Reece felt Alexandra pull away and he was bereft without her small, delicate body in his arms. He was breathing hard, heart pounding, trying to get his bearings. He put his head down and counted to ten.
When Reece looked up again, Lex had curled up into herself on the mattress. He didn’t think he’d ever seen someone so petrified and it scared him. Reece cursed himself. He shouldn’t have kissed her, he could have simply touched her hand again and he would have known for sure. And it was unlike him to do something so impulsive, so reckless. All Reece knew was that at that moment he’d needed to kiss her. And the instant he’d felt her kiss him back, he’d been lost.
He looked at her, his soulmate, lying stiffly on the bed, caging herself against him. Anger began to burn through him, foreign and searing. He felt murderous, wanting to tear apart whoever had tortured Lex. Reece had always been known for his civility and to have this wrath consume him now was both frightening and intoxicating.
The images still struck him. He’d only had enough time to see glimpses of what had been done to Lex, but it had been more than he could stand. And it stung to know that Alexandra believed he was capable of those atrocities as well. Reece was a witch and a healer above all. He couldn’t fathom getting off on torture.
And yet he sat rigid and seething. His muscles were aching from the need for vengeance, from the need to hurt. If the person who had tormented Lex was in the room now, Reece was afraid of what he might do. The alarmingly creative ideas that formed in his mind filled him with a sick sense of satisfaction.
He needed to get out of here. He needed air. He was choking on hate.
Reece pushed himself off the bed and fumbled with the locks on the cell door. He didn’t spare a glance at his soulmate as he walked out into the bright hallway and pulled the door shut behind him, leaving her alone in the dark. He couldn’t look at her right now. He had to get air.
Carden looked at him curiously, no doubt about to make some obnoxious comment, but something in Reece’s eyes warned the vampire to stay silent. “Watch her,” Reece ordered quietly and then sprinted down the hall.
No, no time to wait for the elevator. It was too slow and Reece needed to move. He wrenched open the stairwell door and ran. Choking and wheezing, the witch tore up the stairs, flight after flight. He stomped his feet on each step, trying to push the hate out of him. He shoved other Daybreakers out of his way and barely heard their cries of protest. The only sound he heard was his heartbeat thundering in his head. Tiring, he used the railing to haul himself up when he thought his legs might give out. Sweat poured down his face, but Reece felt icy prickles breaking out all over his body. Pins and needles. Dark spots swam in front of his eyes and then he could hardly see.
Finally the witch made it up to the ground floor, barely able to walk. Reece hobbled awkwardly through the lobby as fast as he could and burst through the main doors of the compound.
Air, cool air around him. Flowing into his lungs, skimming over his face. Reece fell to his knees, crumpled in on himself. Rich and perfect air, breathe it in. Breathe out the rage. Again. Again. Air in, hate out.
His breath slowed. He coughed and his hands shook badly. Didn’t matter. His head had cleared as exhaustion overtook the horrible anger. The adrenaline was gone and Reece was surprised to find that he was still intact. The shattered pieces of himself had somehow reassembled and he was now who he had always been.
“Are you alright?” an accented voice asked behind him.
Reece exhaled slowly. “I think so,” he replied.
With a hiss, Nigel sat down next to Reece on the compound’s steps. He was wearing scrubs now and was barefoot. Nigel was nearly a foot shorter than Reece, but the smaller witch still possessed an air of strength that Reece was grateful for at that moment.
“How’re your legs?” Reece asked him.
“A little sore, but otherwise they’re as good as new. What are you doing out here?”
Reece threw the other witch a sardonic glance. “I could ask you the same question. Did Carden tell you to check up on me?”
“More or less. He called to catch me up on our situation and said he was guarding the girl. And then I believe his exact words were, ‘Cahill’s losing it. Talk to him before his head explodes. Mopping up brain matter is not part of my job description.’”
“Carden has a way with words.”
“Doesn’t he? So I’ll ask you again, what are you doing out here?”
Reece did not want to talk about this now. His composure felt fragile. If he starting thinking about Lex again, he wasn’t sure he could keep himself together. He needed time, needed to think things through. “I just wanted some air,” he told Nigel.
The other witch nodded. “I see. And you left the girl that Thierry specifically told you to guard with Carden?”
“It appears that way.”
Nigel just looked at him steadily. “Reece, we’re part of a team. Just tell me what’s going on.”
Reece ran his fingers through his hair, which was soaked with sweat, and wiped his hand on his pants. The other witch was right; as a member of his team, Nigel deserved to know. “The girl…” Reece started. “The Wild Power or whatever she is…she’s my soulmate.”
