Darkness Unleashed (18 page)

That unnerving golden gaze shifted to run a searching path over Jagr’s stiff form, narrowing as he caught sight of the vampire’s brittle expression.

“I am pleased to discover you unharmed, if not unscathed, brother,” the Anasso rumbled, a hint of question in his deep voice.

“You will not be pleased to discover I have failed in my duty,” Jagr retorted, offering another bow. “Forgive me.”

Before Regan could guess his intent, Jagr was heading for the nearby stairs to the terrace, his back stiff and his shoulders bunched with tension.

“Jagr, wait.” She stomped her foot as he deliberately ignored her plea and disappeared through the open door. “Dammit. He is…”

“Complicated,” Styx helpfully supplied. “Yes, I know.”

Forgetting the fact that she was confronting perhaps the most lethal demon in the world, not to mention her current brother-in-law, Regan clenched her fists and headed in Jagr’s wake.

Walk out on her?

Not gonna happen.

“Well, I’m just about to uncomplicate him,” she muttered. “Excuse me.”

“Regan.”

The dark voice was pleasant, but edged with enough of a command that she instinctively halted to glance over her shoulder.

“What?”

His beautiful face was somber in the moonlight. “I would ask to meet with you and discuss your future.”

Future? Shit. She didn’t want to deal with the expectations her call had no doubt raised in her sister. Or any future that might include a family she’d never wanted.

Not when she had an obstinate, mule-headed, world’s most aggravating vampire to straighten out.

“I…” She halted her instinctive denial as she met the steady golden gaze. He wasn’t budging on this. It might as well have been tattooed across his forehead. She sighed. Great. Just what she needed. Another ruthless vampire with an agenda. “Yeah, fine. But later.” She headed for the door. “Much later.”

Sadie was beyond pissed off.

Nothing unusual.

Being pissed off was a constant state of mind lately.

No. Not
lately
.

She could pinpoint the precise time her life had gone into the shitter.

The moment Regan-freaking-Princess-of-Weres had hit town.

Damn the bitch.

This was all her fault.

She was the one who had called the wrath of the vampires down on the curs. She was the one who had brought Salvatore snooping around where he didn’t belong. She was even responsible for that damned gargoyle who was proving to be such a pain in the ass.

And yet, Sadie knew
she
would be the one held to blame for the entire fiasco.

Caine was not a cur who accepted failure.

Hell, the last person to fail him was stuffed and mounted to stand as a gruesome reminder of what happens to those who disappoint the self-proclaimed leader of the curs.

Which, no doubt, explained why Duncan had done a disappearing act, along with the witch.

Well, screw them.

Sadie didn’t run. She didn’t hide.

Not any more.

Caine commanded she capture Regan, come hell or high water, and that was exactly what she was going to do.

Unfurling the whip, she sliced another ribbon of flesh off Gaynor’s back as he cowered in a corner of the basement.

When they had returned to the tea shop, after yet another futile search for the pureblood, to discover her guards dead and the vampire missing, Sadie had lost no time in taking out her frustrations on the imp.

She couldn’t think straight with her temper blazing and her lust for pain clogging her mind.

Besides, she couldn’t risk shifting. Not when her time was running out.

“Stupid bastard,” she gritted, clenching the whip as she watched the blood pour down the imp’s shredded back. “You swore to me the vampire couldn’t escape from your prison.”

“He didn’t.”

“Ah.” Another crack of the whip. “You have him hidden in the closet?”

The imp screamed. “No.”

“The Dumpster?”

“No.” Gaynor pressed even tighter to the wall, looking remarkably like Culligan, as he whimpered and cowered beneath her strikes. “But he didn’t get out on his own. I can smell that female Were all over the cell.”

The knowledge that Gaynor was right did nothing to ease her fury. While Sadie had been out tracking the damned Were so she could convince her to concede defeat peacefully, Regan had outwitted them all.

Now Sadie didn’t have her prize, and her one bargaining chip was gone.

Regan would pay for that.

In blood.

“And how did she find this place?”

“I don’t know.”

“Liar.” Needing her punishment to be a bit more personal, Sadie stepped forward to kick the imp in the head. There was a satisfying thump as he reeled to the side. “You must have revealed something when you spoke with her. After all, no one would suspect that a demon with half a brain would be stupid enough to hide his most private lair directly beneath his very public tea shop.”

