Playing with Monsters (21 page)

Chapter Twenty-Four

I like not fair terms and a villain’s mind. –
William Shakespeare

I moved through the house, enjoying the silence after the bustle of the party. I’d lived alone for three years and sometimes enjoyed the solitude it provided. At other times it had been stifling, and tedious. I’d grown up in a loud house, filled with laughter and love, but that had ceased when Joshua left. The silence had been a reminder that our family was incomplete. Now, being in Lucian’s fancy house with the luxuries it offered, and alone? Priceless. 

I turned the music on in the bedroom, opened the door to Lucian’s room that connected with mine, and made my way to the shower. The intense masculine scent of him was everywhere, and I closed my eyes and inhaled his addictive, enticing aroma. Normally, I thought men used entirely too much cologne, but Lucian didn’t. He smelled like sex, mixed with sin, wrapped up in a hot package of masculine hotness. It was downright addictive.

I showered quickly, letting Adele and Christina Perry’s sultry voices wash over me. I exited the shower, fully expecting to find Lucian waiting for me, but luckily he still must have been at the party which was probably going strong even though the hour was growing late.

The towels in his bathroom were ridiculously soft, so I took my time drying off before I slipped on a pair of black shorts, a light pink camisole, and my Tieks. I made my way to the room I was using, grabbed a thin zip-up sweater and moved through the house silently as I made my way to the door, slipping away from the house to go feed Luna.

I unlocked the cottage door and pushed it open, hearing her gentle purring as she jumped from the couch and sauntered towards me. I made quick work of the litter box and fed her before sitting down to give her some much needed TLC. Perhaps I should bring her to Lucian’s house where it would be easier to care for her. This whole thing of being strong-armed to stay at Lucian’s home was Lucian’s and the coven’s idea anyway. I was pretty sure I’d be safe at the cottage, protected by the wards and salt.

I was seated on the couch when I heard the first scream. It sounded like Todd, screaming from outside the cottage. I set Luna down and moved towards the door. I tried to figure out which direction the scream had come from when another one sounded from the woods.

“Todd?” I shouted, moving slowly down the stairs of the porch as a chill crept up my spine.

Silence.

I walked in the direction of the woods, pulling the sweater around me for warmth as I made my way to the edge of the woods that led further into the mountains that surrounded us.

“Lena!” he shouted, and I didn’t hesitate, I ran towards his voice. He’d sounded hurt, and even though I didn’t carry a weapon, two people could usually scare off predators in the woods better than one.

I broke through the thicket, my heart beating rapidly as I found Todd standing in the clearing with a strange look on his face. As I got closer to him, his eyes rose to mine and I paused. He looked terrified, and sweat beaded his brow, his skin was sallow, and ashen.

“Lena, go back,” he pleaded, his hand moving to his jacket. “Damn you, run!”

“Todd, what’s the…” I stopped as he pulled a gun from his jacket and aimed it at me.

*~*~*

~Lucian

I studied Kendra, her emotions so different from Lena’s. She was an open book; Lena was the opposite. Where Kendra went out of her way to meet men, Lena held them at arm’s length, afraid to let them get close to her. Where Lena hid her pain from others, Kendra used it, knowing it bought her sympathy. Kendra also appeared to care what others thought of her, where Lena didn’t. Lena was a breath of fresh air, and Kendra was stale air, mixed with too much fucking make-up—Lena didn’t the need cosmetics to be beautiful.

They were almost polar opposites.

“Lucian, Lena left her house. Spyder is setting out to see if he can track her in the woods.”

I looked at Devlin, and his amber eyes moved to Kendra.

“Fuck me, twins?” he asked, his smile twisting into a tight grin.

“Lena left the house?” I asked, ignoring his eagerness to learn more about Lena. That idea was driving me bugfuck crazy. Watching him flirt with her had brought out a bitterness that was foreign to me. I didn’t get jealous, period. Yet when he’d touched her, I wanted to rip his arms from their sockets.

“The watch said she headed to the cottage, and then ran out the door towards the woods,” he returned softly, his eyes moving back to me. “What’s she done to get your attention anyway?”

I smiled coldly, but didn’t get a chance to respond before a scream tore through the room. My eyes darted to Kendra, who was clutching the side of her stomach and screaming in obvious pain. I started to move towards her, but stopped as others rushed to her side.

