Dark Embrace (Principatus) (13 page)

“Move.” She forced the word past her lips. “Before I tear your heart out and feed it to the stray dogs.”

“You’re not walking away from me, Inari Chayse,” he murmured. He lowered his head until she saw nothing but him. “And I think tearing my heart out is the last thing you want to do to me.”

Hot shame burned her cheeks. “You conceited, arrogant bastard.”

He smiled, a lazy, indolent smile that made her pulse triple. “True. But I tend to answer to Ezryn much better.” He tugged her wrists farther away from her sides, jolting her closer to his hard, hard body. “Try it. Say, Master Ezryn and see what happens.”

Volcanic heat erupted in Inari’s core. An explosive mix of raw anger and primal lust. She opened her fingers and spread them wide, flexing her wrists in his tight grip. “I have no master.”

Ezryn lifted an eyebrow, pulling her arms behind her back until their bodies melded together. His knuckles grazed the curves of her ass cheeks, the feather-light contact sending sparks of wet electricity through her core. “Really? I thought all Principatus have a master.” He moved her wrists to one big hand, sliding his free hand up her ribcage, over the side of her right breast. “Y’know, the big guy? Flowing white hair, blinding white light, lots of clouds?” He brushed his thumb over the traitorous point of her nipple straining against the supple leather of her vest and she gasped, the sound escaping her before she could stop it. His eyes flickered at her response, the deep red fire in their black irises glowing brighter. “Isn’t
He
your master?”

Inari closed her hands into fists, twisting her wrists in his grasp. She had to get away. Every molecule in her body was too aware of his potent force. Too aware and too aroused. “You really have no clue about Principatus, do you?” She flashed him a cold smile, letting him see her contempt. She just prayed to the Highest he didn’t recognize it for what it truly was—self-contempt. “Keep fucking with me, and you’ll see just how much leash my
Master
gives me.”

The vampire’s nostrils flared and he lowered his head closer still to hers, eyes unreadable. “Oh, I haven’t even begun to fuck with you, Inari Chayse. When I do, you will know. Your body will be so consumed with pleasure you’ll be unable to function.” He moved his mouth to her ear, his lips brushing her flesh in a cool caress. “When I do, you will forget your other master in a heartbeat. All you will able to do is whimper
my
name over and over again.
Master
Ezryn,
Master
Ezryn,
Master
Ez—”

Inari smashed her knee up into his balls.

Ezryn let out a grunt. Pain ripped across his handsome face. He recoiled, slipping his hands from her wrists.

With inhuman speed—whether that of succubus or Principatus, she didn’t know or care—Inari spun and slammed her heel into his chest in a back kick hard enough to send him arcing through the air.

“Holy shit!” someone yelped behind her. “Did you see that?” Someone else screamed, a high-pitched note of stunned disbelief. The crowd dispersed, some running, others tripping and stumbling just far enough away from Inari and Ezryn to consider themselves safe, more than one holding up their cell phones as they did so, recording every second of the excitement on the innocuous devices.

“Help her,” a female voice screeched.

“Help him!” a male voice laughed.

Inari ignored them all, her stare fixed instead on Ezryn’s body landing on the sidewalk in a heavy thump. The crowd scurried farther away from him, eyes wide with a feverish thrill. A blinding light flashed as one of the onlookers took a photo.

Run
, the voice in her head that sometimes sounded like Tianya roared.
Run now
.

She clenched her fists, darting her tongue over her lips in a nervous swipe. Run? Or take the bloodsucker out?

In a blur of preternatural power, Ezryn was on his feet, his black gaze pinning her to the spot. “Shall we call this foreplay, Inari?”

A siren wailed above the gasping crowd, high and loud. Inari narrowed her eyes, her stomach tight. The cops were coming, and somehow she didn’t think it was to bust the hookers.

Good. Use the distraction. Run away.

Run away? How do you kill him if you run away?

How do you
fuck
him if you run away?

