“No. I will never touch you.” Ever since he’d been with Octavia, he hadn’t touched another woman, even before they had married. He didn’t want these women now, but his cock was hardening against his will. They seemed to have a magical control over him.
His hands went to his trousers. “No,” he roared. “I will not do this.”
He had to get to Octavia, and no team of naked vampiresses was going to stop him. She deserved his protection. And he . . . he needed her. He couldn’t face life without her. He was not going to be damned, not when he had to save her. With a roar of fury, he wrenched his hands from the buttons of his trousers. Stoking his anger, his impatience, he shoved off the chair.
There, the bloody spell was broken.
At his side was a delicate, polished wood table. He picked it up and smashed it to the floor. Hissing, the female demons moved back, hugging together. He kicked the legs off the table, stomping them with his boots. They broke with sharp, splintered ends. Grabbing two of them—one in each hand—he held them out, like stakes. “Do you know where my wife is? Or should I stake you in pairs?”
The vampire women leapt to their feet, their toys falling out to the daybed. They suddenly spun in circles, dissolved into twinkling stars that hung like dust in the air. They streaked across the room toward a door opposite where he stood.
He was going to lose them, lose his chance to find Octavia. Matthew ran . . . but the door suddenly flew wide, slamming against the plaster. Real dust flew up. The sparkling demonesses disappeared through the door, and a woman floated into the room.
A different woman. One swathed in white furs with pure black hair that hung in curls to the middle of her back. Her gown was made entirely of silver thread. Her fur robe trailed behind her in a train of several feet. The hem of it hovered a few inches off the floor, moving smoothly over the carpet. Then he saw her feet were levitated as well.
I am afraid you cannot leave, Lord Sutcliffe.
It was madness. She was not speaking, but he could hear her voice in his head. It was deep and echoing.
You destroyed the young man who was to be my soul mate, my young lover for all eternity. Your dear brother, Gregory. You staked him in his heart and cut off his head. You stole children from me that I needed to feed upon. You hid the succubus from me. But you are going to pay for all the trouble you have caused me. Now, you are mine. You are going to help get me what I want.
He lifted his stake. But it turned searing hot in his hand. He rushed forward, fighting the pain, sickened by the smell of his own burning flesh, but determined to drive a stake into the vampire’s heart. The broken wood pieces suddenly exploded into dust in his hands. Hollering with the pain, Matthew clasped his burnt hands together. Before his eyes, the beautiful vampire’s face changed—it turned into a skull of jet-black, mouth opening wide to reveal long, razor-like teeth.
A screaming sound filled his head, like the shriek of a hundred dying souls. Then Esmeralda launched forward and flew through the air toward his neck.
12
Turned
E
smeralda’s fangs slashed against his neck as he tried to shove her away. Matthew howled in pain as the sharp tips cut his flesh and drew blood.
If there was one time in his life he needed De Wynter, this was it. Madness: He needed a vampire to fight a vampire.
He yanked his pistol out of his trouser waistband and fired at the vampire. The shot slammed into her stomach. It wouldn’t kill her, but it drove her back. Esmeralda howled in fury and jerked off him. He turned and ran, leapt over a sofa. He was near the fire grate, but the windows were still about fifteen feet away. Blood soaked into Esmeralda’s white furs. Her face had changed back to a human-like one, but she hissed at him, baring her fangs. His blood dripped off the tips of her teeth.
He had been a fool. He had followed the boy alone, and now he was going to be killed by a vampire—
Not if he could help it. There was a full complement of fireplace pokers, but he knew none of the iron bars would help him. He needed another wooden stake. According to the slayers, he had to stake her through the heart—or shoot a crossbow bolt through it—then cut off her head. But since she had turned a stake to ash in his hand, he didn’t know how he was going to do this.
What would he do if he were out in the wild?
Most explorers would send some unfortunate native to try first. He had never been that sort of man. He never considered anyone expendable.
This time, however, he was going to be the expendable one, losing his life to be a vampire’s dinner, unless he could get the hell out.
He backed toward the windows. For some reason, Esmeralda hadn’t attacked. She hovered above the ground and smiled at him. A sickening, triumphant grin that flashed her fangs.
“This would be more fun if I were not encumbered,” she whispered.
Suddenly there was a blur of motion. He tried to watch her but he couldn’t; he was forced to blink. When he opened his eyes, a mere instant later, she was gone, and an enormous bat swooped over his head. He dove to the ground, desperately searching for a weapon. He pulled his knife out of his boot, knowing it would do him no good. The bat gracefully beat its wings, wheeled in the air, then charged at him again.
He scrambled to his feet and ran for the window. He was going to leap through it—he had jumped off the ground when talons caught him by the shoulder. The bat dragged him back, claws piercing into his skin through his clothes.
