Feral Passion (21 page)

And for the reasons, Kevin found this most
amusing.

“Not really,” Mary snapped, head snapping
back when Raffaele took a seat next to where she had sprung to her
feet.

“Sure,” Raffaele said, voice speaking
otherwise.

“We are all gathered here today,” Bill
started, voice booming, “to celebrate the joining of man! Woman!
And--” Stuart punched him in the arm, blue and white eyes
glaring.

Mary paled.

“No, no, dear--”

“Stuart, my god I’m going to kill you...”
Raffaele said, cutting off Kevin.

Bill glowered. “You guys are such di--”

“There
is
a lady here,” Kevin snapped, horrified that
his brother would use such horrid language around Mary. Surely he
knew that she had had a censored up bringing? Kevin and Stuart knew
all about each other’s Chosen--it was the rule.

“And? You
are
being ridiculous,” Bill said, using a
mocking, posh British accent.

Stuart rolled his eyes, bored, while Kevin
turned a glare to the orange man that he called his brother. “You
can leave,” he suggested icily.

“I’d rather not, brah.”

“Kevin?” Mary asked, starting to sound
confused. He looked down in time to see her take a seat, edging as
far away from her betrothed as she possibly could.

“Yes, Mary,” he answered, fighting to be
calm.

“Please explain to me who these
people
are and why Mr.
Jacques
is here?” she asked, folding
her hands with forced primness in her lap. Head bowed, she didn’t
look at anyone--most likely scared of Stuart and his harsh
reprimands.

“The other Creators,” he explained, wishing
he could allow her to see him. But, the eyes of a human--even
though she was a Chosen--was not permitted.

“And what about Raffaele?” she hissed,
earning a brief glare from the person in question.

“Stuart wanted him here,” he faltered,
looking at his brother for help. He was
not
about to take on Mary right now.

“Mary, Raffaele is your soon to be bonded
mate. I believe Kevin had told you this only a couple of hours
ago--why didn’t you act on it?” Stuart asked, purposely putting her
in the spot light.

It worked, too. Raffaele’s head snapped in
her direction. Was it betrayal, or anger that she hadn’t done it?
Kevin had checked in on her earlier, only to find them on the bed,
feelings of love and maybe even hope surrounding them both.

Why hadn’t she used that time to tell Raff of
what she had been told? It would have been a perfect time.

“You knew?” he asked, lip curling at her.

Mary avoided looking at Raffaele, shoulders
curling defensively. Clearly, it wasn’t something she wanted to
talk about.

“Did you...bait me into asking?” he asked,
betrayal and anger over laying thickly. Kevin watched raptly, along
with the now attentive Stuart and Bill.

Mary gasped. “What!? Jaques--no!” she
exclaimed, finally showing blatant vulnerability.

“My name,” he growled, eyes flashing
dangerously, “Is Raffaele. And that’s what you’ll be calling me
from now on--as your
mate
.”

The words sounded and
looked
like they left a bitter taste
on his tongue. As Mary paled at his words, Kevin started to feel
sympathy for her.

He had heard her soul, crying in desperation,
in the hospital parking lot. Whatever she had been thinking, it
hadn’t been about “baiting”, or anything close to it. It had been
pure, simply, and painful agony, listening to her silent cry.

“I can’t...” Her eyes held the look of a deer
in the crossroads, scared and not knowing what to do.

There was a silence in which Raffaele just
stared her down, eyes blazing. Finally, Kevin heard faintly, “And
to think-- I didn’t even put up a fight for a woman who is friends
with every male I can think of.”

Not so much as damaging as rude, Mary’s eyes
widened, making Kevin wonder briefly if her eyes would pop out of
her head.

“Raffaele, don’t...” Stuart started, almost
soundlessly.

“Wasn’t easy to catch a man once you offered
space between your legs, correct?” he asked coldly, taking
everything that had happened in the worst, most horrible way
ever.

Chapter 33

Mary could have cried.

Weeped.

Attacked.

