Equites : Book 4 of the Heku Series (34 page)

“
Touch me again, and I’ll
ash you so fast you won’t know what hit you,” Emily said, scowling
at him.

“
You can’t ash me,
Sweetheart. I’m the only one that can revive your precious Elder if
he’s incinerated when we get back,” Damon said, grinning. He
realized that with the bruise forming on Emily’s cheek, he would
have more to deal with when they got back than having to revive a
few heku.

“
Maybe if you decide to
screw anything with a skirt, the Council won’t need you when we go
back,” Emily growled, her hands balled into tight fists.

“
They don’t care what I do
in my personal life, they all do it too. So don’t get your pretty
head worked up over me,” Damon said, amused. He stepped closer to
Emily, and grinned when she took a step back and found only
wall.

“
I seriously doubt the
Council would stoop to hiring prostitutes,” Emily said,
glaring.

Damon grinned and pinned her to the
wall with his body and kissed her before responding, “Not everyone
can find a delicious little mortal to marry so we can fuck any time
we want.”

Emily leaned her head back and smashed
her forehead into his nose, a crunching sound echoed through the
empty hallway. Damon yelled and took a step backwards, unable to
see while his nose healed, “Damnit.”

“
If you ever kiss me again,
I’ll remove those lips,” she said, and took a step around
him.

Emily felt hands on her shoulders and
was soon falling forward as Damon pushed her to the ground. He
flipped her over and pinned her to the floor with his hand around
her neck.

“
I won’t stand here and be
threatened by a nothing mortal like you,” he said to
her.

“
Get your hands off of me,”
Emily said scathingly. His hand tightened and suddenly, she
couldn’t breathe.

“
Until you learn a little
respect, your life here in France just got a lot harder,” Damon
said, and released his grip a bit to let her breathe.

Emily clawed at his hand, “I could
never respect you, and if the Council doesn’t let you go for this,
then I’ve lost all respect for them, too.”

Damon hissed and tightened his hand
around her throat. He got a rush at the way she struggled to
breathe beneath his fingers, and how her small body fought against
him uselessly. Again, he relaxed his grip enough to let her breathe
some.

“
Respect, Emily… and
obedience, it’ll make your life much easier. We could be here a
while you know. No Elder to protect you, and I outrank Kyle and
Mark,” Damon said, grinning.

“
Is that obedience to you
or your dick? Seems to me like it’s running your thoughts anyway,”
Emily whispered angrily.

Damon couldn’t pull back the anger
rising within him. He no longer saw her as anything more than
noncompliant prey. With his hand around her neck, he picked her
head up slightly and slammed it back onto the carpeted floor.
Alexis began to cry from the bedroom, and he ignored her as he
tightened his grip around Emily’s neck.

“
I’d hate for Alexis to be
without a mother… all because her mother was too stupid to shut
up,” Damon hissed.

Emily pulled frantically at his
fingers, unable to move them as she tried to breathe. Her lungs
ached for air and the sound of the baby’s crying started to sound
far away and muffled. She couldn’t focus enough to burn Damon. Her
mind was filled with panic and the need to breathe.

Damon watched through predatory eyes
as she fought to free herself from his strong grasp. Deciding to
end it, he raised his fist above her head. One quick movement and
he would crush her skull in an instant, stopping the
insolence.

Emily felt air flow into her lungs as
a flash above her eyes hit Damon from the side and knocked him into
the dining room. She turned over onto her hands and knees and
gasped for air. She could hear the scuffle from the dining room,
and angry voices yelling at Damon. She looked up as Kyle and
Damon’s fight moved into the living room, smashing walls and
furniture as they blurred around each other.

Emily focused on Damon and the fight
ended as he screamed and fell to the floor, writhing in agony. The
smell of burning flesh filled the room, and she heard a panicked
voice yell her name. She didn’t care who it was, she focused on
Damon to control herself. She wanted a slow, torturous
burn.

Mark took her face in his hands and
forced her to look at him.

“
Stop it,” he said
sternly.

Mark took a moment to study her. She
had a bruise on her cheek with a small cut that sent a drop of
blood down her face, and her eye was black and quickly swelling
shut. Fierce purple bruises stood out on her neck and
jaw.

“
Stop it,” Mark said again,
and the screams from behind him stopped. He turned quickly, unsure
if he would find a pile of ash, or Damon, released from his
pain.

“
You Bitch!” Damon yelled,
and the weight of him slammed against her as she crashed into the
coffee table, sending splinters of wood around the room.

She screamed as her soft mortal flesh
was ripped apart by the shattered table. She could see Kyle and
Silas restraining Damon as he struggled to get to her. The smell of
her blood sent his violent personality past the edge of
reason.

Emily narrowed her eyes at him,
ignoring the pain in her back, and Damon again screamed as the burn
smell returned. Mark was suddenly blocking her view, her face again
in his hands.

“
Let him go,” Mark said
firmly.

Emily laid her head down on the floor
and released Damon from the burning pain.

“
That is enough!” Kyle
yelled. Emily couldn’t see past Mark, so she wasn’t sure if he was
mad at Damon or both of them.

Emily pushed Mark’s hands away, “Get
your hands off of me.”

Mark moved away from Emily just in
time for her to see Silas push Damon out the back door and slam the
door behind him. She stayed where she was on the floor, and looked
up at the ceiling as she tried to calm her temper and ascertain how
badly she was hurt.

Kyle blurred from the room and
returned with Alexis, still crying in his arms. She was furiously
kicking and her tiny face was red with anger. Allen was standing
behind Kyle’s legs, shaking with fear as tears streamed down his
face.

Mark knelt down beside her again once
he was able to control his thirst, the smell of her blood was
enticing and hard to ignore. He put his hands on her shoulders,
“Roll over, let me see your back.”

