Darkyn - Private Demon Part 3

I could walk up and take her now. Thierry rose, his hand tightening on the dagger as he scanned the area around her.

That she was so close to him when he was in need made him more angry than hungry. He was not the only predator out tonight. Has she no one to look after her? To keep her home, safe from things like me?

The woman didn't spare him or the alley a glance, but walked down to the crime scene and, after showing one of the officers her wallet, disappeared into the building.

Thierry sank back down behind the crushed boxes. He was as good as a walking sieve, and she was too small.

Women of any size were the worst of temptations. But if he did not hunt soon, he would be too weak to do more than crawl deeper into the alley filth and hide. Then he would have to wait until someone came close enough to grab.

Not the woman. Not any woman.

His loneliness had become harder to bear than his madness. He could not bring himself to hunt a woman, not after what he had done in his madness to Alexandra, so he had been feeding exclusively on males.

Hunting on the streets of Memphis had been Thierry's greatest mistake.

He had not meant to stop in Memphis; the car he had stolen developed an engine problem, and forced him to leave the interstate, where there were too many state troopers who might stop and offer help. The car's engine had died in the very heart of the city, where there were few places to hide.

The Darkyn hunter who had crossed Thierry's path had picked up his scent, but more important, he had recognized and pursued him. That was when Thierry knew that he was being hunted, and no one else but Cyprien could have issued orders to capture him.

If he was to find his salvation, he would have to outwit his oldest friend and elude his own kind.

Time pa.s.sed. Minutes, then hours. Thierry reached for the strength he would need to rise again. It had always been there when he'd needed it, but now it eluded him. Without it he felt dry and withering, a husk beginning to crumble.

He had not fed enough during his journey to this city; his reserves were exhausted. So, too, was his spirit. Finding the men who had hurt the girl had been the torch in a long, lightless tunnel. His failure to do so would snuff it out, and then there would be nothing but the dark.

He could not survive the madness without some light to guide him. Had he not earned a little?

"h.e.l.lo?"

He opened his eyes and peered over the top of the boxes. Incredibly, the woman from the convertible was standing just outside the alley, looking in.

"Is someone in there?"

Is she mad, too? Thierry dared not blink or breathe, and then something uncurled inside him, something stronger than his fear for her. His scent, always intense when he was wounded, changed.

"If you're hurt, I can call for help." She was actually moving into the alley, looking at the ground and then from side to side. Tracking like a hunter, but she was not Kyn.

Thierry looked at the ground in front of the boxes. A wide, winding ribbon of blood spatters darkened the asphalt.

That was what had drawn her; he must have trailed blood from the street to here. He couldn't believe he'd been so careless.

Stand up. She is right there. Take her.

"It's all right," she said, her voice a caress. "I work with the police." She stopped in front of him and stared at the boxes concealing him. "I can help to get you to the hospital."

Her scent was very light; he almost lost it in the flood of his own. But no, there it was, the smell of her skin like warm, ripe apples. It was such a wholesome and ordinary scent that it disconcerted him. Modern women did not smell of orchard fruit. They doused themselves with costly perfumes. Angelica had hated her body's scent and did everything she could to erase it. This woman smelled of nothing else.

Her blood will taste of it. "I know you're afraid," she told him as she took a step closer, "but I won't hurt you."

Thierry had held out until that moment, but she had drawn too near him, and the need became agonizing. It bargained with him: Only a little. Only enough to heal the wounds.

If he did not take her blood, he would not leave this alley. "Come here."

The sound of his voice, harsh from not being used in so long, startled her. For a moment he thought she might bolt, and part of him prayed she would. He watched her breathe in deeply, and her eyelids grew heavy.

Disgust with himself could not slop him from commanding her again. "Come here. To me."

The little cat moved around the boxes slowly, deliberately, drawn and drugged as she was by l'attrait. Thierry's had always had a particular effect on women.

She was more delicate than he'd supposed, thin-skinned, with fragile-looking limbs. Hollows and shadows marred the alabaster oval of her face. He lifted his hand and drew her down to him, entranced by the shape of her mouth, the lush curl of her lashes. Her garments were plain, a simple blouse and trousers, but beneath the ivory silk small b.r.e.a.s.t.s rose and fell.

She smelled of apples but she was made of moonlight.

Thierry held her by the waist as he positioned her to straddle his lap, intending to keep her weight from pressing on his wounds. The stiff arc at his crotch filled the notch in hers, and he flinched, unaware until that touch that he had become aroused in other ways.

Thin fingers brushed his hair back from his face. "Golden." she murmured as she stared into his eyes, fascinated.

"They're golden."

Thierry's fangs shot out into his mouth, eager for her flesh. He had not touched a woman since he'd nearly killed Alexandra Keller, but he could no more set her away from him than he could cut off his arms.

