Rhye knew if he took the cell phone into the compound lab, Leon would find it contained just one number, super-encrypted and impossible to break. This particular phone was spattered with human blood, the same shit that soaked the front of Livia."Where did you get this, Livia?""I think you know," she replied, her voice quiet but defiant. He turned to face her. "You took it off a Fae? Demons? By yourself? Jesus Christ... how?"She rolled her eyes, "I’m a witch and a warrior for fuck sake, Rhye." She shrugged, rubbing the side of her head as if it hurt her. "I tracked him from the train station. I followed him, and when the chance was there, I killed him."It wasn't often that Rhye was taken by surprise, but hearing those words coming out of the petite witch hit him like a brick to the back of his head. "You can't be serious." But she was. The level look she gave him left no doubt whatsoever.Behind her, the television screen flashed with a live breaking-news bulletin. A reporter came
Livia’s life wasn't all rainbows and sunshine; it was full of pain and betrayal. She once trusted Elfy, believed in Francisco, and trusted so many people, but what did it lead her to? She ended up alone. She had nothing but herself now, and with alpha Rhye in her trail, was there any future for her? Even her own coven ignored her and hated her for a reason even her young mind could comprehend. That, she couldn’t bear. "This is important to me, Rhye. I made a promise to myself to never run again, and yes I found you guys. Maybe it was fate, but I promise not to close my eyes and be blind to everything, and I mean to uphold it." He paused and slid a flat glance over his shoulder. "It’s your funeral. Why don't you leave it to us? My warrior could handle it. Trust me." he said, and pulled the door closed behind him. ***** Rhye threw the last of Livia’s hunting souvenirs into an isolated stretch of the river and watched as the dark water rippled out and the cell phone vanished into the d
The alarm tripped Rhye's senses. Ah, fuck. If Joseph had harmed her, accidentally or not, there would be some serious hell to pay. Rhye liked the witch with an intensity that surprised everyone, even himself. Once the reckless bad boy, Rhye was wrapped around Livia’s slender finger and didn’t care who knew it. He'd kill Joseph with his bare hands if anything happened to his mate. Brother or not. Rhye growled. Something inside him snapped at the thought. How could he think of such an awful act? Joseph was his brother, his only remaining family. Damn it! There was something about that woman that made them all crazy about her. Something no one could even comprehend. Rhye hissed a curse. "What did you do, Joseph?" Joseph gave a miserable shake of his head and gestured vaguely toward the back wing of the sprawling mansion. Rhye was about to take off in that direction when urgent footsteps sounded on the long corridor that led from the general area of the estate’s indoor pool. The soft sm
Rhye smirked. A few months ago, Joseph and his sidekick were ready to tear out each other’s throats. They’d been tossed together by Leon as unwilling partners when she-wolf agent Jasmine showed up at the compound with information about a dangerous magical drug and to solicit help from the hunters in getting the shit off the streets. Now, Joseph, Leon, and Jasmine were almost inseparable in the field; they had been ever since Jessa, Jasmine's older sister, left her and came on board officially as a member of the hunters."Alpha Rhye, what do you think happened to Joseph?" Jasmine's eyes held a trace of confusion as she looked up from the mess in front of her. "If you thought it was a witch, then we should be careful. If this happened to Joseph, then it could happen to anyone.""How can we heal him?""I'll talk to someone, someone who knows about such magic." Rhye groaned. He just hoped Livia could help him heal Joseph. Rhye exhaled a wry breath as he steered Joseph into the hallway. He
They climbed out of the huge dark SUV and skirted the residential area on foot, all three of them keeping to the shadows as they navigated back to the old warehouse lot where the tip had led them.The building looked like shit from the outside – a 1970s industrial eyesore of concrete, wood, and glass. Steel posts from what had once been part of a chain-link fence poked out of the perimeter lot at various angles, not a single one of them straight, not that it mattered. The place had a derelict, keep-out quality about it, even amid the snowglobe flurries that were filling the night sky.The men stepped onto the loose gravel of the empty lot, their boots' heels cushioned by the fresh fall of snow. As they neared the building, he spotted a dark ash trail on the ground. The large, irregular shape was still visible, still smoldering and hissing as the delicate white flakes fell on it and melted on contact. He gestured to the pile of disintegrating remains as Bryan and Leon came closer. "He
For reasons Rhye had no interest in examining even now, he had stood in the center of the carnage he’d wrought, wanting nothing less than complete obliteration. Fire and cinder, smoldering rubble. He had wanted the lab erased from existence, nothing but a scar of black ash on the empty lot where it stood. And whether he wanted to acknowledge it or not, he knew that his want for destruction had more than a passing connection to Livia. It had been her face he’d seen in his mind as he lit the place up. It had been the thought of her grief that made him savor each of the rogue deaths he delivered tonight.Shoving his hands into the pockets of his coat, Rhye headed against the wind and cut down a South End side alley. He wasn’t sure where he was going, although he supposed he should have known. He recognized Livia’s shitty neighborhood even before he turned onto the street that would eventually dump him onto her block. Rhye still couldn’t fathom her living in such squalid conditions. As t
Rhye approached her slowly, not wanting to upset her any further. With a curse, he crouched down, and carefully put his hand on the delicate arch of her spine. His fingers spanned wide, his senses open to the connection, Livia’s pain shot into him like an electrical current.He felt the splintering agony of the migraine that gripped her, felt the hard thud of her heartbeat ringing in his ears as if it were his own. He tasted acid on his tongue, his teeth aching from the force with which she clenched her jaw to combat the torment that was riding her.He heard the voices.Nasty, corrosive, terrible voices that were traveling in the air around them, silent to all but the psychically sensitive witch crumpled before him on the floor.
