Dangerous Games (33 page)

So, you are related in some way to Quinn?

Quinn?

I formed his picture in my mind, and the presence laughed. It was a mocking, spiteful sound.
Ah, my foolish little brother. He thinks he had my mind and body frozen last night while he attempted to break me.

As we have broken you?

You merely hold my body and defenses captive. My deep thoughts are still my own, or I would not be answering, now would I?

Couldn’t argue with that, I supposed.
Why did you raise Azhi Dahaki?

I needed the strength of the three-headed dragon to raise the eternal destroyer.

And why would someone like Maisie want to raise someone like you?

Because in darkness there is strength. Maisie wanted power. I granted her that.

Then you killed her.
Or killed her spirit.

The equivalent of a shrug ran through the darkness of Maisie’s mind.
There is a price to be paid for the granting of one’s desires.

And what is the price you paid? Alienation from your family? A life spent in the netherworlds of hell?

I have gained immortality.
She made a disparaging sound.
And my family has dedicated their worthless lives to ridding the world of both myself and the god of darkness. They cannot see the futility. Cannot admit that darkness
exists because humanity itself exists, and that to erase one, you erase the other.

Well, I wasn’t seeing the connection myself. I mean, humans could be a pain in the ass sometimes, but I very much doubted they were the sole reason for evil’s existence.
So you’re saying Angra Mainyu cannot be destroyed?

He can never be destroyed. Not for as long as there is one human living and breathing on this earth.

With her words came a sense of power, of force. As if she were trying to make me believe that, and nothing else. If that was her intent, then it backfired, because all I could think of was the fact that while this all-powerful god of darkness was still alive—if a spirit could be deemed such a thing—he’d been trapped in the nether regions of hell for hundreds, if not thousands, of generations.

And if it had been done once, it could be done again.

We need to finish this, Riley.

Jack’s mental tones were cracked, evidence of the struggle he was having to contain the being inside Maisie’s body and mind.

I blew out a breath.
Tell me how to rid this world of your dark master, or I will kill you.

Try. You will not succeed. Kill this body, and my spirit will simply claim another.

Annoyance ran through me. But then, overwhelming arrogance and a supreme sense of superiority
did
tend to get on my nerves. I’d put up with far too much of that during my years with Talon.

Talon….

The mere thought of him had an idea sparking deep inside. A horrible, hateful idea that part of me—the part that had seen the remains of too many women mutilated by
this
evil and her so-called associates—rejoiced in.
Jack, am I technically free to do what I wish with this woman now that we’ve confirmed Maisie is long gone?

Yes.

I opened my eyes and looked at the one-way glass. “Get me a threaded sheet knife.”

The sheet knives were a Directorate special. Basically, they were thin, clear sheets of plastic that were as rigid as steel and could slice through just about anything—flesh, metal, or wood—with ease. The threaded sheet knives were almost identical, only they were made of a special compound that reacted with blood and disintegrated to reveal the silver strip that ran down the heart of it. Ideal for pinning werewolves and other shapeshifters to human form—a fact I knew for a certainty, having done it to Talon.

If a threaded sheet knife could hold the soul of a werewolf to human form on the night of a full moon, it could surely hold a demonic spirit to human flesh.

It was worth a shot, anyway. Talking and threatening was getting us nowhere fast.

I glanced around as the door opened, and a security officer stepped in and handed me a knife. As he left, I held up the knife.

Amusement ran through Caelfind’s thoughts.
Am I supposed to feel threatened by something so flimsy?

I thought about the bodies again. Conjured the images of the women, their flesh sliced opened, internal organs gone—eaten—while they lay there dying. Revulsion swept through me, accompanied by anger. I grabbed them both, hanging on to the strength of those emotions, using them as shields as I pressed the point of the knife against the flesh over Maisie’s left breast, right above her heart.

Tell me how to rid this world of your dark master, or I will trap you for an eternity inside dead flesh.

You cannot do that. Once this flesh is dead, my spirit is free.

Even the immortal can get it wrong occasionally.

I pressed the blade into her, watching as it sliced through cloth and muscle and bone with ridiculous ease. Her eyes went wide, and pain began to fill the void. Yet it never touched me, held at bay by either the anger in my soul or Jack’s steely presence.

I drove the knife deeper, ramming it through her sternum, lodging the point deep in her heart. Blood began to seep across my fingers, blood that was warm and sweet to my nose, stirring excitement through my veins.

No, no, no,
part of me wanted to scream, but I pushed it away ruthlessly, concentrating on Caelfind, watching her eyes, waiting for the moment of her body’s death, and the realization that she would never be free.

The knife began to disintegrate, and smoke seeped from the wound, lodging the silver deep inside. Pinning her spirit, the way Talon’s spirit had been pinned.

Only she didn’t scream the way he’d screamed. She merely smiled and waited, her thoughts filled with pain and yet amused.

Until the moment her heart finally gave out, and her body slumped to the floor.

Then she screamed. Screamed like a banshee, until her fury filled my mind and made it almost impossible to think.

Tell me how to rid this world of your master.

My words were little more than a pebble standing against a cyclone, yet still she heard.

He can only be banished by a priest. A priest of Aedh.

And your brother is one?

The last one.

