Gabe snarled in loathing. Only one being could pull off a stunt like that. The woman had to be a Guardian.
Guardians, one of the four nonhuman species that made up the Arcane, were a feral species that appeared human but were often more animal than man. They had unbelievable strength and speed, claws that burst straight from their fingertips, a second set of lethal teeth, and could heal almost instantaneously from most injuries. They were every other member of the Arcane’s worst nightmare.
Guardians were usually employed by the Triumvirate as exterminators for any who opposed the Triumvirate or threatened the anonymity of the Arcane as a whole. The Triumvirate – a group of three ancient and exceedingly powerful Elemental witches that governed all of the species of the Arcane – was indiscriminate and ruthless in how they handled problems. There were no trials or questions; problems were simply removed.
Was this small female a Triumvirate Guardian? Why would she be here? The Triumvirate usually didn’t concern themselves with the Arcane unless they didn’t or couldn’t control their own species. And even then they had to be called in, and it usually had to mean the offender’s behavior risked their exposure to the humans. What could Pryor be involved with that would attract the attention of the Triumvirate?
Anger surged through him at the thought.
If Pryor had brought the interference of the Triumvirate into their House, Gabe would kill him whether it was within the House code or not.
But it couldn’t be that. The Triumvirate Guardians came in destructive hordes. This time there was only one single female involved. His eyes scanned the darkness for more to be certain, but he could only see one – only sense one. What would one Guardian be doing there?
Perhaps she was a rogue? A rogue Guardian didn’t live by any rules and often killed for pleasure alone. And they were a bitch to kill. He seriously didn’t need that added complication. He could let the feral bitch kill Pryor and that would be the end of it, but he still suspected Pryor had information about the missing girls. That meant he would have to save his bastard partner from the Guardian.
His hands reached down to grasp the two short swords he kept strapped to his thighs but paused as he watched the female disappear and reappear to evade Pryor as he lunged for her, clearly blood crazed. Had she shimmered? Guardians could undeniably move at incredible speeds but could they move faster than what his eyes could detect? He didn’t think so. That left one explanation.
A crossbreed.
Gabe knew the Triumvirate itself was vicious in its policy on crossbreeds. They usually enacted their fallback policy for problems: kill it. That further verified his assumption that the Triumvirate was not involved. So then what was a crossbreed doing here? Was she working with the dealer as a bodyguard? It seemed odd that any Sanguen would use a female in such a capacity, even a crossbreed female. Females were protected and sheltered in his culture. They were needed for his entire race to survive.
The female Guardian was quick. And strong. She flipped Pryor’s bulk over her shoulder, then spun away to put some distance between them. Gabe sprinted across the street, keeping his eye on the sparring pair. As he neared he could see that the front of Pryor’s body was soaked in blood and the larger man was desperate to get his hands on the smaller female. He was losing blood, and with the added effect of the human blood Gabe suspected Pryor was on, he would be ravenous. If he got his hands on the female, he would drain her.
Gabe cursed the limitations of shimmering as he dodged the hood of a screeching car, his gaze fixed on the struggling couple. He couldn’t shimmer to a location he’d never been in before, and he’d followed Pryor to this rotting community. As he breached the entrance to the alley the woman jerked to a stop, her head swiveling toward him. He could see the slight flare of her small pert nose. A small diamond stud glittered rebelliously in one delicate nostril. Short, glossy black hair stuck out from her head at various angles. Dark brown leather pants clung to every delicate curve of her small, clearly defined muscles. Her tank was a long way from reaching the top of her low hung waistband and his eyes were drawn to the flash of bare skin revealed as she moved. She was compact, her features almost impish with her heart-shaped face and wide, dark eyes.
Karl doubled over, clutching his stomach. His head snapped up, and his unfocused eyes bored into the woman from behind. Gabe sensed his partner’s movement before he saw it, and he called out a warning to the woman as his body erupted into action. Karl was on her before he could reach her, tearing into the exposed flesh of her neck with a hungry ferocity. Blood sprayed from around his mouth as his lips moved over her.
Fuck!