"So are yours." A dark gold, rimmed with brown so dark it looked black. She might be as small as Alexandra Keller, but at least her eyes did not remind him of her. "Unb.u.t.ton your blouse, cherie." It was silk, and he did not wish to mar it with blood.

No, that was far from the truth. He wanted to see her.

Slowly she unfastened the pearl b.u.t.tons nestled in the silk, opening the edges slowly. She did not wear anything to hide her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, small and firm, taut and flushed. Hard little apples, each barely enough to fill his palms.

A silent howl went up inside him. Father in heaven, have you not done enough to torment me?

Thierry did not dare put his mouth to her perfect b.r.e.a.s.t.s; his hunger would have him tearing at them. His gaze moved up, following the line of her throat to once again fix on her mouth. Like her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the little cat's mouth was small, her lips pale pink. It was not the tight rosebud of a child, however, but the full, graceful curve of an American beauty just beginning to bloom.

He would not savage her, but he would taste her. He would use the dagger on himself if he did not.

"Cherie." He lifted his hand and cradled the back of her head, bringing her face down to his. "Kiss me."

She sighed into his mouth before she kissed it, and her breath warmed his tongue. She smelled of apples, but she tasted of honey and almonds. Thierry watched her eyes close, felt her thighs tighten over his, and then the liquid heat of her mouth melded with his.

She kissed him as she had moved, graceful but cautious, a little cat finding its way in the dark. He had never felt anything like it. His need for her blood pounded inside him, demanding more than soft lips and silky tongue, and he used his hand to tilt her head.

Inside, where it cannot be seen. Where it will be her secret, and mine.

When Thierry sank his fangs into the soft flesh inside her lower lip, she groaned.

Her blood flooded his mouth, hot and strong, the pulse of life that hummed in her veins pouring into his. Thierry drank from her lips, warming with each swallow, intent on taking only what he needed. The wounds in his belly and sides itched as they began to knit and close, the signal that he had had enough of her. Yet she kept kissing him, giving him her tongue as well as her blood.

Thierry discovered that he could not take his mouth from hers. His wife had never liked to kiss, preferring to use her mouth more directly when they were intimate. Thierry used human women for blood only; loving his Angel had kept him from taking more. Oh, there had been moments. Women so beautiful they seemed to glow beneath his hands. But he had been a man of his word, and after rising to walk the night, he had clung to his marriage vows as the last of his honor.

Now he clung to this human woman, helpless, suspended in her pa.s.sion.

The hands on his chest curled tight, and her thin body trembled, moving her against him in small, s.h.i.+vering waves.

At last he felt her pulse slow and found the strength to tear his mouth from hers, panting with the heat and life she had given him, feeling the hateful ravenous beat surge up inside him, the killer within that demanded this and more and everything she had- "Enough." He pushed her back, holding her as she swayed.

Had he taken too much? He could feel the old, forbidden madness grinding inside him, demanding the rest of her.

How simple it would be to give her rapture as she enthralled him. There was more to be had from her than the blood in her veins. Her trousers were flimsy; he could have them off her in seconds. No one would stop them or see them here.

Like this, she would refuse him nothing.

Like this, he would kill her. "Enough."

"No." As lost in l'attrait as Thierry was in her kiss, she reached for him again. "More."

In that moment he nearly put her on her back, for there was nothing in this world or the next he wanted more than to bury his c.o.c.k and his teeth in her flesh.

"Cherie," he whispered, desperate now. "You must stop or I will not. Stop, please."

Her hands fell to her sides, and she looked down at him, her eyes wet. "Please."

It was good that he was insane, or she would drive him to it. "You must leave me now," he told her, dragging in air as he fought for control. "You will forget me."

"I will forget you." A single tear slid down her cheek. Another chased it to her chin.

"You will go home and sleep." He stood and brought her to her feet with him. There was blood on her lips, and he bent down and quickly licked it away before it could drip on her blouse. The second taste of her nearly undid him. "In the morning, what you remember of this will seem like a dream."

"A dream." She smiled a little. "Remember."

He b.u.t.toned her blouse and put his arm around her to guide her to the edge of the alley, it took everything he had to remove his hands from her. He looked for oncoming traffic and anyone who might see her. The street was deserted, the police gone. He found her keys in her pocket and pressed them into her hand. "Go now, little cat. Drive straight home. Sleep." He couldn't help adding, "And dream of me."

She nodded and walked to her car, moving like a small robot. By the time she drove around the block l'attrait would disperse, but its lingering effects would ensure that she followed the instructions he had given her. She would dream of him, but he would never see her again. That was as it should be.

His savior turned her car around to drive away. Thierry would have retreated into shadows again, but he could not. Not when he saw the vanity plate on her front b.u.mper.

JEMA'S BENZ.

"Hold still."

