their necks, he walked the length of the hall while all gazes turned toward him—except for the first couple, still writhing on the floor.

  He halted beside them, lifted one hound off his front legs, and then released it.

  The hound lunged toward the couple; its jaws opened wide and snapped around the back of the man’s neck, cutting it in two. The man’s head rolled away as his body grew slack above the demon woman.

  Gabi flinched, but she didn’t release her grip.

  Alex admired her courage. He’d been in his teens before he’d grown inured to this endless feast.

  “Who is he?” she whispered.

  Alex glanced back to the tall, powerful warrior, who continued with one hound toward the dais, where he took his seat and slumped in his chair, his hands gripping the arms of his throne, his expression wiped of any emotion. “The Master of the Demons.”

  “Are they all demons?”

  “No. The man never changed his form when he attacked the demon woman. He’s a human, forced to relive his own sins and torture again and again. Watch long enough and you’ll learn a lot. Demons and humans meet in the hall, fornicate, and feed off each other.”

  “And the Demon Master?”

  “Never moves from his throne until the meal is complete. Then he leaves, the servants sweep away the carnage, and it starts again. Look for his aura, Gabi.”

  He knew the moment she’d found it by her sharp indrawn gasp.

  The Master’s aura surrounded him in a large black cloud that slowly firmed, so immense it stretched the length of the dais. His spiked tail swept up and down, then curved toward his body as it settled. But it was the crenellated ridges atop his snout and the golden, glowing eyes, with their lizardlike, slitted pupils, that identified his inner demon.

  “He’s a dragon? They exist?”

  “You’re a werewolf,” he said dryly. “Why are you so surprised?”

  “Because I’ve never seen one in this realm. Alex?” Her head swiveled, her gaze locking with his. “Is this happening now, or is this the future?”

  “The answer’s more complicated than that. And simpler.”

  “I don’t understand. That sounds like mage-talk.”

  Alex couldn’t help smiling. How many times had he railed at Simon for his ambiguous pronouncements? “Let me try to explain. The same way this cavern doesn’t occupy the same place or time as our reality back home, neither does that place. When doesn’t matter so much, but Simon believes the how will occur soon. In our realm and time.”

  “The ‘how’ to accomplish what?”

  “For them to escape. To breach a portal and enter our realm.”

  “Why do you think that will happen?”

  “When I started watching this feast, centuries ago, there weren’t as many tables. They weren’t situated as close together as they are now. So close—”

  “You feel like you could reach through and touch them?”

  “Right. Fewer demons, fewer humans. The hall is filling. One day there will be no more room.”

  “Are there no other rooms in that keep?”

  “There are an infinite number, but Simon believes that if we opened windows into each of them, we would find the same thing. Not enough room, and so many demons and unfortunates that the carnage of each night’s punishments stretches longer every meal.”

  “What is that place? Does it have a name?”

  “You know what it is, Gabi.”

  She withdrew her fingers from the mirror. She waited until it blinked and returned their pale reflections, then she turned to wrap her arms around his waist, snuggling her face against his chest. “It’s Hell. Isn’t it, Alex?”

  He tightened his arms around her, felt the faint shivers, and knew that she’d realized she’d glimpsed her own future.

  Miki gave the driver a haggard smile as she stepped out of the limo with his assistance. She’d fallen asleep in the backseat. Her body felt stiff, her movements forced. She was tired and bruised, inside and out. And dirty.

  She longed for a hot bath. One she could lie inside and never leave, just emptying and reopening the taps to fill her tub long past the time her skin pruned.

  But there was no running water in the building. Not even a light over the entrance as she fumbled in a pocket for her key.

  As the limo pulled away from the curb, she held out her keys, seeking enough moonlight to find the building key.

  The lock turned behind her. The shadow in the doorway was stooped and thick. Old Man Mouton stood in the opening, a shotgun resting across his folded arms. “Thought we were gonna have to mount a patrol of our own, missy.”

  “Sorry I didn’t tell you I’d be late. Something came up.” If only she’d stopped by when she’d thought about it earlier. She might have hesitated, might have decided it was wiser to stay inside.

  Light blinded her for a moment as he pointed a flashlight at her and scanned her body. “Best get off the doorstep. Not safe out there, fille.”

  The gruffness of his tone, deeper than usual, had Miki’s throat tightening.

  “That man from the magazine come by earlier. Dropped off an envelope. Bet it’s cash. And notes for you.”

  “Emile was here?”

  “Just said that,” he snapped.

  Miki took no offense, knowing his gruffness hid a soft heart.

  “You get on up to your room. Keep your door and windows locked.”

  Miki blinked tiredly. Windows, too? She lived on the second floor. Well above reach of any criminals looking for an easy target.

  But the way his gaze bored into hers told her there was more to his warning. His lips firmed. “There’s craziness on them streets. Crazy people. Crazy t’ings. I don’t have ta tell you ’bout it, now.”

  His whispered words sent a chill down her spine. He knew. Knew what she’d f
ound. What she’d done. Miki’s gaze slid away from his. “Thanks for looking out for me. I’m heading to bed.”

  “Remember, keep those windows closed.”

  The air inside the stairwell was thick, humid, and starting to stink with garbage piling up outside the building and in the occupied apartments. Her room would be stifling. “I’ll remember,” she replied and started the climb to her apartment.

  “Need my flashlight?” he called after her.

  Wanting to get away, to be alone and lick her wounds, she didn’t answer; she just lifted her key chain in the air, hit the end of the small flashlight hanging from the fob, and began the slow climb.

  Once inside her one-room apartment, she stripped, dropping her clothes and letting them lie on the ground as she moved toward the bathroom. Inside, she lit candles, stoppered the sink, and filled the basin with bottled water. She started with her face, working suds into a cloth, then scouring her skin in circles.

  Watching her own reflection in the mirror, she concentrated on working methodically—scouring, rinsing, before moving on to another area to clean. She paused at her neck, turning her head to find the faint indentions where Alex and Nic had taken their bites and healed her wounds with their tongues. She scrubbed extra hard on the corner of her neck.

  The last place Alexander had bitten her.

  The liar. He’d said he wasn’t a vampire. A Revenant, as he’d called them. But she recalled the savage bite he’d given her at the last when she’d been too overcome with misery and enervating pleasure to throw his words back at him.

  Alexander was the man in the alley. And she’d been fool enough, desperate enough, to want to believe he was human and good.

  She scrubbed behind her ear, circling over the tattoo Alex had remarked upon. The one she’d chosen in this new life as a symbol of her rebirth.

  She rinsed the cloth, soaped it again, and rubbed lower, over her aching breasts, welcoming the discomfort, washing her skin as though she could wash the memories of what she’d allowed—no, invited—them to do. Her nipples flared, raw and red, too tender for even a soft touch, but she scoured them anyway.

  Working steadily, she reached the apex of her thighs. She lifted a foot and placed it on top of the closed lid of her toilet. The first touch of the cool, wet cloth to her inflamed pussy had air hissing between her lips.