Dark Desire (18 page)

Mikhail glanced at his brother, saw him gently, even tenderly stroke back Shea's hair. The gesture touched his heart.

Gregori sighed.
It is obvious how he feels, but he does not always know what he is doing. He is quite capable of harming her if something triggers the beast in him
.

Mikhail rubbed the heel of his hand over his forehead. The Jacques he knew and loved was so different. His laughter came readily, and compassion always tempered his predatory nature. Jacques was so intelligent, so easy to love. Long after Jacques had lost his ability to feel his emotions, he had retained the memory of them. He had often helped the older males to recall memories of their own laughter. Who had done this to him? To be forced to sentence another brother to death…Mikhail couldn't do it. It was time to step down, time to hand someone else the weight of responsibility for their dying race.

Mikhail felt Raven slip her arms around his neck. “Jacques is strong, love. He will find his way back to us.”

Mikhail turned her palm up, kissed the center gently.
Gregori thinks Jacques turned Shea O'Halloran without her knowledge or consent
. His black eyes met her blue ones, filled with guilt, tenderness.
He does not think the woman has any idea of our ways.

Jacques will—

No, little one, Jacques remembers very little of anything. Hatred, rage, revenge, the woman—that is all he thinks of. We are not certain he is capable of taking care of her.

Look at him with her
, Raven instructed. She repeated it aloud. “Look at him with her.”

Jacques wanted the strangers to be gone. So many males pressing close to Shea kept him on edge. He trusted none of these people, with the possible exception of the blue-eyed woman. Jacques could hardly bear to look at the one who claimed to be his brother, the one who had attacked and nearly killed Shea. Strangely enough, it hurt to look at the man. Jacques' head seemed to want to disintegrate every time their eyes met. Memories. Fragments. Pieces of nothing.

Enough
, he whispered to Shea, his words a soft command. Her tongue stroked across the wound to close it, a seduction of pure sensation.

Shea came out of the trance slowly, a sweet, coppery taste in her mouth. The terrible gnawing hunger was gone, but her body was on fire, soft and pliant, in such need. Suddenly aware of the others in the room, she burrowed closer to Jacques for protection. If they all were just gone, she could sleep, figure things out later. She could sort through all the data she had and determine just what these people were.

Fear slammed into her, her mouth went dry, and her heart began to pound in alarm. Shea could feel Jacques' hands tightening like bonds on her arms. A hypnotic trance. Jacques had induced it. Her green eyes slowly
opened to move over his face in a slow, terrified study. So why wasn't she joyful, ecstatic, that they had found his people, his family? Why wasn't she thrilled at the arrival of a healer?

There was something wrong here. Her only hope was to get out of the situation, leave Jacques to his family. There were now plenty of people to care for Jacques without her. The healer obviously was far more skilled than she was. Shea was shaking, embarrassed that those surrounding them could see how badly she was trembling. She was always in control. She just needed distance to regain it.

No!
Jacques' voice was much stronger now and much more frightening.
You cannot leave me
.

Shea knew he was capable of far more power than she could conceive of. And he was manipulating her, had been all along. For the first time she allowed the facts to come together in her mind. Vampire. Jacques was a vampire. All of these people were. Her hand went to her throat. She was probably one of them now.

“Let go of me!” Shea struggled in earnest now, shocked at how physically strong Jacques had become with the infusion of Gregori's blood.

Jacques snarled, black fury rising along with fear of losing her, fear that she could not survive without him, fear of once again being alone in utter darkness. He held her down easily, but the sound of her heart racing was alarming to him, dragging him back to a shred of sanity.

Into the swirl of violent emotions came the healer's voice. “She does not understand the ways of our people, Jacques. You must be gentle with her, guide her, as your brother guided Raven.”

Shea fought the compelling voice, a weaver of spells. “I want to leave. You can't keep me here.”
Jacques, please, don't do this. Don't make me stay when we know it's impossible for me. You know me, know me inside and out.

Stop it, Shea
, Jacques pleaded with her, knowing he was holding on to his intellect and reason by a thread.
Nothing has changed.