Maybe even killed Raffaele with her bare
hands.

The words that he had said, so crude and
hurtful that she felt like it was just a painful stab in her heart,
her very soul. Above them, three resounding gasps lit the room,
their audible shock almost over-riding her inner agony.

His frosty eyes met her, the blue depths so
emotionless yet hate filled that Mary could have cried.

“I... Why would you...” she started, only to
be cut off by one of the voices above.

“Never have I been so disappointed in you,
Raffaele,” came a solemn, regretful voice from above. She watched
as Raffaele’s eyes dilated, the icy color replaced by a hard black.
His hands were clenched at his sides.

“Not as much as when I turned into a killer?”
he asked, voice hard and unforgiving.

Mary held in another gasp, both from pain and
even more shock.

He continued. “You remember, don’t you?
How my father, Antonio, sent me out to kill anyone who might wish
to expose of him? How can the way that I talk about
her
, even compare to the
disgracefulness that I committed for half of my life? She is
exactly what she makes herself out to be--a power hungry female,
who uses her body to get what she wants. That’s how she got me,” he
said, ruefully angry.

Her hand flew to her chest, eyes closing.
Standing, turning, she tried to think of a time when she had ever
hurt so much, when she had never felt so helpless and stuck.

“Kevin,” she started, voice cracking. “Can
you wake me--?”

“Is that all you ever do? Run? Is that why so
many woman are being killed--because you are weak and refuse to
stick around to take care of what you started?”

Tears stung the back of her eyes, breath
coming shorter as she digested what he had all along thought of
her. Is that what she appeared to everyone? Weak and flighty?

Had she really implied that her body would
capture his interest, that she was anything but chaste? A harsh sob
came from her throat, unwanted and agonized.

“I didn’t mean--”

A hand came down on her shoulder, angry and
meaning to hurt. Her body was jerked to face the man that had just
torn her heart out, flinching at the contact.

“You sure as hell did. Kevin told you
to bond with me. You waited till I was forced into sticking with my
promise. You
know
that once a
Promise of Bond is made, it can’t be broken. Can’t believe I was
dumb enough to believe anything from you...”

He trailed off, voice betrayed, furious.

“God fucking damnit,” came a hard shout
before everything went black around her.

For a second, she thought that he had killed
her. Panic settled into her viens until she realized that she was
breathing, he wasn’t trying to kill her, and ocean blue light was
starting to pour out around her.

Raffaele was no where to be seen, and the
room was exactly as it had been a second ago, only a deep blue that
reminded her of the men from the Blue Man Group. Eyes darting
around, hands wiping at the tears that were streaming down her
cheeks without stopping, she tried to catch her breath at the pain
that was closing around her. Folding her arms around herself, she
took a step forward.

“Take a seat please,” came a detached voice,
almost devoid of emotion as the image of Kevin and a twin took
place in her mind. The dream... Kevin had been completely white,
she just realized. Maybe, since this man’s room was blue, so was
the emotionless voice that was telling her to sit?

Mary sat down in a chair identical to
Kevin’s, only blue in its coloring. Hands shaking, she closed her
eyes and tried to calm herself.

“You understand Raffaele’s problem, don’t
you?” the faceless man asked, a trace of an accent in his
voice.

She shook her head slowly, chest jerking as
she thought about his reaction to the news of the bonding.

“He believes that you forced him into this,”
he said, as if that solved everything.

“But...how? And what’s your name?” Mary
asked, clenching her hands in her lap with the nerves and
depression that were taking place in her heart.

“I am another Creator, Stuart. Now, to the
matter at hand--Kevin did indeed tell you that he wished for you to
bond with Raffaele immediately, correct?”

She nodded, breath catching her throat. She
leaned down, putting her head between her legs, hoping to stop
whatever was wrong with her. The tears wouldn’t stop coming, and
her breath was catching, non-stop.

“Why did you not do it when you had the
chance? The order of the Creator, even how rare it is, is strict
and to be done as soon as possible.”