Livia woke up slowly, feeling as though her consciousness had been transported somewhere far away and tranquil, only to be returned to her body like a feather carried gently on the breeze. Maybe it was a dream. A long, sweet dream... a peace she hadn’t known for months. She stretched a little on the futon, her bare legs rasping against the terry-cloth of her bathrobe and the soft crush of a blanket that covered her from chin to toe. She snuggled deeper into the pleasant warmth, sighing, and the sound of her own breath startled her. No noise. No blaring music or chattering television, even though she couldn’t sleep – could hardly function – without them. Livia’s eyes snapped open and she waited for the psychic assault to hit her. But there was only silence. Dear Lord. Seconds passed, then a full minute or more … and there was only blessed, wondrous silence. "Did you sleep well?" The deep male voice carried from across the studio apartment somewhere. She smelled toast browning, and t
Shock at what she’d done had barely begun to flicker through her mind when she felt something heavy and oppressive build within her. A sudden, sharp pain in her chest had her crying out as something foreign inside her pulled tight, stretching like a rubber band. Oh, god, it hurts. It felt like every atom of her being was being simultaneously crushed and pulled to its breaking point. The foreign sensation grew stronger and heavier until it felt like she was being ripped apart. The agony was unreal. She tried to scream her pain, but her chest was caving in, and she couldn’t breathe. It was gathering her power. She could feel it, like a thorned vine, latching onto the tendrils; she could feel it squeezing them, choking them. With a violent, agonising wrench, it yanked her power back into her, the cold, burning pain of it tearing a ragged shriek from her throat. Like a hand swatting a fly, the whiplash of it folded her body in half and sent her hurtling toward the floor. Strong arms
Thighs clenching at the feel of it, so erotically foreign, yet so right, she writhed between kisses and moaned. In response, Rhye coils his tail around her leg, guiding her to widen her stance. He slipped a thigh between her legs at the same moment he cupped her breasts, as he sucked her earlobe into his mouth. Moaning in delight... "Oh, God..." Livia growled.The multitude of sensations had her crying out into Rhye’s mouth. Pressing her breasts into his hands, she ground down against his thigh, needing the pressure where she was so wet and swollen for him.Like an extra set of arms, she felt him wrap his majestic tail around her, enclosing her in a cocoon of warmth, safety, and need. Even with her eyes closed, she knew he didn’t surround her completely. She didn’t have to wonder why. The knowledge that he’d left a gap so she could breathe and her inner demon could watch unimpeded had a new rush of wetness slicking her core. It was like she had been transported to a different dimensio
That was enough to snap her out of the trance.Unsure if she was more freaked out about being hypnotized by a fucking tail, or charmed that it seemed to like her, she pet it in return, carefully stroking a fingertip lightly over the spade tip.If it were possible, her eyes would have widened even more at the shiver working through Rhye.Did he like that?Oh, how she wanted to play and find out.Soon, it retreated, and Livia marvelled at all three men as she really, truly realised that they weren’t humans. They were predators and, unlike humans, had the features necessary to both lure in prey and kill it. Joseph’s eyes, Rhye’s tail—they were all mesmerising."Like cuttlefish," she muttered under her breath.Rhye zeroed in on her and cocked his head. "What’s that?""Oh, nothing." Peering up at Rhye, she prompted, "You wanted to ask something earlier?"The alpha gave her a look that said he knew she was intentionally redirecting the conversation but that he was going with it. "How did it
The words escaped without thought, but she didn’t have the mental capacity to regret them, even when the room was suddenly full of low, masculine laughter."Does that mean you think I’m pretty, too?" Leon rumbled, his eyes, now a vivid purple, sparkling—literally sparkling—as though they were dotted with a thousand tiny stars.His voice had already been deep, but now it was even more so. The gravelly, bass sound vibrated through her like distant thunder but was also creepy at the same time, but Livia didn't show how scared she was of the two-headed wolf. There was something about Leon's wolf that made her shiver with fear. He was something else. There was darkness in him, and she could see it. Livia paused, seeing a vision of Leon killing Joseph in the subway, while Rhye was unconscious on his side. Livia gasped; anger settled over her, and rage throbbed in her like a heartbeat. Leon creeped into Joseph... He would kill him. Livia could feel it... She didn't have a choice but to use h