Everything has changed. These people are your family
. She tried to take a deep, calming breath.
Jacques, I was your doctor, nothing more. I don't belong here. I don't know how to live like this.

You are my lifemate
. The words were firm in her head.
You are tired, my love, tired and afraid. You have every right to be. I know that. I know I frightened you, but you belong with me
. He did his best to keep his voice a soft whisper of sense, but it was difficult with the beast rising and the fragments in his brain confusing him.

She lay looking up at his strong, harsh, uncompromising features, the warning in his furious eyes.
I don't even know what it means to be your lifemate, Jacques. You know I want the best for you, I want you well and whole again, but I can't be with all these people. I need time to sort out what's happened here. What I am. I can hardly breathe right now, let alone think things through
.

She was telling the truth. Merged as he was with her, Jacques could feel the familiar pattern in her brain, her intellect leaping forward to protect her from any overwhelming emotion. She was too tired and drained to succeed at her attempt. He struggled once again to reassure her.
You are my lifemate. It means we belong together, never apart
.

She shook her head adamantly. “No way.” Her enormous eyes jumped to the others. All at once they looked sinister, beings too powerful for their own good. “I want to leave this place.” It was somewhere between a demand and a plea for help. Instinctively she looked toward Mikhail. His fingerprints were on her swollen throat. She had saved his brother's life. He owed her.

Raven tightened her fingers around Mikhail's, feeling his tension, his indecision. Clearly the woman was asking for
help, and Mikhail could do no other than offer his protection. But Jacques was already warning them off, a low growl rumbling in his throat. He sensed Shea was looking to the others for assistance, and it triggered his predatory instincts. At once he was dangerous, violence swirling close to the surface, aggressive toward Shea, clearly demanding submission.

Byron nearly leapt forward, but a show of Jacques' gleaming fangs held him motionless. He glared at Mikhail. “I told you she had not chosen. Take her from him. She must be protected.” Hope was shining in his eyes.

“Jacques.” Gregori's voice was pure black velvet, a caressing, compelling tone impossible to ignore. “The woman is overwhelmed. She needs rest, a healing sleep. Both of you should go to earth.”

Shea's heart nearly stopped. She shoved hard at Jacques' immovable chest, caught the picture of the earth opening, accepting them. Buried alive. A scream of alarm caught in her throat. She flung herself off the bed in an attempt to get away.

Jacques caught both fragile wrists, pinned her to the mattress.
Do not fight me, Shea, there is no way to win
. Jacques struggled to stay in control. Shea was trembling, her mind filled with fear of him and what he was, what he represented. The loss of freedom, the horror of being a vampire preying on human victims for sustenance as portrayed in old novels, the terror of ever needing a man the way her mother had—to survive.

“Take her from him,” Byron demanded.

Jacques turned his head, eyes glittering like black ice. His voice was hoarse, a growling representation of his long-silent vocal cords. He made a supreme effort to stay in control for Shea's sake. She had been there for him; he had to do the same for her. “No one will take her from me and live.”

There was no doubt he meant it. Shea lay shocked, unable to absorb that he had spoken aloud. There would be a bloody war here, and someone would die.
Please, Jacques, please let me go. I can't live like this
. There were tears in her eyes, tears in his heart.

Jacques tried to reach her, calm her with his mind, but she was panic-stricken, too petrified to think.

“Send her to sleep. She is weak and worn. You must care for her health.” Gregori's voice was always the same, as pure as the sound of crystal-clear water running over rocks.

“No!” Gregori frightened her more than anything. She was always in control. Always. No one had ever taken her decisions out her hands, not even her mother. She just needed to be alone, have time to think. Shea struggled in desperation against Jacques' hold “Let me go!”

The purity of Gregori's voice was finding threads of fragments in Jacques' head, weaving them together. Shea was so frightened, small, and vulnerable lying beneath him, pinned helplessly.
It is all right, my love
. Jacques bent his dark head and kissed her temple.
You will sleep and heal. I will ensure that you come to no harm. In this you can trust me
. The command was firm and strong. He heard the echo of her anguished cry in his mind fading as she succumbed to his order.