“Please…” Ridiculously, the imp tried to drag himself across the floor. “I said nothing, I swear.”

She followed his painful path, kicking him in the side. “So a clueless Were barely out of diapers managed to outsmart a centuries-old imp?”

Curling into a ball, Gaynor managed to gather enough balls to glare at her.

“She also managed to get past four of your curs.”

Sadie stilled, distracted by a sudden, unpleasant thought.

“Yes, she did,” she said slowly. “And her scent wasn’t outside the building. Why?”

There was a long pause as Gaynor struggled to breathe with his collapsed lung.

“Maybe she’s found a witch of her own,” he at last panted.

“Or taken mine,” Sadie growled, her eyes glowing in the dark as she considered the various possibilities. “Of course, all she really needed was to get her greedy little hands on one of the amulets.”

Gaynor grunted as he received another kick to the head. “Why are you punishing me? I didn’t give her a damn amulet.”

“Why am I punishing you?” Leaning down, she grabbed the imp by the hair and glared into his ruined face. “Because I can, you pathetic worm.”

Jagr wasn’t surprised to discover his hands shaking as he braided his hair and slipped on a clean pair of jeans. The hot shower might have been capable of washing the filth from his skin, but it did nothing to wash away the lingering effects of his madness.

Or the horrifying memory of his fingers squeezing into Regan’s throat.

Nothing would ever wash that away.

He had come so close…

Too close.

Leaning against the wall of the bathroom, Jagr banged his head with enough force to crack the marble.

In his mind, the images of blood-soaked corridors tormented him. Those hours of slaughtering Kesi and her clan were still wrapped in fog, but not the long journey out of her lair. Or the unstable years that followed when his rampages would strike without warning, leaving anyone in the vicinity slaughtered.

Over the past centuries he’d allowed himself to believe that those days were behind him. He’d buried his rage deep, and carefully honed his control. Oh, he would always possess a dangerous temper and a ready willingness to use violence when necessary. But he never unleashed his full fury.

Not until tonight.

Again the image of Regan, her eyes wide and her lips parted as he crushed her throat, seared through his mind.

No.

He would never, ever take such a risk again.

Ignoring the unexpected wrench of agony at the mere thought of walking away from Regan, Jagr forced himself to leave the bathroom and returned to the connecting bedroom.

He tossed his satchel on the bed, digging out his remaining daggers before shoving his used clothes into the bag.

He was reaching for the clean shirt he’d left on a side table when the unmistakable scent of jasmine had him spinning toward the door.

Stepping into the bedroom, Regan allowed her gaze to skim over the open satchel on the bed before returning to linger on his still bare chest.

A heat flushed through Jagr as her emerald eyes flared with awareness, tracing the scars that ran the length of his stomach.

Before Regan, he’d always kept his scars well hidden. They were a badge of shame that no one was allowed to witness. But standing before this beautiful Were, he felt nothing but searing pleasure as she studied his hard body. There was no disgust, no pity, no aversion.

Just pure appreciation.

Wanting nothing more than to yank off the jeans that were the only thing covering him, Jagr instead forced himself to turn back toward the bag.

His desire for Regan might be a brutal force, but it was nothing in comparison to his driving need to keep her safe.

For the first time in centuries, someone else’s existence mattered more than his.

With an impatient click of her tongue, Regan moved to perch on the end of the bed, her expression impossible to read, though there was no missing the anger that snapped in the air around her.

“I thought I would find you here, you big lummox.”

He didn’t look up. It was bad enough to have her so close. To be wrapped in her exotic scent and feel the heat of her body.

To actually see her on the bed where he’d so recently spread her legs and plunged into her damp heat…damn, it was enough to snap what little control he had left.

“Lummox?” he muttered.

“It’s a word.” He sensed her shift on the bed. Gods. His jeans tightened painfully over his growing erection. “What are you doing?”

Don’t look. Do. Not. Look.

“I would think it’s rather self-evident.”

“I guess it is. Hard to miss a six-foot-plus sulking vampire. Or is it pouting? Difficult to tell,” she taunted. “I assume you’re leaving?”

“First I intend to go imp hunting.”

“And then?”

Pain ripped through his chest, nearly sending him to his knees. “Then I will return to Chicago.”

She breathed a shockingly vile curse. “So, you’re fleeing back to your prison…oh, I mean lair. It’s so much safer to watch the world through MTV and YouTube, isn’t it, chief?”