Livia frowned. She picked up on that apparently being a bad thing easily enough, but why he thought she would care was beyond her. When she voiced as much, he just blinked at her like she’d stunned him speechless; at first, she was sure.Peering between the two of them, she took in the tense set of their shoulders and the tightness in their expressions that lingered, despite her assurance that she didn’t care about their lack of purity.Deciding to fix the problem she’d inadvertently caused, Livia smiled softly at them. "I don’t care if you’re pure or as mixed as milk and coffee, but I’ve obviously stepped on a sore point, so I rescind my invitation." Hoping to lighten the mood, she ended with a haughty sniff and an imperious wave of her hand.Joseph’s eyes narrowed to suspicious slits. "Well! Now that you don’t want to see, I want to show you. What is this witchery?"Leon made a low sound and nodded, mimicking Joseph’s suspicious expression, though his grey eyes were dancing with amu
Speechless, Livia gaped at the beautiful monster before her. Drawn like a moth to a flame, she took a step closer, wanting, needing to see him, to touch him. She managed a single step before Rhye cursed, eyes wide and dark brows furrowed, as he stared down at himself."How the fuck did you do that?" he demanded, pinning her with a stunned look.God, but his eyes were unreal. Vibrant, ocean deep blue with a sunburst of bright green around the pupils. They were the eyes of a predator. Eyes of a pureblood alpha. She wanted to get lost in them, wanted to stare into them until she’d mapped every facet."I have no idea," she admitted with a slow shake of her head. At the disbelieving expression he gave her, she tried to think past the shock of seeing him and explained, "The heat of your power was starting to get painful, and then, all of a sudden, it felt like mine got pissed off and threw yours back at you.""You shouldn’t be capable of that," Rhye muttered, but it was said almost absently
The memory of the creepy, child-looking demon and the sensation of it sucking the power out of her, remembering how weak she’d felt afterward, sent a shiver down her spine and hardened her resolve. All her martial arts and self-defense training had been useless against the thrall it had used on her. She’d spent too long and worked too hard to not be a victim to give up on this now. Rhye smirked at her for the second time that day, setting a new record. His eyes shone with approval at the resolve in hers. “I can force your power out of you. If you’ll allow me to try,” he tacked on at the end. Livia appreciated the effort he was making to be more polite, now he knew she wasn’t a spy sent to surveil them. She just wasn’t sure how to react to this new Rhye. He’d gone from cold and dangerous to interested and almost nice. Almost. It was a jarring change. Seductive, dangerously enticing, and intriguing as hell, but still jarring. Livia glanced at them, gauging their reactions to his of
Cocking her head, Livia frowned at him. "I don’t understand." Her eyes went wide as it hit her. "Oh my god, I get it. So, if they make vampires popular in movies and books, demons will become stronger because more humans are glorifying them. Same for witches and werewolves and everything else, yes?""Exactly.""Holy shit. I wonder how much I affected them in my Twilight phase as a kid."Joseph growled, "Those fucking movies! The "vampire" and "werewolf" demons were out of control. The "underworld demons" were pissed. They’d been top dogs for most of what"—he glanced at Leon—"like the last thousand years?""Mm, thereabouts, yes.""Wait. Did I hear you say ‘top dogs’?" she asked, ignoring the twilight thing in favor of something more important."Yes, but now anymore," Leon nodded.“Spiteful little fuckers, really. And always hungry!” Joseph pointed to a few thin white scars crisscrossing the back of his hand, scars she’d somehow never noticed before. “They like people meat, and they are
"As Joseph said, it’s not exclusively a torture chamber, and it’s not used as such all that often. Only when we’re left with no other recourse," Rhye soothed with a small smile.Her gentle giant, the man who touched her with such tenderness and care, was talking about torturing people with about the same amount of contrition as confessing he didn’t always take the time to recycle.That wasn’t actually what shocked her, though. She knew they were on the dark grey side of the morality scale.When she continued to frown at him, he lifted a hand and cupped her cheek, looking suddenly unsure. "Does that bother you, Livia? Would it help to know we don’t hurt the innocent?"Rhye was very still at her back, she noticed. He hadn’t pulled away from her physically, but she could sense him closing off, could almost feel him pulling the cold, unfeeling mask back into place.Joseph, who’d strolled farther into the room, snorted. "Of course she knows that!" He stopped walking when she didn’t immedia