It was the first time he’d said it aloud and for some reason the admission shook him. A strange warmth flooded him and Reece had to look down to hide the smile that captured his lips. He’d heard so much about the soulmate principle in the past few years, but he’d never contemplated it happening to him. It wasn’t love at first sight or at first touch, no. But it was still powerful and captivating. It was an uncomfortable stretching of the heart to make room for another. It was the inexplicable and undeniable urge to know anything and everything about her. It was lust and infatuation. It was the complete and utter alteration of life and self as he knew it.
“That complicates things,” Nigel replied.
Reece laughed humorlessly. “Oh, I know. Do you have a soulmate?”
The smaller witch looked off into the distance. “No, not that I know of. But I saw it happen to one of the witches in my Circle. Shannon. Her soulmate was a wolf shifter that she just happened to bump into on the way to a pub one night. It wasn’t easy for either of them, a Daybreak witch and a Night World wolf. In the end they decided to stay apart, each living in their own world. But he would come back for a night now and again…and Shannon would be a wreck for weeks afterwards. She loves him.”
“Genevieve loved Aiden St. Helen, even after he tried to kill her.”
Nigel nodded. “She did. Regardless of its benefits, the soulmate principle doesn’t make love any easier. We are who we are. Maybe if soulmates found each other at birth before life screws them up and pulls them in different directions, it would be the perfect bliss it’s supposed to be. But.”
The witch didn’t continue, but then he didn’t have to. “But,” Reece agreed.
“Did she tell you anything about Angie?”
“Not really. She mentioned Angie’s name, seems to think Angie killed the vampire who shot Beth. But she doesn’t know what she is, Nigel. She doesn’t know anything about the Wild Powers.”
“Wrong place, wrong time?”
“Maybe. I’ve got a bad feeling about it. St. Helen was there, watching from the rooftop of the next building. We need to know how much he knows.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I’ve got to talk to her. We both broke down when we found out…I shouldn’t have left her.”
“You needed time. Maybe she needed it too.”
“I’ve got to talk to her,” Reece repeated, slowly standing up. His legs were wobbly under him; he needed to heal himself after his stair-climbing marathon.
Nigel grimaced. “Cahill, I hate to be the one to say it, but Carden isn’t here so…”
Reece looked quizzically. “What is it?”
“She’s okay for right now. Go shower first. You stink and you look like hell.”
Realizing how grimy he felt, Reece replied, “Thanks for the advice.”
The compound was unassuming from the outside. It appeared to be a four-story brick office building just outside of Silver Spring. The humans who passed by probably thought that it contained doctors’ offices, law firms, accountants. Little did they know that the compound stretched twenty-five stories below the ground level and it now held one of the four people who were destined to save humanity from the Night World.
Aiden didn’t give a damn about humanity or the Night World. The only thing he cared about was that his Eve was inside, hiding in the body of another. He had to get to her.
He watched the Daybreak compound from across the street on the third floor of a similar looking building, which actually did house a law firm. The senior partner, whose corner office Aiden now occupied, lay on the floor behindhis oversized cherry desk, completely drained of blood.
Aiden was tired and sated. After he’d been buzzed into the building, he promptly began a rampage, biting as many humans as he could stand and snapping the necks of the others. All of the employees at this branch of Watson, Henderson, and Malloy were dead. It had been a long time since Aiden had killed this many people, humans or Night World. Complete decimation used to be his specialty at Daybreak and it had earned him the nickname “Hellraiser,” which he now despised.
Eve hadn’t liked how much death he caused, even though she knew he was attacking those who would have seen her slaughtered and Daybreak destroyed. Of course, she didn’t know that the ones he killed had been Angie’s enemies as well. Either way, Aiden had stopped killing. For her.
It was an odd thing for him to do, Aiden admitted to himself now. At the time he rationalized it as being necessary: Genevieve didn’t like it when he killed and to earn her trust and continue obtaining information from her, Aiden needed to stop. But he could have hidden his kills from her, as he hid all the parts of himself that belonged to Angie. His chose not to. Eve’s abhorrence for killing had affected him somehow.
When had she begun to change him?
From the very beginning, he realized. She’d gotten under his skin the moment he’d recognized her as his soulmate when she’d thrown her arms around him. He had been assigned to kill her that day and he hadn’t been able to. He’d told himself that, as her soulmate, he could get information from her about the Wild Powers that would be useful to the Night World. He would kill her later.
