The Mark (Interracial Paranormal Romance) (Toil and Trouble) (16 page)

"Look," I told the were. "On a bad day, you could probably take him. But he's pissed. And hungry. Maybe you should take one for the team."

I reached out and yanked a piece of hair from the were’s head. He didn't even notice, his nose was already elongating and becoming snout-like.

I gripped a section of my kinky hair and started to weave his hair into my own. "Calisio un voratio," I chanted. "Calisio un voratio. Calisio un voratio."

I gasped as he scooped me up and scooted me into the back of the car. As his fangs glistened as he stared at my chest, I realized that I'd misread his hunger for blood for a hunger of something else.

I circled my arms around his neck and brought him close. My lips quaked as I took my tongue and traced the outline of his fangs. His body shuddered with desire with each lick.

I pulled back and brushed his face with my palm. "I was so worried. I didn't want my last memory of you to be a stupid argument. I'm so sorry."

"I know," he said, ripping my dress down the front. "Me too."

I sighed with pleasure as he took my nipple in his mouth, his cool hands kneading it as he suckled me. His fangs pierced the delicate tissue and I cried out in ecstasy.

I pulled off his dirty button down shirt and ran my fingers over his strong, sure chest. I wanted to feel every curve, every ripple of him. My touch drove him wild and in an instant we were both naked, clinging to each other. As much as I wanted to feel his fangs against my neck, ripping the skin and guzzling my blood as I clasp his body to me, I needed to feel him inside me more. I needed him to fuck me.

I straddled him, steadying myself on the backseat cushion as I bucked my hips against him, impaling myself on his bulge in one solid thrust.

"Oh gods, Jade," he murmured into my hair. "Oh yes."

I threw my head back and let out a hungry groan as he moved inside me, hard and warm. The rest of the world melted away as we rocked together, consumed with desire. I locked my arms around his neck and began to move my hips in slow, methodical circles.

My fingers locked in his hair and I tugged as I began to hop up and down on him, crashing into him over and over. Giving him all of me. Taking all of him and holding steady to it. Holding fast to the pleasure.

I felt it in his groans as he twined his arms around my waist and held me still as he jackhammered in and out with abandon. Even in his frenzy, his passion, he was still whispering as he moved inside me.

Only you, Jade. Only you…

When he finished, he screamed my name and his cries pushed me over the peak, the sky exploding with light. I saw every star and when I reached toward it, his hand in mine, I could almost feel their warmth.

He traced my jaw tenderly with an index finger, still wet with my desire. "Did you call out my name while he fucked you?"

I pulled myself from on top of him, clutching my tattered dress to my naked body. "That's some pillow talk, Jack. I didn't sleep with any were."

He wiped a hand over his mouth. "I can taste him, Jade. Don't lie to me. Especially when I almost faced the sun for defying my maker to come rescue you." The hurt in him was so strong and it gutted me, and I was empty when he gripped the sides of my face. “I’ve never done anything but love you and you betrayed me.”

My face crumbled then. All the emotions I tucked away, the fear, anger, remorse, lust came spilling from my eyes. "If it would have been anyone but him," I said between gasps. "It was just a kiss, Jack. Nothing more."

His green eyes filled with pools of black. Vampire tears. "Just a kiss, huh?" He picked up a balled shirt and tossed it to me. "A kiss is everything." He slid out of the back of the car and pulled on his slacks.

I got even more hysterical then, my body wracked with sobs. I never wanted to hurt him...especially not for some guy who left me high and dry. "Just let me-"

"Dawn is near," he cut in, his back to me. "I don't have time to go home so I must go to ground. I left the car in working order."

Before I could explain about Riley, Jack disappeared, fading into the purple haze of morning.

Chapter Twenty-One

Moral Support

I knew one thing for sure...if I would have known Jack had contacted my mother and told her that I was kidnapped and to be tried for mortal murders and exposing the supernatural world, he wouldn't have gotten a piece of tail last night.

But he had, and my mother, who hadn't been outside the Greene County line in 5 years, loaded up her old ford f150 and made the trek to Raleigh. And when I got home at 6:35 am, tear streaked and devastated over Jack and generally pissed off at the world, my mother was sitting Indian style, meditating beside my front door. Surprise!