His hands clenched into fists at her accusation, refusing to consider the bitter truth of her words.

“Return to Styx, Regan. He’ll be able to track Culligan.”

“I don’t need him or you or anyone else to track Culligan,” she gritted. “I already found him.”

The defenses he’d been struggling to build were shattered as Jagr jerked his head around to stab her with a shocked gaze.

“What?”

Her eyes flashed, as if pleased at by his sharp reaction. “Where do you think I picked up that handy-dandy little amulet?” Her brows abruptly drew together. “An amulet, I might add, that was confiscated by your friend Tane before he would let me come down here.”

Jagr shook his head. Later he would thank Tane for ensuring that Regan couldn’t slip up on him unaware, but for now he could think of nothing but the realization that she’d found the imp who had tormented her for thirty years.

“He’s dead?”

She shrugged. “He was alive when I left the cabin, but his odds of living through the night are about zero to none. Not once the curs realize he’s just as pathetic at being bait as he is at being an imp.”

He stepped toward her, his bare feet sinking into the thick carpet, his damp braid brushing across his back. Not that he noticed. He was utterly consumed by the tiny female perched on the end of the bed.

“You found the imp and…walked away?”

“I had other things on my mind, as I have mentioned more than once,” she said.

Jagr frowned. She was behaving as if finding the demon responsible for her years of misery, a demon who she had risked her life to kill, was nothing more than a trivial encounter.

“Dammit, Regan, you’ve waited your entire life to have your revenge.”

The emerald gaze never wavered. “I’m well aware of that.”

“Then why didn’t you take it?”

“I told you.”

He growled low in his throat as he studied her stubborn expression.

Okay, it was official.

The woman was going to drive him right over the edge.

“There had to be more than just a need to find me, little one.” He folded his arms over his chest, refusing to back down. He didn’t understand why he had to know. Only that he did. “Killing him would have taken you less than a heartbeat. Tell me the truth.”

She abruptly rose to her feet, standing so close to him that his entire body was bathed in sweet jasmine heat.

“Christ, I don’t know,” she rasped. “I suppose a part of it was the fact that he looked so incredibly pathetic chained in that cabin. For so many years he was my personal boogeyman. He brutalized me for so long I began to think of him as invincible.” Her lips twisted as she gave a shake of her head. “But then I saw him as he truly is. A weak, cowardly idiot who crawled through the sewers because he didn’t have the talent or intelligence or spine to be a decent man. He just wasn’t worth the effort of killing.”

He trembled with the need to pull her into his arms as her eyes darkened with a vulnerability that cut through his very soul.

This was more than lust. More than an instinctive need to protect.

This was…

Gods, he didn’t know what to call it.

He only knew that it had buried so deep inside him that he’d never be rid of it.

“And the other part?” he demanded, his voice thick.

“I realized I didn’t need to kill him.” She held her arms wide. “The chains are already gone.”

A combination of emotions warred through him. Pride, relief, astonishment, and a treacherous sense of regret at the knowledge she no longer had need of him.

Unable to battle his need, he reached up to lightly stroke his fingers down her cheek.

“Regan.”

She stepped even closer, sending jolts of agonizing need through his body.

“I understand now,” she said, softly. “He wasn’t holding me in the past.
I
was. It’s time to let it go.”

He shuddered at the feel of her soft skin beneath his finger tips. A warm, satin temptation. His thighs clenched in response, his erection painfully hard.

“So you’re free,” he whispered, ignoring the desire clamoring through him. It was something he was going to have to get used to.

“No, I’ll never be completely free. The memories will always haunt me.” Her hand reached up to cover his fingers, pressing them against her cheek. “Just as they haunt you.”

Feeling as if he’d just been singed, Jagr yanked his hand away and stepped back.

“They do a great deal more than haunt me,” he pointed out, his voice harsh.

Her lips thinned with annoyance. “You reacted to your situation. Just like any other human or demon or fey would.”

“A blind, killing rage?”

“If it had been a blind, killing rage, you wouldn’t have stopped with the curs holding you captive. All of Hannibal would be dead.”

Jagr shifted. It was true. In his early days, the rage would consume him to the point he couldn’t halt. Only the threat of dawn could end the rampage and drive him back to his lair.

Still, he’d lost enough control to strangle Regan. And that was unacceptable.

His gaze lowered to her throat that was once again smooth and unmarred.

“I hurt you.”