She ground her teeth together, the damp heat between her thighs like a curse. “Let’s call it round one, Ezryn. Round two will see you dead.”

More gasps and laughs came from the circling crowd. Another flash bleached the night. “You go, girl,” the same man who’d called for help for Ezryn earlier bellowed as someone clapped. A Kings Cross crowd through and through. Too jaded, laidback or high to recognize the real danger in the situation.

Above the noise, the police siren grew louder. Closer.

Inari’s skin prickled, something deep within her core knotting tight. Her muscles began to burn, her teeth to ache—her Principatus soul stirring deep within. Rising.

A shudder wracked through her, sending new heat into her limbs and the pit of her belly. The knot there twisted tighter, a wicked, squirming sensation that made her nipples pinch. Oh no, the Principatus in her didn’t want to fight. The Principatus wanted to
mate.

The realization stole her breath. By the Powers, no.

Her head spun. This was not right. She was ex-succubus. Succubi did not mate. Succubi fucked and left. They took their fill and moved on. She was Principatus. Principatus did not mate. They killed and left. They terminated their target and hunted the next. She didn’t want to mate with anyone, let alone a vampire. It was impossible, and she would not let it be so.

Ezryn—and the crowd—watched her, all silent, all motionless.

She turned on her heel and, rocked by confusion and cowardice, ran away, the icy burn of transformation threatening to overwhelm her. The crowd melted from her path. The screech of the approaching siren pierced her ears as she burst into an impossible sprint. Her Principatus force—so close to release—surged through her. Or was it her succubus force? God help her, she couldn’t tell.

No. It’s not. It can’t be.

She ran faster, the bright, blinking lights of the strip blurring into a myriad of colored streaks. Her heart hammered and her blood roared. The sounds of Kings Cross at night became an indistinct hum of white noise.

She took one corner, another, another, the hot night air cool on her flushed face, the taste of sin and sex pervading every breath she took. She fled through dark, quiet back streets, moving at an inhuman pace, her body burning not just from sexual hunger but physical exhaustion. Her feet ached, her stiletto boots less than perfect for such a marathon. She didn’t care. Experiencing pain lessened the torturous longing in her core. Ten miles and ten flights of stairs later, she burst through the door to her home, charging through the small apartment until she reached her bedroom. Safe.

She threw herself down on the bed, the collection of black and red silk cushions she’d gathered over the centuries bouncing on the mattress as she rammed her face and fists into its soft surface. “Argh!” she screamed, squeezing her eyes shut. “This is not right!”

“Y’know,” a familiar voice noted behind her, and she froze, her already frantic heart leaping into new life, “for a Principatus, you’ve done a very bad job of keeping your home base a secret.”

Chapter Five

Jacob narrowed his eyes, locking his stare on what he suspected was the window of Inari Chayse’s bedroom. He’d seen her run past it in a harried sprint before she’d suddenly disappeared from view as if she’d thrown herself at something, possibly the bed.

What are the chances she’s not on that bed alone now, Jake?
The unsettling question made him clench his fists.

Ezryn was inside the Principatus’s apartment, and he doubted the master vampire was ending the assassin’s life.

He let out a ragged sigh.

Following Inari first through Paddington in the hours just after dusk had revealed little he could use but unnerved him all the same. The Principatus was by far the most sensual creature he’d ever seen. She oozed sex, her every move sinfully seductive. She also oozed power. A calm menace seemed to hang about her, tainting the seductive rhythm of her body, like that of a dominatrix only tenfold.

He’d found himself wondering how many of the Principatus’s male targets had sported a hard-on when destroyed.

That rather absurd but perversely arousing thought had been crossing his mind when Ezryn had entered into his line of sight, walking up behind Inari on Oxford Street and slipping his fingers around her smooth upper arm.

The look on the Principatus’s face when she turned to his master was etched forever on his retina—shocked disbelief and unequivocal desire. And no matter how much Jacob wished it wasn’t so, that same desire burned on Ezryn’s face.