The storm moved in slowly, blanketing the land in a peculiar, dreary drizzle. All day it blotted out any chance of sunshine and hid the mountain range in sheets of silvery rain and a shroud of thick fog. In an abandoned shack, three men huddled by the fire and tried to escape the water leaking through the cracks in the roof.

Don Wallace sipped at the scalding-hot coffee and stared uneasily out the window into the gathering dusk. “Unusual weather for this time of year.” His eyes met the older man's in a long, knowing stare.

Eugene Slovensky hunched his shoulders against the cold and regarded his nephew with reproach. “The weather is like this when the land is unsettled. How could you allow the woman to slip through your fingers, Donnie?”

“Well, you had her when she was a mere baby,” he retorted. “You let her escape you then. You couldn't even trace her mother between Ireland and America. I was the one who did that, nearly twenty years later. Don't act like I'm the only one who bungled this.”

The older man glared at him. “Don't take that tone with
me. Things were different all those years ago. We didn't have the advantages of all the modern technology you have now. Maggie O'Halloran had people help her escape with her little demon whelp.” He sighed and glanced once more out the window at the fog and rain. “Do you have any idea the risk we're taking coming into their territory?”

“I believe I was the one who tracked and killed those vampires we got a few years back while you stayed safe in Germany,” Don snapped, irritated.

“You weren't very discriminating about who you marked as vampire, Don,” Eugene pointed out waspishly. “You enjoyed yourself whenever the mood struck you.”

“I was the one taking the risks. I should be allowed to have some fun,” Don snapped back.

“Well, this time concentrate on why we're here. This is dangerous work.”

Don's eyes flattened, hardened. “I was with you when we found Uncle James's body, remember? Happy fifteenth birthday, Donnie. Instead of a real live vampire to stake, I get my uncle's body buried in a pile of rubble. I know how dangerous it is.”

“Never forget that sight, boy, not ever,” Eugene cautioned. “Twenty-five years it's been, and we still don't have his murderers.”

“At least we made them pay,” Don pointed out.

Eugene's eyes burned. “Not nearly enough. It will never be enough. We have to wipe them out. All of them. Wipe them out.”

Jeff Smith stirred and glanced at Don Wallace. The old man was crazy. If there really was such a thing as a vampire, Jeff wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to become immortal. They had killed fourteen so-called vampires, and Jeff was fairly certain a couple of them had been the real thing. No human could have taken the kind of punishment Wallace had so eagerly dispensed and survived so
long. Most of the victims definitely had been human, though, Wallace's enemies. Don had really enjoyed those sessions.

Jeff was also certain Shea O'Halloran was no vampire. He had researched her very carefully. She had gone to a regular daytime school, had eaten in front of other children. She was a bona-fide surgeon, respected in her profession. A child prodigy, all her professors spoke highly of her. Jeff couldn't get her out of his mind. Her voice, her eyes, the fluid, sexy way her body moved. The crazy old man was obsessed with finding her, and Don always did what his uncle said. Don's uncle, old Eugene Slovensky, held the purse strings, and the money was considerable. If they found the woman, Jeff was not going to let them kill her. He wanted her for himself.

“Why do you think she's is this area?” Slovensky demanded.

“She always uses cash, so we can't follow a money trail, but she often leaves her signature behind anyway.” Don grinned, an evil facsimile of a smile. “She just has to help people in these isolated villages. It's kind of amusing, really. She thinks she's so clever, but she always makes the same mistake.”

Eugene Slovensky nodded. “The brilliant ones never have any common sense.” He cleared his throat nervously. “I sent word to the Vulture.”

Don Wallace's hand jerked, and hot coffee spilled over his wrist. “Are you crazy, Uncle Eugene? He threatened to kill us if we didn't leave the mountains the last time he saw us. The Vulture is a true vampire, and he doesn't exactly like us.”

“You killed the woman,” Eugene said, “he warned you not to. I warned you not to. You just had to have your fun.”

Furious, Don hurled the mug across the room. “We're hunting a woman right now. We've followed her for two
years, and now that we're close, you call in that killer. I should have put a stake through his heart when I had the chance. He's a no-good vampire like the rest of them.”