“I couldn’t... He didn’t look like he wanted
to be tied down,” she tried, surprisingly speaking more clearly
than she thought she could have.

“He was focused on nothing but you!” he said,
sounding astounded. “How could you not have taken that time to
explain to him what was happening?”

“You saw his reaction! When I told him I was
a Chosen and that I knew of Kevin! It would have only made it worse
had I told him that he was made to be bonded to me!”

“This...is true.”

“Exactly,” she said, relieved that he had
understood what she was saying. If only Raffaele could hear what
she was saying, getting an understanding just as Stuart was.

“So you used guilt, playing desperate and
hysterical, to get his Promise,” he concluded, voice prompt.

Mary let out a frustrated screech, slapping
her knee. “No, you idiot! I was honestly close to just offing
myself, and all you can think about is that assholes problems with
accepting that I hadn’t planned on making him bond with me?”

“Now, Mary... Please consi--”

“Don’t try to fucking sweet talk me!” she
raged, finally snapping. Raffaele’s words were in her ear, haunting
her. “I was against what Kevin had told me to do the very minute he
said it. I wasn’t going to tell anyone because I knew that Raffaele
would be betrayed by it--just as he is now!” she screamed,
wondering if the bastard was even there anymore.

The silence after her rage was deafening.

“And you are honest with your words?” he
finally asked. Mary could just picture him, rubbing a
beard-scruffed face, considering.

A tear slipped down her cheek.

“Yes,” she vowed, head bowed as if in pain,
knowing that with that one word, she had either sentenced her death
or a life that would be full of something that she was starting to
not even want to know about.

Her vision dimmed, till everything was
black.

Chapter 34

He slipped in silently, purposefully,
intently. He invaded, he conquered, and he owned what he chose to.
And with all of the might that he possessed, he couldn’t stay away
from the greatest prize any longer.

The unknowing meeting she had held with him
yesterday had encouraged him to take her, had made his restraint
weaken like none else could have. The beauty of the pale skin, the
innocence of her soft features, the smell of her...

It had been too much.

So here he was, bypassing the security
system, feeling like an invalid as he pushed open the newly hatched
window. The room, when he entered, was exactly what he would have
expected for someone like her.

He smiled down at her sleeping form, smiled
as he thought of how her face would not hold innocence for much
longer, instead...pain, agony, most likely crying out for help.

Maybe the dream she had had, the one where
his...accomplice had helped, would have warned her, gave her a
sense of what was to come. He prayed that it had.

He loved to see the look of horrified
realization on a woman’s face.

Mary was so deep asleep that she couldn’t
awake to see him, and for that he was happy.

An easy taking led to a much more interesting
torture, as he had come to learn some time ago. The charge log at
the station was probably stock full at the police station, the dead
bodies piling up as quickly as they had gathered among the
earth.

He thought about how they had tainted,
spread, mutilated, and almost snarled into the bleak darkness of
the room where his next and most precious victim lay.

A scarred, mutant hand reached out, touching
a strand of the silky soft hair that would soon be covered in her
life’s blood. Taking a breath and praying that she was still
untapped with her powers that he knew she possessed, he reached
into his backpack that he had laid down by his feet, taking out the
blind fold, gag, and seat belt strap.

Lifting her head slowly as to not wake her,
he set about wrapping the blind fold around her head and the rest
of the preparations. He wondered briefly at when he should begin
the ritual. He should have talked with Armoria first, the woman
that had come to him, intending to help.

At first, he had been skeptical about
trusting her, about letting her in on his plan. She had then begun
to gain his trust, which hadn’t been easy. The powers that she had
revealed to him and frightened him, made him believe that she was
with the enemy. But, from the beginning, she had been up front and
ready to answer anything he might ask--besides where she had
originated. Her name was unique in itself, along with her smell and
look. Blonde, pale, eyes silvery, she had smelt of Acutos and
Archaeos, along with something that had somehow made him believe
that she wasn’t on their side as he originally thought.