“Kendra,” her mother whispered, her eyes wide with uncertainty as Kendra lifted her hand, as if she was seeing something, which obviously wasn’t there.

“It’s not me; it’s Lena,” she whispered, horrified by whatever she was feeling. “I think she’s dying.”

I vanished, not giving a shit if anyone else felt the disturbance in the air.

She’s not dying—not yet at least.

*~*~*

~Magdalena

I brought my hand away from my side, covered in blood. My ears rang from the sound of gunfire. He’d fucking shot me! “Todd,” I whispered as he held the gun back up, fighting against something only he could see. The wound wasn’t deep, and if I was right, the bullet either grazed me, or it was a through and through; nothing important was hit. It felt like I was dying, though. I didn’t have time to stop and examine it.

“Run, damn you! Run, don’t make me do this.”

“You don’t have to do this,” I watched warily as he came closer to me, luckily the gun was now aimed at the ground.

“You don’t understand. I can’t control it, Lena. You aren’t listening to me, run! Now!” he screamed as he strode towards me.

I wasn’t fast enough; my side ached but I’d been able to determine that it wasn’t as bad as it felt, even if my thin sweater and shorts were covered in blood. Sure, he’d shot at me, but he’d yanked his own arm away at the last second, causing the bullet to veer from its original target. Flesh wounds were better than dead, but something wasn’t right with him.

I had just turned to run when he tackled me, hard. My body hit the ground beneath his with a hard thump that knocked the air from my lungs. His hands captured mine as he dropped the gun beside my head so that he could hold me down.

“Todd,” I cried as his knees spread my legs apart wide, and with one hand he reached around to the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a knife.

“Why didn’t you fucking run?” he demanded as his mouth smashed against mine. His kiss was hard, brutal, and yet I could feel him trying to pull himself away. I felt the nick of the knife as he cut through my shorts, exposing my skin to him. He paused, looked me in the eyes and said the last thing I had ever expected him to say: “Kill me, Lena. It’s the only way to stop it from killing you.”

“Kill you? Just stop,” I cried with trembling lips. His hand came up and grabbed my hair, slamming my head against the hard ground painfully. Stars erupted in my eyes and ringing began in my ears as tears leaked from my eyes, or maybe it was blood. I struggled against him but he was so much stronger than I was. He straddled my waist as he began to work his pants, exposing his hard dick. His legs held mine down, until he forced himself between my legs, and I begged him to stop.

I looked up at him, watching as tears slid down his cheeks as he readied himself to rape me. He wasn’t willing; something was wrong. I couldn’t think, my head was woozy, my vision was blurry as I tried to comprehend what was about to happen.

“Todd, stop this,” I whimpered. “Please,” I begged, but his eyes slid to mine, and what I saw in them would haunt me for the rest of my life. He was going to rape me, even if he didn’t want to; as if something was forcing him to do it.

“Kill me,” he begged as he positioned himself into a better angle to get inside of me.

My hand fumbled for the gun, and I knew he knew I had it. He didn’t try to take it away; instead he pushed himself inside me roughly and painfully as he took from me what I’d never willingly given him. He pushed until I was sobbing and struggling against him; my unprepared body ached with every thrust. He brought the knife up as if he would drive it through my heart. I lifted the gun, and shot him.

Taking a life is never easy, even if the other person is the vilest creature on the planet. Todd wasn’t, but he’d given up fighting whatever had control of him. He’d planned to finish the job. He had, in no uncertain terms, told me it was either him or me who was dying, and he’d tried to give me a chance to save myself. 

His body landed on me, and I sobbed as I struggled to fight my way out from underneath him. I was half naked, with blood covering my body, and I hurt, physically and mentally. I looked at the boy I’d once loved and dropped the gun I’d used to take his life. 

A sob ripped from me as I tried to get to my feet. I heard scuffling, and then voices. I turned to find Lucian and another tall man with messy black hair and icy blue eyes running towards me. Lucian flinched as he took in the carnage. I was covered in blood, numb, and there was no denying that I’d been raped. 

Todd had gained entrance into my body, and I’d been unable to stop him. He’d tried to hold back, but something darker had taken control of him. The gun I’d killed him with was next to his body, probably one belonging to his father that we’d taken out for target practice a time or two.