Slovensky grinned, shook his head in denial. “Not like the rest of them. He hates, Donnie, my boy. He hates with an intensity I have never seen before. And that can always be useful for us. He wants a certain woman this time, the one with the long black hair. He wants her and those close to her dead. He has their trust, and he'll deliver them into our hands. He may be beneath contempt, a snitch, but he is powerful.”

“All their woman have long black hair. How am I supposed to know the difference?” Don pouted. “Do you remember the kid? The one about eighteen? He hated that kid. He really wanted that kid to suffer.” He smiled with satisfaction. “He did, too. Most of all he hated the last one we caught, the one with the black eyes. He ordered me to torture him, burn him. He wanted it to last forever, and I made sure it did. The Vulture is evil, Uncle Eugene.”

Slovensky nodded. “Use him. Let him think you respect him, that he is the one in charge, giving the orders. Promise him the red-haired woman, too. Tell him we'll give them both to him if he will deliver James's murderers. My poor brother James.”

“I thought you said we needed to study her, that she wasn't as strong as the others and we had a better chance of controlling her. In any case, she doesn't have black hair.” Don got up abruptly and paced across the floor to hide his expression from the others. It had been far too long since he'd had a woman completely in his control. His body grew hot and hard at the memory of his time in the basement with the last one. She had lasted three delicious weeks, and every moment of it she had known he would eventually kill her. She had tried so hard to please him, done anything and everything to please him.

He wanted Shea O'Halloran in his hands for a long, long time. She would learn respect. The icy contempt in her vivid green eyes would be replaced with pleasing, begging. He fought to control himself, cursed the others sharing the small confines of the cabin keeping him from indulging his fantasies. Don turned his head to catch Smith watching him. His mask slipped into place, his friendly smile. Smith was weak, always whining. He got off watching Don perform, but he rarely had the guts to do anything exotic himself. One of these days, Don resolved he would show Smith just how weak he really was. Their longtime partnership was coming to an end.

Slovensky dragged a blanket around his shoulders. In his sixties, he felt the chill of the rain seep into his bones. He detested these mountains and all the memories that came with them. Twenty-five years ago he had brought his younger brother, James, on a vampire hunt with other members of a secret society dedicated to wiping out the loathsome creatures. They had trapped a vampire, but it had killed James.

Shea O'Halloran was the key to all of it now. He would use her to ferret out his brother's murderers and deliver retribution, as they deserved. Donnie would put a stake through the Vulture's heart and rid the world of a detestable worm. And then the society could study the woman, obtain the proof they needed to be finally recognized as scientists, as they deserved.

“How long are we going to be stuck in this hellhole?” Smith demanded.

Wallace and Slovensky exchanged another long, knowing look. Wallace shrugged, pulled out a pack of cigarettes, and shook one loose. “You should know by now never to go outdoors when the land is so unsettled. It means they're out tonight.”

“Every time it rains we're locked in? Damn, Don, the least we could have done was get decent accommodations.”

“Stop whining,” Slovensky snapped. “The last thing we want to do is advertise our presence here. They control the locals, bind them to them in some way so that the villagers are loyal to them.”

Jeff turned away from them, staring out at the darkening land. Slovensky was a total whacko. Wallace he had met in college. Don had been everything Jeff was not. Cocky, self-assured, handsome, and tough. Wallace had cornered one of Jeff's constant tormentors, held him, and encouraged Jeff to beat the kid to death. The sense of power was incredible, and the two of them became inseparable. Don was sadistic, violent. He'd enjoyed watching snuff films, shared the experience with Jeff, and eventually became obsessed with the idea of making them. Jeff filmed Don's private performances, each of which became a classroom for torture. At first they'd used prostitutes, but twice they were able to lure a student to their warehouse. Afterward, Don was always mellow for several weeks, a month or two even, if the sessions had been to his liking. Jeff knew that the need to kill was riding Don hard now, and anyone close to him had better keep a low profile.

When the older man went outside to relieve himself, Jeff went to stand beside Don. “You ever think what it would be like, the power we'd have if we forced one of them to make us like them?” He whispered it softly to be sure Slovensky could not possibly overhear what he would consider sacrilege. “We'd be immortal, Don. We could have anything we ever wanted. Any woman we wanted. We could do anything.”