She rolled her eyes. “For God’s sake, I’ve tripped over my damned feet and done more damage.”

He shook his head. “You don’t understand.”

“I understand that everyone has moments of insanity.” She deliberately moved forward, perhaps knowing he couldn’t form a coherent thought when she was so near. “Salvatore told me that Styx nearly destroyed the entire vampire race because he protected some crazed vampire he was sworn to, and your own clan chief tried to kill your precious king. Should they be locked up in their lairs?”

Again he couldn’t refute her words. Styx had protected the previous Anasso even when it was obvious the vampire was threatening to rip apart the peace they’d struggled for centuries to achieve. And Viper had been willing to sacrifice his own king to save Shay from death.

It was even rumored that Styx had been lost in bloodlust when he’d been attacked by a band of renegade vampires intent on taking his crown.

“Nothing you say will change my mind,” he forced himself to say, although the words didn’t ring quite true in his heart.

No doubt because he wanted his mind changed.

“Fine.”

Obviously wearied of his stubborn refusal to dismiss the dark fever that lurked deep inside him, Regan took matters into her own hands.

Literally.

Keeping her gaze locked on his tight expression, she grasped the hem of her too-tight shirt, and with one smooth motion had it yanked over her head and tossed on the floor.

Jagr grunted, feeling as if he’d just been hit in the stomach with a sledgehammer.

Against his will his eyes lowered, feasting on the slender limbs that were toned with muscle and covered with flawless ivory skin. She wore a flimsy bit of lace that covered her breasts, but it was no barrier to his greedy gaze. Not when the rosy nipples hardened beneath his hot gaze.

A roaring need to tumble her onto the nearby bed instead had Jagr backing away until he banged into the wall.

“Regan, what the hell are you doing?”

With a wicked smile, Regan casually reached up to snap the tiny clip of her bra, dropping it on top of her shirt.

“You said I couldn’t change your mind,” she purred. “At least not with words.”

His mouth went dry, his brain shutting down as his desire settled into the driver’s seat.

“So you think you can manipulate me with…”

The words lodged in his throat as she slid down the zipper on her jeans and shimmied them down her body. There was a moment as she halted to kick off her shoes, then the jeans were gone and she was standing there in nothing more than a pair of white panties.

Holy hell.

The things he could do to that exquisite, ivory body. Delicious, sinful, perhaps even illegal things that would include his lips and tongue and throbbing fangs.

As if fearing it might have been forgotten, his cock gave a painful jerk against his jeans, reminding Jagr of just how good it felt to be buried deep inside Regan’s heat.

“Is it working?” she murmured, running hands up his bare chest.

Working? He was on fire, being consumed by flames that raged through his body like an inferno. And worse, he was beginning to forget why he shouldn’t have her beneath him as he explored every inch of her delectable body.

He squeezed his eyes shut as his muscles clenched with desperate hunger.

“Gods,” he breathed, his stomach cramping as he tried to deny the furious instinct to take this woman to his bed and never let her go.

Her soft chuckle feathered over his chest, her fingers skimming down to tease at the waistband of his jeans.

“You’re showing your fangs, vampire.”

His eyes snapped open as he reached out to grasp her shoulders, careful not to dig into her tender flesh.

“And you’re playing a perilous game, Were.”

“Should I be afraid?”

“Yes,” he growled, although he knew with perfect clarity that there was no genuine danger.

At least not to Regan.

He, on the other hand, was in very serious danger of imploding if he didn’t ease the savage need to be inside her.

Soon.

She deliberately licked her lips. “Are you going to hurt me?”

“Keep it up, and I’ll devour you.”

The green eyes glittered with invitation. “You promise?”

He smacked his hands against the wall behind him, barely noticing the large holes he punched into the paneling. Screw it. Tane could send him a bill.

“Regan, I want you too much and my control is too unpredictable,” he gritted, his body trembling. “If I start this, I won’t be able to stop.”

“Who said anything about stopping?”

He shook his head. This was a mistake. Even if he could be confident his control was trustworthy, Regan no longer needed a champion. Hell, she never truly had.

And no doubt, she was already making plans to move on.

Plans that didn’t include a damaged vampire.

So why not enjoy what was offered before he returned to his dark, lonely lair?
The voice of temptation whispered in the back of his mind.

Because he was rapidly reaching the point where he would never be capable of letting her go.
The voice of reason answered.