Well, not exactly the last. But perhaps the last still retaining flesh form.
And the dragons?

Behead them.

Can’t they take over another body, as you can?

She hesitated, twisting in fury.
No. Not without my help. Now, release me, as you promised.

I laughed—a harsh and hateful sound—and began to pull back.
All these years of serving a dark god, and you still believe in promises?

Her fury followed me, nipping at my mental heels like a rabid dog until the force that was Jack stepped in and stopped her cold. I fell out of her mind, feeling like I was falling from a great height, and found myself on my knees, on the floor, trembling and shaking and sweating.

And then I felt the warm stickiness of blood across my hand, smelled again its metallic sweetness, and my stomach rose.

I pushed onto all fours, scrambled over to the waste bin, and lost every scrap of food and liquid I’d eaten during the day.

When there was nothing left to lose, I collapsed back against the wall and sucked in great gulps of air. It felt like I’d gone ten rounds in the training ring with Gautier, with every inch aching and bruised, and my head pounding. The only thing that was missing was the actual bruises.

It was a good five minutes before I had the strength to even open my eyes. Jack leaned against the rear wall, his hands on his knees as he sucked in air, the skin on his arms paler than I’d ever seen them and his fingers little more than skin and bone. Which just proved how much strength it had taken to hold Caelfind.

My gaze slid on to the stone circle. Maisie’s body lay slumped in the middle. Blood gleamed darkly off the front of her shirt, and the thick scent had my stomach twitching again.

Or maybe it wasn’t the scent of blood. Maybe it was just the realization of how easily—how very easily—I’d spilt her blood and ended her life.

I might tell myself that I would never be the killer Jack wanted me to be, but the truth was, that skill was already within me.

I
could
kill, and kill easily, when I had to. When I wanted to. When I needed to.

Bile burned my throat. I put my hand over my mouth and swallowed heavily, then forced myself to remember the lives Maisie and her cohorts had destroyed.

Because while I might hate what I had done here today, while I would probably suffer nightmares about it for weeks or months to come, the truth was, if it saved just
one
life, then part of me could not regret it.

As for the part that
did
…well, at least that proved there was still hope left. Today might have proven that the killer Jack wanted me to be already resided within, but accepting that part of my soul—becoming comfortable with it—was still a ways off yet.

And I had to be thankful for that. Had to cling to it, as fiercely as I could. It was my only hope.

Jack pushed upright with a thick groan. His face was gaunt, cheekbones prominent. A man in serious need of a good feed.

And the dark hunger gleamed in his eyes.

“Control it, boss,” I said softly. Warily.

“If I wasn’t, you’d be lunch rather than sitting there making stupid statements.”

I grinned. “Good to see your sense of humor doesn’t leave when the bloodlust rises.”

“It will if you keep blathering. Get your butt home, and get some rest, Riley. I’ll finish off matters here.”

My gaze slid to the body on the floor—to the dark pool of blood beginning to thicken near her body.

Knew it wouldn’t go to waste.

I shuddered, and got the hell out of there.

F
our hours’ sleep was never going to be enough, so when the alarm went off at six it was damn lucky it wasn’t flung across the room. But the natural irritability that came with lack of sleep increased tenfold when I realized I wasn’t alone in my bedroom.

And the warm sandalwood scent told me who it was.

I rolled onto my side. Quinn sat near the window, surrounded in a halo of fading sunshine, a dark silhouette of male perfection. Mother nature at her perverse best—for while the bod may be beautiful, the nature of the man left a hell of a lot to be desired.

Though I guess he’d probably say the same about me. And would probably be right.

“What are you doing here?”

“I came to thank you,” he said, voice soft and oh so sexy.

“For what?” I flung off the sheet and got out of bed. Quinn’s gaze slid across my skin like liquid heat, and my hormones reacted accordingly.

“For doing what I could not. Capturing and containing Caelfind.”

I picked up a T-shirt from the floor, gave it a sniff to check its freshness, then pulled it on. “We would have all saved time and effort if you’d been honest with us from the start.”

“You don’t understand—”

“No, I don’t,” I said, as I stomped out to get coffee. It wouldn’t help to put out the low-burning fire caused by both Quinn’s presence and my own nature, but it sure couldn’t hurt my grouchy mood. “There was nothing stopping you from telling me that night the priest made his appearance. Only your own ornery need to do everything your own way.”

“There’s the pot calling the kettle black,” he muttered.

I shot him an annoyed look. Even though he was no longer surrounded by the blinding halo of sunlight, he still looked little more than a shadow because he was dressed from head to foot in black.

Even his dark eyes were shaded. Wary.

Some perverse part deep inside was mighty pleased about that. The other part, the part heated by the growing nearness of the full moon, just wanted to grab him and shag him senseless.

Because right now, the wolf within didn’t really care about hurt or anger or anything else. Not when the moon fever was surging through my bloodstream. But once the full moon had come and gone, she
would
care. She
would
hurt, and she most certainly
would
regret having given in yet again.

I couldn’t do it. I had to hold firm, no matter what.

Dammit, I had a wolf who cared for me. A wolf who didn’t abuse my trust or my feelings. A wolf who longed for the same sort of future as I did.

That
should
be enough.

It was perverse—insane—to want more.

And yet, deep down, part of me did.