Gabe darted forward but was suddenly jerked to a halt as though restrained. Every cell in his body wrenched to a standstill. Poised on the edge of violent discovery, his eyes locked with hers. The scent of blood saturated his senses. The smell of Karl’s blood was familiar and nearly overwhelming, but another scent, barely a curling wisp of incense, rose from the taint of his cousin’s blood and sliced thinly across Gabe with the fury of a whip.
His every muscle clenched in recognition. The length of his canines exploded in his mouth. His lips parted with the powerful force of his reaction.
Gabe felt a mindless fury swell up from some unexplored depths inside him. It was dark and deadly as it flowed over him. Something stalked that darkness within him, something that had lain dormant, waiting patiently until this moment. Now it was alive within him, dangerous and determined. Gabe suddenly knew only one thing: the woman was
his.
Her blood belonged to
him
. Instinct clawed and snarled, tearing away from his mind, leaving him without his prized control. He couldn’t think; he could only react.
Gabe lunged and slammed into his partner. They rolled together, bits of garbage and papers scattering with the force of their movements. Karl fought with a single-minded intensity to get back to the woman, throwing Gabe from him and leaping at her. Shimmering, Gabe met him in mid-launch before he could reach the woman. Karl struggled to get back to his feet, but his body jerked convulsively and he went still.
The adrenaline coursed through Gabe’s body, his chest heaving with his breath as he rolled to his knees over his partner’s still form. Immediately his eyes sought out the woman. His woman. The smell of her blood still encircled him, obliterating everything else. No longer could he smell the oppressive scent of the garbage or the nearby bay. There was only her.
Swiveling his head, he allowed his gaze to travel over her. Every inch would belong to him. It was a fact his freshly roused instincts would not be steered from. She was speaking into a small black phone, calling for others to come, to “clean up”. His eyes focused on her lips, pink and glistening from the nervous slide of her tongue. They moved, but he couldn’t hear her words over the humming of the instinct murmuring in his head. She held her other hand against the side of her neck. Then those dark eyes turned to fix inscrutably on him.
Rising to his feet, he reached out and pulled her hand away from her neck where Karl had torn into the pale, delicate flesh. Blood smeared the frantic pulse, and fresh blood welled from the wound even as it started to heal before his eyes. Enthralled by her scent, he leaned in closer, and inhaled. The scent swirled thick and sweet, wrapping him in its promise. The shimmering crimson liquid beaded and began to slide down her neck – the only color in a world suddenly gone gray.
Lowering his head he caught those drops on his tongue, gently laving the bite. Fire streaked through him and his body jerked beneath the force of his reaction to the taste of her. He needed the exchange.
Needed
to give her his blood, to mark her with the essence of him, to claim her. At that moment it was a drive he had neither the strength nor desire to resist.
Deep inside him the darkness rippled, and a beast growled with satisfaction.
Kel Sheridan’s entire body clenched hungrily as the hot stranger ran his tongue over her neck. Her breath speared sharply through her chest at the force of the sensation. Darkness swirled around her, the air hot and spicy in her nose. The flavor of his scent flowed over her tongue, and her heart started to pound viciously in her chest.
Somewhere in her mind a small voice was trying to warn her, trying to be reasonable, but she couldn’t hear a damn word. Not that she really cared right now. Every cell in her body seemed to strain toward this stranger. The force of it was a deafening rush in her head.
Kel watched as he lifted his head, her wrist chained loosely in his long fingers, and searched her face. His eyes roved slowly over her with such intensity that she could almost feel them.
She trembled. Kel never trembled, not anymore. At least not in fear. No, this was a delicate, delicious kind of tremble that felt like her body was being stroked. And the man was definitely the kind to tremble over.
He had a wide forehead and the most incredible deep-set eyes. They were a dark green with strange gold centers that seemed to have lives of their own, expanding and contracting around the blackness of his pupils. It was almost erotic. His dark blond hair fell down around the slashing bones of his cheeks and fell just past his dimpled chin. There was a dark blond growth of hair around his mouth in a closely trimmed goatee, making his full lips seem so much softer by contrast.