Wallace was silent for a few minutes. “We'd need to find out more about them. Most of what I know, the old man and his freaky friends told me, and it's probably all bullshit.”

“You sure?”

“Superstitious crap. All the people around here are superstitious. They believe these vampires can direct your mind,
even shape-change. If they had all these great powers, Jeff, why didn't they use them when we were having fun with them?”

Jeff shrugged, disappointed. “Maybe you're right. But they just hang on to life so long…” He trailed off.

“Hate keeps them alive.” Don laughed in anticipation. “They're almost as much fun as women.” He looked thoughtful. “But there's the Vulture.”

 

The sun gave up its feeble fight, the storm and the late hour completely obliterating its paltry light. The sky darkened still further, and the clouds grew heavier. The wind began to strengthen, driving the rain so that it pelted the ground hard enough to bruise leaves and vegetation. A low moan rose, echoed through grotesquely swaying branches.

The wind raced northward, howled down a canyon, rushed through the darkened forest, and climbed higher into the steep mountains to find a cabin dark and silent. Inside, away from the sheets of silvery rain and the monstrous wind, two bodies lay motionless, entwined on the bed. Shea was curled up, small and slight, her wine-red hair spilled across the pillow like blood. Jacques' much larger frame was curved protectively around her. Jacques' arm was firmly locked around her waist, holding her to him. His heart began a rhythm, a strong, steady sound in the silence. He drew air into his lungs to inflate them, to resume their normal function.

Jacques waited for the familiar rush of agony his awakening had triggered these last seven years. It would surge through him with the first circle of life, blood heating every cell and nerve ending. The rush didn't come. Instead he was sore, his muscles ached, but he felt strong and alive again. The healer's blood was incredible, his internal healing beyond Jacques' wildest expectations.
Gregori. The dark one
. The words came floating out of nowhere, one of those elu
sive fragments he could never seem to hold on to. Jacques tried to do so, wanting the information, knowing it was important, yet pain exploded in his head.

It didn't matter. He calmly allowed the fragment to drift away and slowly released his hold on Shea. Before giving her the command to wake, he scanned their surroundings to locate possible danger. There were others of his kind close by. It put him on edge. It was imperative for a Carpathian male to find a female, his true lifemate. If he did not succeed in binding Shea to him, every male in the vicinity would be pressing his suit, hoping against hope his chemistry would match hers. As with all the knowledge that came to him, he felt the truth and rightness of it, knew it was real and not imagined.

A silent snarl lifted his lip, revealing his white teeth. Deliberately, Jacques stretched, a slow, languid movement designed to reacquaint himself with his muscles, with his strength. His body was still a little sluggish, but it was alive again. As he moved, he felt the softness of Shea's body brushing along the hardness of his. His body responded, a sweet ache unknown to him for centuries, now ever present. He turned on his side and stared down into her still, pale face.

His body hardened aggressively. His hand went to the buttons of her shirt, his fingers brushing against her cool, creamy flesh. His heart jumped, and his breath caught in his throat. Such exquisite torment. He'd had no idea anything could be so soft. As he pushed her blouse from her shoulders, he leaned close to her ear. “Wake, little red hair. Wake needing me.” He kissed her eyes, took her mouth, tasting her first breath, his hand closing over her breast to feel the way her heart raced into his palm.

Blood rushed, a symphony of sensation sending heat and need and an urgent ache coiling through Shea. Jacques' mouth was magical, reverent, a slow seduction, while his
hands traced the contours of her body. He could feel her awakening, her mind opening to his. Her emotions were mixed—longing, need, a reluctant caring for him, overpowering fear of what she was, and a deep sorrow. He brushed his hand down her face to trace every beloved line already committed for all eternity to his mind, to his heart. Her face was damp. Jacques bent his head and followed the trail of tears down the slender column of her neck. Her skin was warm honey flowing up from melting ice, the combination irresistible. His tongue swirled over her pulse, and need slammed into him so hard that his body clenched painfully. Shea made a sound, a soft moan somewhere between despair and acquiescence. Her body was arcing into his, pressure and hunger building to drown out all good sense.