I leaned over to the sink and folded my arm, putting my head on top. Last night, I didn't believe things could get much worse. I was wrong.

Before I could even step a foot inside the apartment, my mother had to clean the energies with sage. Then, because my fridge was desolate except for a bag of blood and a box of pizza, she drug me to Harris Teeter for a shopping spree. Three hundred and fifty-five dollars and sixteen cents later, she'd needed help unloading her massive suitcases. Plural. Because she wasn't leaving my side until the Watchers cleared my name.

All of a sudden I wanted the Trial to have happened like, yesterday.

"Jade, where do you keep your crystals?" I heard the opening and closing of cabinets. "Actually nevermind dear, I'll just find them on my own."

Flushing the toilet to keep up appearances, I pushed out of the bathroom. She knew better. If there was one way to get under a witch's skin, it was rummaging through her magical supplies.

I walked over to where she stood, peering into my glass bottles. "Eye of newt, gossamer wings...hey!"

I snatched them from her grip and stacked them the way I had them then closed the cabinets. "I'm a necromancer, mom. Crystalwork is for-" I stopped, snapping my mouth shut.

She scoffed, crossing her thin arms against her chest. "My gods," she said, shaking her head. "The city has turned my daughter into an elitist!"

I rolled my eyes, turning to the strainer for a tumblr. I filled it with water, murmuring a small charm for strength. "Don't be dramatic. I'm just saying that my training kind of...discounts the oldworld traditions. Crystalwork is just kinda hokey like sweeping to create a magical space and riding a broom."

"Nonsense," she said, walking to her mountain of belongings. "The old ways are just as effective as your newfangled sorcery."

"Oh yeah?" I said, finishing the water. "I tried scrying for my keys the other day and it led me to an old pair of shoes."

My mother was on her hands and knees, scattering books and papers all over the floor. "Magic only works if the wielder believes in it. If you think something is bullshit, then your result will be, well, crap."

I cringed as she pulled out even more junk, littering my freshly swept floor. I walked out of the kitchen, kneeling beside her. "Maybe if you told me what you were looking for, I could help you find it."

She kept searching through it, her eyes darting back and forth. "If the mess bothers you so much, I know an amazing tidy up spell that works like a charm."

The first thing that came to mind was, "Because your house is so tidy?" but I decided against it, massaging my temple.

"I like cleaning up," I said, moving a few papers back to the pile. "I get a sense of satisfaction when I do it with my own two hands."

She paused, looking up from the mess. "Like your father. Something he picked up from the military. And boy did that man look delicious in his dress whites." She chuckled to herself, turning back the hands of time. "How he put up with me all those years, gods only know." She looked back down and snatched up a piece of paper. "Found it!"

She looked at me like she did when I was six and accidentally turned her familiar, a cat named Midnight, into a plush stuffed animal. "Your history of course. The dress your great great great etcetera grandmother wore during her witch Trial in 1694."

"Details," she said, with a wave of her hand. "Her death was the beginning of our magical bloodlines, Jade. Where our power originates from."

"Ah," I said with a nod. "So I'm wearing it for good luck. What else?"

"Well," she said, pulling out a ziplock bag of colored candles. "It shows respect. Reverence. You're accused of a flagrant disregard of the sanctity of magic and the supernatural realm, so you'll need all the help you can get."

"Yellow is for intellect and memory," I answered after a dramatic sigh. "Blue for psychic protection, and silver for astral energies and channeling far memories."

"Good," she said with a small smile. "You absorbed some of what I taught." She lined each candle in a holder on my altar then sunk to her knees. "Audio meus pects pectoris, tribuo mihi regimen. Ostendo mihi semita." She finished the spell and then blew a gust of air over the candles, setting the candles alight.

I watched in awe as her old leather trunk rattled then popped open.

I pulled myself from the floor and padded to where it stood. I glanced inside and gasped. Tucked beside a flowered housecoat and a southern cookbook was the most beautiful dress I'd ever seen. It was the color of the moonlit sky, black and gray glimmering as the light danced on the fabric. The dress was soft to the touch, like my fingers were grazing a cloud. A brown cord laced up the corseted back and when I touched it, I could feel the love and care that went into every stitch.