The broad width of his shoulders cast her in shadow and narrowed into slim hips and long legs. He was wearing a long-sleeved black thermal shirt and a knee-length leather jacket, faded blue jeans, and black boots. He made her mouth water and her heart pound with anticipation.
But anticipation of what?
Okay, Kel, get a grip.
The sweepers would be here in mere minutes to clean up the bloody mess left behind by that slimy dealer. And she had no idea who the yummy stranger was. He could very well be one of the bad guys, despite what her gut and, obviously, libido were telling her. She forced air into her lungs to regain her equilibrium.
And the world dropped away from beneath her again. Pressing the palm of one hand against the firm muscles of his chest, she tried to steady herself.
She was held suspended, her mind utterly still, the slow thud of his heart reverberating beneath her palm. She felt herself sinking into the pools of his eyes, absorbing him deeper and deeper with each breath. The heat of his body surrounded her as he lowered his head again. His hand slid slowly up the bare skin of her arm to cup the back of her neck. The pace of his thudding heart increased beneath her palm.
Kel’s stomach flipped over when, with a flash of white teeth, one of his sharply pointed canines slid across the flesh of his bottom lip. The movement drew her eye, and she stared in fascination as a scarlet drop of blood welled up from the puncture he’d made. His head slowly lowered over her and the scent of his blood filled her. Her stomach muscles clenched in reaction. Then his lips slanted across hers, and his hot tongue plunged into the moist depths of her mouth.
Kel jerked as the sharp, spicy tang of his blood slid over her tongue. It felt like someone had touched her with a live wire. Her entire body arched and tightened, and sparks exploded behind her eyelids. One of his hands fisted in the short hair at the nape of her neck as his other hand released his grip on her wrist and grasped the wide belt at her lower back, jerking her body into his. Her skin prickled beneath the sensation that zinged mercilessly through her system. It felt like her body had been asleep all this time and was finally waking up.
And her body wasn’t the only one waking up. She could feel the hard ridge of his cock against the softness of her belly and she pressed herself closer. She
needed
to be closer. He pulled on her belt, and she fisted both hands in the front of his shirt, needing to hold on to something in the maelstrom of sensations spinning crazily around her. Jerking at his shirt, she raised her knees around his lean hips to lock her ankles at his back. She needed to feel the hard ridge of his cock rubbing against that heated throb between her legs. Bracing her crossed ankles against the hard swell of his ass, she ground herself against him. His responding growl rumbled against her lips and made something inside her respond in kind.
“Damn, Sheridan, you should be charging admission.”
The words slowly penetrated as the intense sensations began to ease, leaving her mind and body feeling heavy. She realized she was draped over the sexy stranger, wantonly rubbing herself against him. It felt so good. She felt good.
Slowly leaning back until there was just enough space for their breaths to mingle, she met his strange eyes. They held hers, the gold flickering in their centers as the fingers buried in her short dark hair moved in a small caress against her scalp. God, she tingled all over. A little shiver went through her, and her focus dropped to those full lips. She ran her tongue over her own, savoring the taste of him that still lingered there. Damn, he tasted dark and seductive, so rich and addictive.
“Hello, Sheridan, are you in there?”
A slow frown furrowed her brow as she glanced over her shoulder with heavy, unfocused eyes.
A big man with dark hair and pale gold eyes smirked at her. He whistled low, his brows raised high. “Are you done or do you want us to go wait in the van a little longer?”
Kel blinked, looking past him to the brown, nondescript vehicle backed into the alley and the three other smiling people who were staring at her. They waved, and dread began to sweep through her, evaporating that tingly sensation. The cleanup crew she’d called in. Her partner, a big Drachon male, had a look on his face that said he would enjoy this story for a long time.
What the hell was she doing?
“That’s one way to interrogate a suspect. I can’t wait to watch you cuff him.”
“Shut up, Merrick.” Kel snapped as her partner’s comment resonated in her mind. She could feel the stranger’s hard, warm body between her legs, and it took a supreme act of will to let him go.