She pulled him to the ground, slamming him down. Blood leaked from the wound in his throat, soaked into his shirt and coat from his shoulders.
In an instant—so fast he couldn’t see how it was done—the bat was gone, and Esmeralda was sitting on top of his chest. Nude. Her large, heavy breasts swayed over him.
True, with her black hair, ivory skin, red lips, and lush body she was unusually beautiful. But to him, she looked like a beast. He moved to shove her off him, but she caught his wrists. He tried to buck her off, but she was too strong.
“I have a choice, Lord Sutcliffe. I could simply drain your blood and kill you. Or I could give you immortal life.”
“Get the hell off me, you whore,” he growled.
Her eyes were black, but reflective, shining like an animal’s eyes did at night. They flashed with fury. “So this is how it is to be. I offer a gift, and you insult me. Just like a man. You think your paltry insults will bring me to my knees. That I will sob and cry before your moralistic judgment.” She laughed, and it was the high-pitched laugh of a madwoman.
Then she arched forward. He tried to jerk away, but she grabbed his hair. She yanked his head so hard that if he’d tried to resist, he suspected she could have torn his head off his neck.
Esmeralda twisted his head, arching his neck. The pain was excruciating. He kicked; he jerked his body underneath her; he tried to fight.
“Come now,” she said coldly. “Surely you can push a mere woman off you. Surely, just as a woman should be able to fight off a rapist if she really wanted to, you could fight me off. I can only do this to you because you really want it—”
She broke off. He was trying to absorb her words—and the spitting fury behind them—when she suddenly roared. He swung with his arm—
She grasped his wrist and snapped it. As pain shot through him, she plunged her teeth into his neck.
He could feel his blood rushing out of his body to her mouth. But he could feel something else . . .
Christ, it couldn’t be. His cock went bolt upright, hard as a brick. His body felt like it did when Octavia’s lush, hot body was against him. His heart was pounding with desire; he was panting with lust.
He didn’t feel anything but revulsion for this woman. Yet for some insane reason, having his blood drunk was making him aroused.
Damn it, this was a nightmare. He should be fighting. But the intense sexual heat roaring through him made it impossible to fight. It made him want more.
He was going to die, damn it, because of lust.
I will spare you if you help me.
He could hear Esmeralda’s low, throaty, accented voice in his head. He was writhing underneath her, trying to fight the intense sensations of sexual pleasure. Her teeth were fastened into his neck. He couldn’t get free.
Help her, Lord Sutcliffe. Help your wife, the succubus. You cannot protect her. If you keep her a prisoner, she will die. If you let her fuck you, she will kill you. A succubus does not belong with a mortal man. Tell me where she is, and I will take her. I will train her. I will teach her how to survive. Give her freedom. Save your pitiful life.
There was no way in Hades he would give Octavia to this monster.
You stupid fool. Do you think going from one man’s bed to another will be good for her? Do you think she will be happy to kill you? I can free her.
“How?” he croaked. He was weak from blood loss.
You men will destroy her. I will not. With me, she will have the power to rule the world. Once we unleash that power, she will no longer be a servant of Lucifer, forced to harvest souls through sexual pleasure.
“A servant of Lucifer? Hell, not Octavia. She’s not a demon.”
She is. It is what she was born to be. She must do her duty and take male souls, or she will be destroyed. She can never live like a docile mortal wife, which is what you want her to be. Let her be what she is supposed to be—powerful, sexual, seductive.
“No!” he roared. “She is my wife. I will not permit that.”
Do you not understand that you have no power, you stupid man? You men always believe you are in charge, that you have all the control. This time you do not.
She sucked harder at his neck. His legs felt weak and numb, as did his arms. But he still had a raging erection.
Damn it, he was going to come. He refused to. He refused to let this give him pleasure. Octavia gave him pleasure—she was beautiful and sensual and good. She was the only woman he desired. Not this monster who was draining his blood.
If he let Esmeralda kill him, he would not be able to protect Octavia. He had to find out the truth about what Octavia was. He did not believe Esmeralda: He didn’t think this monster was going to protect his beautiful, gentle wife.
“I’ll help you,” he rasped. “I’ll do it. But I don’t know where she is. I’ve been trying to find her for months. Let me live, and I’ll search for her and find her for you.”
I could just release you now, but you would die anyway. I’ve taken too much blood. I’m going to make you one of us. But I have to do something special with you. Your wife will reject you—she will sense you no longer have a soul. So I have to make you into something different. A vampire with a soul.
“What? I’m not going to be one of you,” he managed to mutter, but he was losing consciousness. He fought to keep his eyes open, yet his lids were too heavy. He couldn’t move his arms or legs. He was sure he could feel his heartbeat slowing.