“Damn,” the man beside Lucian swore, and Lucian moved into action, pulling his coat off and covering me as he lifted me in his arms and, without a single word, headed to his house.

He said nothing, just held my trembling form tightly as he marched towards his expansive house. The moment we got there, cars were already showing up, and Kendra was beside us quickly.

“Is she shot?” she demanded, “I felt it!”

“She’ll live, Kendra, Lena’s a fighter.”

He ignored her other questions as he continued to move through the house. My family followed us up the stairs and into his room.

He sat me down on a small bench before turning on the shower. His eyes kept looking me over, probably waiting for me to become hysterical. I felt numb, as if I was watching it happen to someone else. I was trembling; my heart ached as I considered the consequences of what I’d just done, and what had happened to me.

My teeth began to chatter a little and I struggled to pull myself together. “Perhaps this sex thing just isn’t in the cards for me,” I rasped softly. Lucian’s eyes widened for a moment and I thought I saw a hint of a smile.

“I told you, you just haven’t had the right kind of sex yet,” he murmured. Good, he didn’t pity me. I hated pity.

Lucian turned, removed the coat and gently unzipped and removed the sweater and camisole that were covered in blood. He moved with me into the shower, uncaring that he was ruining his expensive suit. After checking the water’s temperature, he soaped up a soft cloth and began washing me carefully; avoiding the wounds from the bullet, and where Todd had cut me with the knife as he’d removed my shorts and panties. His fingers gently traced the wounds and rinsed them with water.

He didn’t ask me if I was alright, and I was grateful. I didn’t want to speak, because I didn’t trust myself not to become hysterical. I needed the silence to figure out what the hell had just happened, and to accept it. I needed to compartmentalize it, and push it behind the wall of emotions I wasn’t willing to deal with yet. Eventually that wall was going to crack, and then I’d have to face it all at once. 

He carefully washed my hair, and I watched as blood rinsed down the drain along with shampoo bubbles. I wasn’t sure who had bled more, or whose blood was being washed away.

When Lucian finished, he guided me out of the shower and began drying me off. He pulled open a drawer and retrieved something as I gazed blankly at the wall. I could feel him examining my wounds and slathering a cream on them that smelled like the cream he used the other night when I was burned so badly. I sighed with a bit of relief; it had healed the burns efficiently, and it had taken the pain away. He cut off lengths of gauze and medical tape and covered the area where the bullet had grazed me, then wrapped a soft towel around me.

He didn’t need to ask questions about the rape. He’d seen what had happened, or more to the point he’d seen the evidence of it. He didn’t push, or ask me to open up about how I felt; only an idiot would ask that, seeing as I’d just killed someone. Someone I’d once cared a great deal about, on top of that.

He maneuvered me to his bed, where my family was waiting, and helped me onto the bed before he pulled the covers up, lay down beside me, and held me close. I closed my eyes, shutting out everything but the feel of Lucian as he gave me warmth and the sense of protection I needed to sleep.

No one said anything. I was pretty sure it was because Lucian was warning them with one of his patented glares that makes you shrivel up inside before you have the urge to run for your life. I heard feet shuffling through the room and out the door.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

“Sleep, Lena. I’ve got you,” he whispered back, placing a soft kiss at the thundering pulse on my neck. “Nothing can touch you here; you’re safe.”

I slept dreamlessly, escaping the nightmare of reality.

Chapter Twenty-Five

~Lucian

I’d just made it through the woods when the shot was fired. Her hand clung to the gun long after the body had landed on top of her. No sound had escaped from her, no emotion. I’d stood in shock, and I knew Spyder was just as shocked. We waited for the barest of moments to see who prevailed as their bodies collapsed on the ground. She’d pushed him off of herself, revealing that their bodies had been connected and the proof of his rape.

Where most girls would have been hysterical, Lena was clinical, cold, and detached. She’d been covered in his blood; her hair had been colored red with it. She struggled to her feet, half naked, her face bruised; even with the blood covering her silken flesh, the bruises were visible.

We’d waited in silence for what felt like an eternity for her to scream, or, fuck, something. I’d expected screaming…anything would have been better than the look of detachment that she leveled me with. Dead eyes, as if she’d shot herself instead of her rapist. I’d run to her, watching her tremble as the adrenaline that had briefly taken hold of her slowly escaped her system now that the danger had passed. Lips trembled, hands shook, and she had remained still until I got close, when her eyes had snapped up, meeting mine.