He hadn’t been able to do it later, either. Aiden saw her violet eyes again, staring up at him with shear love as he wrung all of the breath from her. If he’d held on another moment, he would have done it. But instead he had let go and listened as she coughed and gasped for air. Relieved.
Damn it, he hated her. Eve had made him smile and laugh, made him shiver and gasp. She made him forget about all that he’d worked for: the existence of the Night World, the preservation of his kind, his position with Angie. One touch and all of that was gone. He had nothing left now. She’d destroyed it all, she’d destroyed him.
And now the illustrious Hellraiser watched the compound that was supposed to keep her safe. He smiled at that. She, more than anyone, should know that she was as vulnerable there as she was anywhere else. If she hadn’t learned that yet, he was damn well going to prove it to her.
He knew that she was there. He’d seen the auburn-haired witch that had carried her from the alley right outside of the compound and he’d seen the other witch that had been struck with the blue fire as well. More than that, Aiden could feel her. He could sense her in the air that he breathed.
He ached for her. Already in his mind, he’d stopped thinking of Eve as a slim girl with blond hair and violet eyes. When he pictured Eve in his arms now, he envisioned the petite, curvaceous body she had escaped into. He imagined running his fingers through the glossy spiraled hair that had caught his attention on the subway, gazing into the clear blue eyes that had pierced his soul and given him solace. Aiden wondered if Eve had known how attracted he’d been to Alexandra when she had chosen to flee into the vampire. Did she know how Alexandra had heated his blood when she’d reached beyond his mask of cool detachment to see the tormented man that he truly was? Had she known that it was Alexandra who had made him feel the link connecting his soul to Eve’s after he’d cut himself off from it for days?
Damn it, he loved her. It was all he could do to keep himself from rushing into the compound now to gather her into his arms and ravage her until she begged him to stop. He needed to lose himself in her brilliant blue eyes, in the lush curves of her body, in the heat of the soulmate link. He had nothing else left.
He wanted her dead, and yet he needed to touch her. He needed tofeel her racing heartbeat pressed against his own.
How could one person be so at odds with himself? Aiden felt as if the contradicting parts of his soul were slowly annihilating each other. He didn’t know what would be left of him when it was over.
Watching the compound now, he didn’t care. He would find a way inside, find a way to get to Eve. He didn’t know what would happen then. His mind swarmed with images of her blood on his hands and flashes of her mouth pressed to his, her body shivering under his.
Aiden pressed his hand against the cool window. It was dark outside now and the compound’s security lights shone brightly, illuminating the front entrance and the sidewalk. He knew that the secret tunnel exit would be well-guarded now, after the failed attempt to get Eve to safety, and he would need a powerful witch to open that door into the compound anyway. But he had to find a way in soon, he didn’t know how much time he had before Angie figured out that Genevieve was still alive. Aiden had learned a few tricks over the years to block Angie from his mind, conscious and beyond. But blocking her only raised her suspicions. No doubt the vampire was in her penthouse that very moment, calling contacts and pressing snitches for information. Aiden had to get to Eve before Angie did.
It came to him so easily that Aiden was almost taken aback. He’d always appreciated Okum’s razor, that all things being equal, the simplest explanation was the right one. It seemed to follow that the simplest way into the compound was the best way.
Abandoning his post at the window, Aiden jogged through the law firm’s main office and down the stairs. The chilly night air struck him as he stepped out onto the street and it felt so good. Eve didn’t like nights like this, where the wind still had a cold bite. She’d always loved the sultry, summer air that he thought was stifling—they’d bickered about the power of the air conditioning in the car all summer long.
Aiden St. Helen walked up the stairs to the Daybreak compound, as if he had never left. He opened the doors and glanced around the lobby. It was exactly the same as it had been. Of course, it was. He’d only been gone for six days. Still, he felt strange and outside of himself as he walked towards the security station.
The guards finally saw him and one of them did a double take. “Freeze!” he shouted at Aiden, drawing his gun.
Aiden innocently raised his hands in the air, his palms open and fingers spread. He watched in amusement as one of the other guards frantically picked up the phone and dialed Anton’s number. The older lamia would be upstairs in his living quarters by now, annoyed by the call that was probably interrupting his dinner. The guard hastily tried to explain the situation. He sounded so crazed that Aiden laughed silently.
Two other guards slowly approached the intruder with the weapons drawn and cocked. Aiden made no move to stop them as they wrenched his arms behind his back had shackled him in wooden handcuffs. He only smiled as they roughly pulled him to his feet and then shoved him through the doors that led to the main hallway and elevators.
