Abandoned to the Night (The Brotherhood Series, Book 3) (3 page)

“I am glad it is you who came,” she said remembering the earthy taste of his skin. Holding her arms wide, she glanced up at the heavens and blinked away the droplets. “Forgive me,” she whispered. “But know that everything I did, I did for them.”

“What are you saying? Is it some sort of spell? Are you rousing your demon army to come slay me where I stand?”

Ivana ignored his incessant questions.

“Punish me. Protect them.” A sense of relief pushed to the fore. The rain had come to cleanse her, to wash away her sins. Despite the gravity of her situation, she felt oddly calm. She sucked in a deep breath and closed her eyes. “I am ready now. Do what you have come to do. Do what you will.”

Set me free
.

Chapter 3

L
eo stared at the golden-haired devil and had to admit she looked more like a celestial being; one of God’s heavenly angels waiting for the clouds to part so she could be spirited home. Damn it. With her arms stretched wide, her face glistening with a radiant sheen as the raindrops slipped from her skin, her dress clinging to the soft curves of her body, he knew he did not have the strength to carry out the evil task.

She lowered her head and stared at him. “Why the delay? Do you plan to wait until you see a glimmer of hope flash in my eyes? Is it your intention to torture me?”

Torture?

If she believed this to be torture, then the woman had no real concept of the word. Loneliness plagued him. A feeling of utter hopelessness was his constant companion now. The pain lingered. It festered inside with no hope of an end in sight. That was the most brutal punishment of all.

Leo wiped his hand on his thigh then gripped the handle of his sword with both hands. One mighty swing and he would take her head from her shoulders. Clean. Easy. It would be an act of retribution, a way of restoring the balance. It would be a way of making her pay for all the agonising nights he had spent craving blood. It would be recompense for the nights he had spent glaring longingly at the pulsing vein in a pretty debutante’s neck, knowing he could never truly satisfy the need clawing away inside.

Justice was all he wanted, for Elliot: his brother and friend. Justice for Alexander and for all those forced to live with the restrictions brought about by the terrifying affliction. And so, with a renewed sense of determination he took a step forward, drew a deep breath and raised the sword.

The heartless creature before him offered a reassuring smile — a smile of all things — then raised her head to the heavens once more.

“Bless the children,” she whispered, but he heard the words rebound back and forth in his mind. “In my absence, keep them safe. Protect them always.”

The children?

Did she mean the children she had used to deceive him, to cause doubt and uncertainty to take hold? For a moment, he might have believed she cared about something other than her need to steal the souls of mortal men. Why would a woman sent to do the Devil’s work pray for the Lord’s assistance?

Leo lowered the sword once again. A sudden urge to understand her motives gripped him. “Tell me. Tell me why you turned me into the monster you see before you. Tell me why you sought to rob me of my humanity.”

The golden-haired temptress glared at him. “Will you not just get it over with. I am tired, cold and soaked to the skin. At the moment, death seems quite a pleasant option, and I have no desire to talk anymore.” Her weary gaze drifted over him. She opened her mouth to speak, hesitated, then said, “But know that you earnt the right to be chosen. Know that you had a part to play in it all.”

The woman spoke in riddles in an attempt to confuse him. “That explains nothing.” He wanted an answer to the question haunting him. This was to be his only opportunity to make any sense of it. “Why me? I need to know why you chose to me out of all the men passing through here.”

Not just him. Why had she chosen Elliot and Alexander? Were there more gentlemen wandering the world suffering with the same debilitating affliction?

She narrowed her gaze, dropped her hands to her side. “You mean you don’t know? You do not remember? Do you not have the faintest suspicion? Have you not come to the obvious conclusion?”

Leo wiped the water from his face and flicked the excess liquid from his hand. “Would I have asked if I did?”

“Have you not replayed the events of the night over and over in your mind?” she asked incredulously. “Have you not examined them in the hope of stumbling upon your mistake, your error of judgement?”

Leo gave a disdainful snort. “I have lived the nightmare over and over again for the last three years. I have dissected every word spoken, every deed and action. But still it makes no sense to me. My mind is like a dark, empty cavern whenever I think of what happened to me that night.”

She shook her head and cast him a look that spoke of contempt. But another emotion flashed briefly in her eyes: compassion, perhaps pity. “Then I cannot help you. You must kill me, or you must leave here. You do not—”

“Frau Lockwood. Frau Lockwood.”

Suddenly her gaze shot beyond his shoulder, and she muttered a curse. “Now look what your dithering has done.”

His dithering? She made it sound as though she wanted him to put an end to her life.

“Do not say anything to him,” she continued through gritted teeth. “He has no idea what we are. He would be frightened, confused. He would not understand.”

Leo glanced behind at the old man tottering along the street, holding a coat above his head to protect him from the rain. “If I abide by your request, what will you do for me in return?”

Her eyes widened, and she shook her head. “You would blackmail me for my desire to protect an elderly man’s feelings? Good Lord, you really are a monster.”

The words were like barbed arrows piercing his heart. He knew what he was. He did not need the woman responsible for his depraved condition to remind him. Dismissing his irritation, he decided to use the situation to his advantage.

“Tell me what I want to know about the night you sunk your filthy fangs into my neck and I will keep your secret.” Leo gave a satisfied smirk as it felt good to have the upper hand. “I would hate to reveal the true nature of my affliction. And I doubt his heart would take the shock.”

She sucked in her cheeks as she glared at him. “Is that the price of a man’s sanity? Do you have no shame?” She shook her head and sighed. “Very well. What choice do I have?”

“None. But I will have your word.”

“Then you have it.” She barged past him and rushed towards the old man. “Herr Bruhn, you must go back inside. You’ll catch a chill out here in this dreadful weather.”