Emily pushed his hands again
forcefully, “I said, don’t touch me.”

Allen’s entire posture changed when he
caught her scent. His small body crouched low, and a hiss escaped
his lips as he drew them back to expose his teeth. He lunged at
Emily, but Mark was able to catch him and pull him out into the
backyard.

Emily sat up slowly. She could feel
the wetness on the back of her shirt from the blood as she used the
couch to stand up. The world shifted beneath her feet, but she
caught the wall to steady herself. Her head was pounding, and her
throat burned as she walked up to Kyle and took the baby from
him.

Kyle watched to make sure she made it
into the bedroom, and then turned to the backyard when he heard the
bedroom door lock. He blurred out to Damon and glared at
him.

“
What the hell was that? We
leave you alone for 12 hours and you try to kill each other?” Kyle
growled.

“
That woman is impossible!
What does he see in her?” Damon asked angrily.

“
I would expect more out of
a member of the Council,” Kyle said harshly, he knew he was
overstepping, but didn’t care. The image of Damon poised to kill
Emily was fresh in his mind.

“
I won’t let her speak to
me like that. She’s just a mortal,” Damon said, standing up as his
anger began to turn into panic.

“
She’s just a Winchester…
just an Elder’s wife…” Kyle said, and watched Damon closely as
Silas let go of him.

“
I don’t have to take that
from her. I’m an ‘old one’ and a member of the Council,” Damon
said, glaring.

“
Who threw the first
punch?” Kyle asked.

Damon sighed, “I did… but she deserved
it.”

“
What started this thing
anyway?” Mark asked, still holding onto Allen.

“
Damnit, I thought she was
asleep so… I had a friend over…” Damon said, and sighed. It all
seemed like a stupid fight now that his head was
clearing.

“
I take it you didn’t find
a nice remote bedroom,” Kyle said, irritated.

“
No… she was asleep!” Damon
said, trying to defend himself. “I don’t see any of you inside
interrogating her, blaming her for trying to kill me.”

“
Why should we? It’s easy
to see that this all started because of a serious lack of judgment
on your part,” Kyle hissed.

Damon stood up and crossed his arms,
“I’m still a member of the Equites Council, and as such, I demand
you show me the respect I deserve.”

Kyle sighed and walked back inside,
followed by Silas, Mark, and Allen.

Kyle knocked on the bedroom door, “Em?
Can I come in?”

When no one responded, Kyle tapped the
door under the handle and broke the lock, then walked into the room
and shut the door behind him. The smell of fresh blood hit him, and
he winced slightly and waited until the desire to feed passed. The
room was dark, but he saw Emily sitting on the bed nursing Alexis
and looking at up at him.

Kyle sat down on the bed, avoiding
looking at Emily. He looked around the room for a moment and then
sighed, “How badly are you hurt?”

When Emily didn’t answer him, he
risked a glance at her. She was still watching him through her one
good eye.

“
Fine, I’ll talk,” Kyle
said, turning back to the wall. “Damon told me what happened, and
while I admit it was stupid on his part, you have got to learn to
control your temper. It’s bad enough to have Chevalier lose his
temper with you, but Damon doesn’t have as much control as the
Elder does.”

Kyle waited a few minutes before he
spoke again, “When you’re ready to talk, we’ll be in the living
room.”

Kyle glanced again at Emily, and then
left the room when she didn’t respond.

“
How bad is she?” Mark
asked when Kyle sat down on the couch.

“
I don’t know. She’s not
talking,” Kyle said, and looked at Silas. “Fill Damon in on what
you told us in the limo.”

“
You saw the start of it,
how the Coven Heads filled the council chamber, accusing the
Council of keeping the child heku and the Winchester baby a secret
from them,” Silas started. “After you left, things got heated and
the Council was forcibly removed from their chairs and thrown into
prison.”

“
One at a time, they were
taken up to the council chambers, where a make-shift council
interrogated them for hours on end. They were demanding to know
where Emily had gone, but, as you know, none of them knew. This
went on for two weeks,” Silas said quietly.

“
The Cavalry mounted when
it was clear and staged outside of the city with a lot of the heku
from town. Most were afraid to even leave their houses, but a few
risked it and stood with us as we waited for a break to free the
Council.”

“
We were getting updates
from a guard that was stationed down in the prison. He was able to
send us small notes of what was going on, at great personal risk to
himself. He let us know as soon as the Coven Heads killed the first
member of the Council, Saul,” Silas said quietly.

“
We arranged an attack. A
time when the Cavalry would invade the palace simultaneous to the
release of the entire Council by the guard. When the time came, we
rallied with the remaining council members and stormed the council
chambers. The Coven Leaders had started to fight among themselves
and weren’t prepared for our attack.”

“
The fight lasted only
about an hour, that’s when we saw that Nelson had been killed. He
was the only loss on our side from that fight. Four Coven Leaders
died, but the rest were restrained by council members and the
Cavalry. As soon as word got out that the true Council had regained
control, those hiding in the city flooded into the palace to show
their support.”

“
A warning was sent out to
every coven in the Equites that no further action would be
tolerated. The Coven Leaders that spearheaded the mutiny were taken
to the cells to be tried as soon as Damon returns. The Cavalry was
put in charge of finding you, and we’ve spent the last three weeks
searching for any sign of your whereabouts,” Silas said, and smiled
slightly.

“
We have pulled bank
reports, phone records, and have every supporting coven out trying
to catch any sign of Emily’s scent. We figured that was the one
thing you would have a hard time masking. I have to give you all
credit, until the phone call from Kyle, we were beginning to wonder
if we would ever find you.”

“
Now is the hard part, do
we believe you?” Kyle asked, glancing from Mark to
Damon.