Jacob ground his teeth. It was a complication he didn’t need. It made what he’d planned far more…risky.

He’d lingered back in the teeming throng of pedestrians moving along Oxford Street, watching as a young vampire approached Ezryn. For a split second, he’d almost launched himself from his concealed position, ready to defend the true overlord against a possible threat. When he’d seen Ezryn laugh, Jacob had relaxed.

But only a little. A laughing Ezryn was not something he was used to. Not the completely relaxed, open laughter he’d witnessed from his master earlier tonight. It was as disconcerting as the desire Jacob had seen in his face, and all because of the Principatus, Inari Chayse.

Does it change your plans? Will you still kill her?

He swallowed, his mouth dry. It didn’t.

So what are you going to do, General Ford? Go upstairs now? While Ezryn is in her home? Stop him doing…whatever he is doing to her?

“Dark Ones,” he muttered. He shuffled his feet, curling his fingers into his palms. He couldn’t do that.

He was brave, but not that brave.

Narrowing his stare on the Principatus’s window, he considered his next move. He could stand here until Ezryn left, but something warned him his master wasn’t going to be exiting the place for some time, and as disturbing as that was, inaction disturbed him more.

With one long, final look at the open window, he slid into the shadows.

He traveled the dark, early-morning streets without a sound, his presence undetected by those he passed. He rarely used his vampire powers to move among humans anymore, but Fat Harry’s compound was on the other side of Sydney Harbor and he needed to get there fast.

Fifteen minutes later, he stood outside a mansion so overtly pretentious he couldn’t stop his sneer. It was perfect for the bloated, egomaniacal idiot and so very typical.

Pulling in a slow breath, Jacob tasted the air.

The slightest tinge of decay threaded through the sweet scent of Chinese Star Jasmine hanging heavy on the night, and he curled his lip. Yes, Fat Harry was in. There was no mistaking his vile stench.

He stepped up to the massive gates, wriggling his fingers as he studied their dagger-pointed, ten-foot iron pickets. Broaching them wouldn’t be difficult. What waited on the other side was another matter.

An image surfaced in his mind, an apparition of a memory he’d long fought to suppress. He fisted his hands, the image like a stake to his lifeless heart.

Melissa, his wife, in his arms…

It was her hair he always remembered first. Copper-spun silk that fell about her shoulders in a tumbled mess of curls. His wife had hated her hair, but he’d loved it. Its weight, its texture, the way it slid through his fingers like cool water, the way it turned a deep blood-red when wet. He would fall asleep every morning with its clean scent in his nose, his face pressed to the back of her neck, his arms curled around her slim body. He would drift off knowing even though she spent the daylight hours living her human life, when he woke she would be there waiting for him. And before he opened his eyes every night, that same clean scent would thread into his empty lungs and he would smile. It was always her hair he remembered first…

The silken strands clinging to his fingers, matted with blood. Her blood. She gazed up at him, her eyes, the color of the ocean on a cloudless day, glassy. Sightless. He’d shaken his head, held her to his chest. She was warm, but it was only the residue of the life once in her body. They’d ripped that life from her. Ripped it from her veins, her chest, feasting on her even as they raped her, over and over, her screams and cries met with laughs and cheers. And he’d been unable to save her. Unable to stop them. Haral’s zealots, sent by the newly ascended overlord, had butchered his wife, his love, and forced him to watch it all.

They’d bound him with silver-lined manacles, holding him captive as they violated her body and drained her veins, taking turns at her until she lay limp beneath them. And the last one…the last one to sink his dick between her legs had knotted his fists in her hair and tore two handfuls from her scalp, calling loyalty to Fat Harry as he did so. Her hair…his wife’s hair…

The sound of soft footfalls to Jacob’s left shattered the tortured memory. He swung his head in their clumsy direction, sensing the human female before she stepped from behind a row of densely grown evergreen poplars.

“Are you a vampire?”