The old man squinted and blinked rapidly. “Is everything alright? You’re soaked through. What has happened to your cape? Why have you not gone home?” He tried to use his coat to shield her from the rain as his concerned gaze fell to Leo’s sword. “What … what is going on here?”

“All is well, Herr Bruhn.” She put her hand on his back and steered him away. “There is a problem with my carriage. The road is impassable, and I must walk home. This gentleman has been instructed to ensure I reach there safely.”

The man glanced back over his shoulder. “But who is he? I have never seen him here before.”

With some difficulty, Leo placed his sword back in the harness. “Herr Bruhn.” He inclined his head to the old man. It suddenly occurred to him that he didn’t know her name. In the years when he had cursed her and wished for her demise, he knew her only as the golden-haired devil. “I have been instructed to protect the lady,” Leo said, struggling to form the only polite word he knew of to describe the woman standing in front of him. “But you must go inside. If we do not leave now, I fear we will struggle to make it back, even on foot.”

“Herr Bruhn, I cannot afford for you to be ill too,” she implored.

Leo wondered why she did not use her skill for persuasion to force the man back into his home. Well, if she wouldn’t do it, he would.

“You must go inside, Herr Bruhn. You must go inside now.” Leo’s tone was firm, commanding and the golden-haired devil shot him an irritated glare.

“I must get inside,” he said shuffling towards a house on their right. “You are certain you will make it home safely?”

“I am certain,” she replied. “I need you to be well. I need you to take care of the children. And I need to hurry home and get out of these wet clothes. Sylvester will be along to see you tomorrow.”

Placated, Herr Bruhn nodded vigorously. They escorted him to his door, bid him good night and then simply stared at each other.

“Well?” She thrust her hands on her hips as soon as Herr Bruhn closed the door. The wet garment clung to her womanly curves, enhanced the shape of her perfectly round breasts and Leo groaned inwardly.

“Well, what?” he snapped, being somewhat agitated by his reaction to her shapely figure. Damn it all. He had spent years lusting after women. To some extent his cock possessed a mind of its own, responded to the female form as opposed to the character of the woman within.

“Are you going to kill me where I stand or are you coming with me?”

Leo jerked his head back. “Coming with you where?”

An image of the forest flooded his mind, quickly followed by the dark, suffocating confines of her carriage, and the stone stairs curling up to the demon’s chamber.

A smile touched the corners of her lips, but it did not reach her eyes or illuminate her face. “I do not like lying to Herr Bruhn. You will escort me home. We will change out of these wet clothes, drink to suppress our hunger. I will tell you what you need to know, and you will decide what you wish to do with me.”

She was not using manipulation to persuade him to follow her, but as she sauntered past him, he felt a tug deep in his gut that forced him to traipse along behind.

Christ, if Elliot were here, he would think him fit for Bedlam. Indeed, in the hours he had waited at the window of the tavern in the hope of catching sight of her, he could never have predicted this was how the night would end.

The tavern!

“Wait,” he cried, remembering the maid he had instructed to sleep until he told her otherwise. “I’ll be but a minute.” They would find her in his room and believe he had administered poison, or an opiate to drug her into submission.

She stopped, picked her sodden cape off the ground and shook it out. “My carriage is waiting further along the road. I shall wait for you inside.”

Leo swallowed down his surprise. She could have climbed into her conveyance and sent the horses bolting for home. He would never catch up with her. He would never reach her once she’d passed through the iron gate of her fortress.

He nodded and then made his way back up to his room. The water running from his clothes left a slippery trail across the wooden boards. Giving the maid a vigorous shake and a command to wake, he was gone before she had a chance to sit up and rub the sleep from her eyes.

Pushing through the wind and rain, Leo continued along the deserted street. The thin streams of light escaping through the shutters did little to illuminate his way. The hulking black shadow of her carriage loomed into view. He could have been invisible and still the coachman, sitting muffled in his greatcoat, could not have paid him any less attention. An attempt to listen to his thoughts proved futile, and if it had not been for the twitch of a finger on the reins, Leo would have staked his life the man was a sitting corpse.

Leo paused at the carriage door. A sudden sense of foreboding gripped him, and he pulled his sword from its back harness and held it at his side. Elliot’s voice echoed through his mind. The voice of logic and reason reminding him it was sheer folly to climb into her conveyance.

But Leo had nothing left to lose.

He had lived the same nightmare every day, made all the worse since Elliot found love. The woman’s curse had left him alone, abandoned to the night that had so cruelly claimed him. The escapades of the brotherhood would become a distant memory, leaving him no choice but to forge ahead, to carve a new life for himself.

Do you intend to stand in the rain all night?

Her words penetrated his chaotic thoughts. She did not frighten him. Not anymore. Nothing she could do to him could be worse than the hell he was already living.

Sensing his decision, she opened the door for him, and he climbed into the one place he thought never to see again. As soon as he slammed the door shut the carriage lurched forward, and he fell back into the seat, his hand still gripping the handle of his sword.

“I shall make sure you’re given a big enough bed so you may sleep with it as well?” Her amused gaze travelled down the length of the steel blade.

“Sleep? Are you trying to provoke me? You know I haven’t slept a wink since you pricked my neck with your sharp fangs. Besides, I have no intention of staying that long.”

She gave a low chuckle. “We shall see. One never knows where the path of fate may lead.”

“You say that as though you have the ability to predict the future.”

“More the ability to remember the past.” She reached for the blanket at her side, used it to dry her cheeks and pat the ends of her hair. “None of us know what the future holds. Surely experience has taught you that. Did you expect that a drunken night of debauchery would see you cursed for eternity?” Her gaze drifted over him. He saw something akin to regret, perhaps disappointment reflected there. “Indeed, like you, I am fully aware of the price one pays for naiveté, for being so weak and insipid.”