Dr. Alexandra Keller planted one hand between Arnaud Evareaux's bare shoulder blades to keep him from rising from the exam table. With her other hand, she adjusted the overhead lamp s.h.i.+ning down on the lower half of his torso.

Mysterious b.u.mps of various sizes bulged beneath Arnaud's otherwise flawless skin. Two light scents, much like lavender and parsley, tinted the air.

"It burns," he complained.

"It should." Alex selected a small b.u.mp, lanced it, and quickly dug out a metal pellet shaped like a small freshwater pearl. The scent of parsley became more intense. The pellet made a clinking sound as she dropped it in her discard tray.

"Next time you decide to go trespa.s.sing in the moonlight, pick a property whose owner doesn't shoot first and ask questions later."

Arnaud turned his head to give her a one-eyed glare. "I would have pried them out myself, had the coward not shot me in the back."

She plied her scalpel again. "Given the scatter radius, Arnie, if the coward had shot you in the front, you'd be prying this stuff out of your groin." She smiled as Evareaux groaned and closed his eyes. "Or I would."

It took another thirty minutes to remove all the buckshot from Evareaux's lower back and b.u.t.tocks, but his Darkyn physiology healed the lance wounds almost instantly, so once the last pellet hit the tray, all Alex had to do was sponge him clean and hand him his clothing.

"I mean it, Arnaud," she warned. "Stay away from those farmers' daughters. The next one might blast you in the face."

"You were able to heal the master's injuries," he said as he stepped into his pressed trousers.

"The master had his face beaten off. He didn't have little bits of metal lodged in his brain." She went to the sink to wash up. "So how long have you been part of the garden gang?"

"I have served the master for six hundred fifty-four years." Arnaud sounded huffy.

"What sort of talent do you have?" She didn't think he'd tell her, but the Darkyn had mental abilities that gave them some form of power over humans. Cyprien could erase memory, while his seneschal could compel humans to do things physically. According to Cyprien, every Darkyn's talent was different and unique to the individual.

Alex had a talent, too, but she didn't like hers.

"My gift is none of your business," the vampire told her, his voice growing colder.

"Is it something more embarra.s.sing than me picking shot out of your a.s.s?" When he said nothing, Alex's lips twitched. "Okay, we'll let that be your little secret. How long have you been a vrykolakas?"

He fiddled with his tie. "I was cursed after the master returned from England."

She stripped off her surgical shroud, bailed it up and tossed it in the dirty linens hamper. "You were not cursed.

You were infected with something that caused your DNA to mutate." She saw his expression. "G.o.d does not hate you, Arnaud. If He exists." Personally, she wouldn't put money on it.

"I violated my holy vows." He shrugged into his jacket. "I became a creature of the night who feeds off the blood of the living."

Alex thought of her brother, John, a Catholic priest more devoted to his G.o.d than his only living family. John had lived more piously than the pope. She pulled off the mask hanging from her neck.. "What did you do before that?"

"Excusez-moi?"

Alex rolled her eyes. "What did you do to earn the Almighty's wrath before you became a blood-feeding night creature?" Arnaud appeared confused, so she added. "You'd have to do something pretty rotten, right? So what was it?

You were a Templar. A priest with a big sword. Did you forget to polish your armor? Skip some rosaries? Play hooky from the last Crusade? I need some details here, Arnaud."

"You do not understand." He made the same gesture that Cyprien did whenever Alex got on his nerves. "You are only a child among us." He stalked out of the treatment room.

"Wait, I wanted to ask you-d.a.m.n it." Alex kicked her instrument cart, sending it flying across the floor to collide with the table. Both fell over and made a gratifying amount of noise. The Darkyn were really starting to p.i.s.s her off.

Moments like these made Alex miss her former life as a busy, successful reconstructive surgeon in Chicago. The patients she'd treated took a lot longer to heal, but she'd been able to make a difference in their lives. Okay, so she hadn't had the world's greatest relations.h.i.+p with her brother. When they were kids, John had protected her, cared for her-h.e.l.l, he'd been her whole life. It was only after becoming a priest that he'd tossed her away and gotten sucked into the church. We might have settled things between us, she told herself. Eventually.

Until Michael Cyprien had sent his men to kidnap Alex and bring her to New Orleans, and the world had turned upside down.

Most of what had happened in the six months since that fateful day in the garage at Northeast Chicago Hospital still seemed surreal to Alex. Cyprien had s.n.a.t.c.hed her because she was one of the few surgeons in the world fast enough to successfully operate on him. He had abducted her, and then convinced her to restore his face. After the surgery was when things had gotten out of hand, and Cyprien had nearly killed her in a mindless l.u.s.t for blood. Alex had later woken up back in Chicago with no memory of what had happened. In time she had learned that Michael had saved her life by giving her his own blood, but in the process he had also infected her with it.

To top off everything, they'd fallen in love with each other.