Then something wet and slippery pressed to his lips. It was the vampire’s wrist. She pressed it to his mouth. Slowly, he realized it was her blood flowing into his mouth.
He fought to pull back and spit it out, but he couldn’t will his body to move.
Whether he liked it or not, his body wanted to drink.
In the hallway outside Mrs. Darkwell’s private room, Octavia stopped. Through the closed door, she heard sobbing. Inside the study, a woman was crying as if her heart was breaking.
It could not be Mrs. Darkwell. It must be one of the other girls in the house, and Mrs. Darkwell was breaking this poor child’s heart, just as she was trying to destroy Octavia’s.
To think all her life she had yearned for a dangerous adventure, like the kinds Father went on, the type of exotic and glorious adventures Sutcliffe had experienced in foreign lands.
Now all she yearned for was peace and a normal life. Octavia wished she had stayed at Sutcliffe’s London house—that she hadn’t run away and that she hadn’t learned that beasts wanted to kill her.
For it would have meant that this morning, she would have held her daughter.
Squaring her shoulders, she pushed open the door and stormed into Mrs. Darkwell’s private room. To her surprise, Mrs. Darkwell was alone. Her golden hair was immaculately styled. Her clothes were perfect, and her face did not look as if she’d been crying. For a moment, Octavia was mystified.
Then she realized she didn’t care what was going on. She stalked forward and slammed her hands on the desk. She winced, trying to absorb the soreness of her legs and her private place. Apparently it took a while to recover from giving birth. She snapped, “Where is my daughter? Why did you not bring her to me? Why do your servants refuse to fetch her for me?”
Mrs. Darkwell merely set her quill back in the pot of ink, a placid expression on her face. She settled her hands on her silk skirts. A small strand of pearls glowed at her throat. A turban decorated with pure white feathers sat atop her head.
Octavia was so furious: While stealing a
child,
the woman had been well able to select fashionable clothes.
“What is it, my dear?” Mrs. Darkwell asked gently.
Octavia ripped the quill from the ink and flung it across the room. How dare this woman smile so patiently at her?
“Where is my baby?” She glared at the ledger in which Mrs. Darkwell had been writing. It rose and flew off the desk. Sheets of paper suddenly tore from it. They tumbled to the fire grate, where they landed on the coals and began to smoke.
“Is my daughter in this house?” she demanded.
But Mrs. Darkwell ignored her, shoved back her chair, and stood. She stalked to the fire and salvaged her ledger pages. Then she glared in annoyance. “Stop this, Octavia. Setting the house on fire will not help.”
Octavia rushed to the desk and jerked open the drawer. She pulled out letters, searching for something that would tell her where her daughter had gone.
Mrs. Darkwell snatched the letters from her hands. “There will hardly be the clues you seek in my correspondence. Perhaps you might have found something in the ledger you just destroyed. Did you think of that?”
The woman moved to her and Octavia flinched, expecting an attack. But Mrs. Darkwell embraced her.
Oh no. She pushed the woman’s elegant hands away. She did not want to be soothed, or stroked, or lied to. She needed the truth. “I must know where my daughter is. You had no right to give her away. I am a married woman—a countess, and I am able to raise my daughter by myself.”
“My dear, you are in danger from satyrs, vampires, werewolves. To keep your daughter would have been to put her in grave danger. You still do not have complete control of your powers. What if you hurt her unintentionally?”
“I wouldn’t—”
“You might. Do you not want her to be safe? If she is away from you, with a good family, you know she will be. To explain why she is not with you, you will say your daughter was stillborn. In truth, she will be alive and well, and she can be raised by people who will teach her how to live with her magic powers.”
“My daughter has powers?” Octavia whispered. It seemed madness, but she had not even thought of that. That magical powers must be inherited. She must have been given hers by her mother.
“Yes, of course. Just as you do. Not as strong as yours, for her father was a mortal with no special magic. Powers such as yours lessen with each generation that contains more mortal blood. She will learn how to live with them, how to use and control them. Obviously your father tried to deny that you possessed magic. Yet that did not help you. His attempt at protection simply left you unprepared to cope when you unlocked your magic.”
“But she is my child. Why can I not be with her?” She had married for the sake of the baby. That was why she had agreed to a loveless union. She would not relinquish her baby now!
Mrs. Darkwell grasped her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “If we make the world believe she died, she will be safe. Otherwise, she could be kidnapped or hurt as a way of getting to you. The beasts that hunt you would happily use the child to lure you into a trap. Then they would kill you both. And there is Sutcliffe. . . . He will not let you disappear with his
child
. Unless you want to live as his prisoner—”