He was pushed into the elevators and the guards pressed the button for the 25th underground floor. “Maximum security?” Aiden asked proudly. “You flatter me. I hadn’t realized just how dangerous I am.”
He laughed loudly then and the guards looked at him warily. Oh, their expressions were priceless. Their own Hellraiser was scaring them. This was too perfect. Aiden laughed until tears streamed down his face. He could barely stand when the elevator doors opened. The guards had to supporthis weight as they led him down the hallway towards the cells because the vampire was doubled over, convulsing with laughter.
“What the hell is wrong with him?” one guard mumbled to the other.
“His soulmate died,” the other replied. “I’ve heard that it can make you insane.”
“She’s not dead,” Aiden gasped, awkwardly wiping the tears from his face with his shoulder. “She’s not dead.”
One of the guards looked at the other and shook his head. “It's a shame. Hellraiser was one of the best.”
The second guard unlocked the door to a cell and shoved Aiden inside, still handcuffed. Aiden fell to his knees on the cement floor and threw his head back. Insane, insane. They had no idea.
Reece let the scalding water pour over him, hoping that it would wash and burn the day off him. He’d never felt so out of control in his life. In a matter of hours he had turned an important mission into a monstrous clusterfuck, found a new Wild Power who was also his soulmate, and had come precariously close to a nervous breakdown. And now…Reece didn’t know what would happen next. He only knew that he needed to see Lex and he needed to talk to her about what had happened.
He dressed in some of the extra clothes he had brought from Canada, glad to be rid of the black gear he’d warn during the mission. He glanced at his reflection in the bathroom mirror and was taken aback. He seemed years older than he had when he left Montreal. There were dark circles under his eyes and his cheeks had hollowed a little. He needed food and sleep, but didn’t have the patience for either.
Reece took the elevator down to the bottom floor. He’d done a decent job of healing the strain in his leg muscles, but a fine tremor still remained. Well he deserved it for his stupidity. Running up twenty-five flights of stairs was hardly a healthy or effective way to cope with what had happened today. But it had seemed like a good idea at the time.
Carden was still standing guard at Lex’s door. The vampire could be an intimidating presence, even at this distance. He was a little shorter than Reece, but Carden probably outweighed him by at least twenty pounds. The vampire was solid muscle.
Right now Carden seemed bored. He was leaning back against the wall, staring off into space. But though Reece was silent as he stepped into the hallway, Carden’s gaze snapped over to him. Despite appearances, he was acutely alert.
“Did you get all clean and pretty for me?” the vampire drawled when Reece had gotten closer to him.
“How is she?” Reece asked, brushing off Carden’s joke.
“She stayed curled up for a while, but now she’s working on wearing down the floor by pacing back and forth like a lunatic. Is this the effect you usually have on women?”
“Alexandra,” the witch said shortly. “She’s my soulmate.” The words came easier this time, but still warmed him.
“I figured,” Carden said surprisingly. “You should have seen your face when you ran out of there. It was like you’d touched a live wire. I looked the same way when—” the vampire broke off abruptly. He ran his fingers roughly through his short brown hair, as if he were trying to shake something off of him. The muscles in his shoulders had tensed. But when Carden spoke again, his tone was as casual as ever. “Did you find out anything else from her, besides the obvious?”
Reece considered pushing the vampire to finish what he’d been about to say, but decided to let it go. The last thing he needed was Carden getting defensive. “I got her name. Alexandra Harper. She was involved with the vampire who killed Beth. They only got to DC a few months ago, before that they traveled a lot. She doesn’t know that she’s a Wild Power. I told Nigel, she doesn’t seem to know what a Wild Power even is. If that’s true, it means that when she killed Gen, she didn’t know what Gen was. But I still don’t know if she’s involved with Angie.”
Carden focused on the window into the cell. “She’s whacked, Cahill. The screaming, the fetal position thing, the pacing… and now she looks like she’s going to be sick.”
Reece pushed his way in front of the vampire to see Lex for himself. His soulmate was bent over, as if she were vomiting. Her hair was in a tangled mass around her face. He remembered how silky it had been when he’d pulled it back from her face earlier. He should be in there right now. “Shit,” he mumbled. “I’m going to try to talk to her again. Hopefully it will turn out better this time. You mind keeping watch?”
“No. I’ve always liked to watch,” Carden purred. “Just make sure the show is worth it.”
“You’re a sick, sick man.”
Part 11
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