She didn’t want comfort, didn’t want words. I’d wrapped her in my suit jacket, covering her partially naked body as she’d wrapped her arms around my neck and buried her face in the crook of my neck. She allowed that small bit of comfort, her silent release of the breath she’d been holding fanned my skin and showed her relief that it was over. I swallowed down the growl; the urge to reanimate him, to kill him again, shot through me.

I whispered comforting words to her, something I hadn’t done to a woman in a very long time. I’d passed her family without a second thought, moving towards the bathroom. I’d set her down once we were inside, peeling her bloodied clothing from her body as I took in the abuse she’d endured. She was a fighter; even though she hadn’t been the stronger one in that confrontation, she’d won the battle. Her body was proof.

She was compartmentalizing. Pushing it from her mind, pretending it had never happened. Her emotions were raw, sizzling and igniting the fire in her eyes. She held it at bay, as if it was a nightmare and she would wake at any moment. Her body trembled against mine, my suit ruined as she leaned against me for comfort; me, not her family. She didn’t ask for them; instead she’d clung to me as a lifeline.

With the softest of voices, she said the last thing I expected through teeth that had begun to chatter a little. “Perhaps this sex thing just isn’t in the cards for me.”

I stared at her, watching as she waited for me to respond. There was steel in this woman, a strength I never would have dreamed she’d possess. Blue eyes stared back, life and emotion flowing back into them as she watched me.

“I told you, you just haven’t had the right kind of sex yet.” I wanted to be careful in my teasing, because as soon as she had recovered from this and the Harvest nonsense, I would show her exactly what the right kind of sex was.

Once I was sure she was clean, I walked her from the shower, covering her with a towel as I dried her skin. Words weren’t needed here; she knew I had her, she knew she was safe, and she knew I wouldn’t ask if she was okay.

She wasn’t. She’d been fucking
raped
. I’d been too late, forcing myself to remain at the party to give her space. No one was fine after a rape, and she didn’t need to be asked that stupid question. Why humans asked it after violence had occurred was beyond me. Her little show of fire a bit ago that replaced the deadness I’d seen in the woods surprised me, and I’d felt a rush of relief push through me as she slowly came back from what had happened. Most women didn’t for weeks after being raped, if ever.

From one of the drawers, I retrieved some gauze and medical tape, as well as the cream Bane brought me the other night. The cream was a sham; it had a nice fragrance, but did nothing. I ran my fingers over the worst of her wounds; partially finishing the job I began in the shower. I didn’t want to heal her too much, as to draw suspicion to what I could do, just enough to take away the worst of the pain and prevent scarring, as I had with her burns the other night. Better she think it was the fucking cream than me that healed her. I smoothed a length of gauze and medical tape over the wound to complete the camouflage.

After stripping off my wet clothes and slipping on a robe, I didn’t take her to her own room; instead, I guided her to mine, tucking her beneath the silken covers, my eyes mentally noting each mark, each bruise. She’d fought him. My fierce little warrior had fought him off, and even though she hadn’t won, she’d prevailed against his strength. She’d lived.

Spyder had remained behind with the body and his mental voice drifted across my mind.
“It was an Asmodeus demon. Chicken shit fled as soon as the boy died; his body reeked of the possession once the demon had left it. Bad news is, it wasn’t one we know.”

The Asmodeus demon must have taken control of the boy some days ago, possessed his body, and claimed ownership of it. They’d then gone after her, which meant only one possible thing. Demons had come to play at Haven Crest. The big question was, why? Todd and Cassidy’s tryst in Lena’s home and in her own bed made sense now. He wasn’t just weak; he was pathetic enough to be possessed by a very nasty creature whose earmarks were lust and violence.

It could be Asmodeus demons who were responsible for the rash of young women disappearing lately, or it could be her brother who was responsible. It was something we needed to look closer at, seeing as whoever it was, was fucking around in my business. Young witches had a variety of uses, be they alive, dying, or even freshly deceased.

I could sense her emotions although I had missed what he’d said to her. Normally I’d try to read her mind, but with Lena, I couldn’t. She’d perfected her walls, and with each new day she woke, she reinforced them.

Once I had her tucked securely in my bed, protected in my arms, I heard a whispered, “Thank you,” her voice raw from screaming for help that hadn’t come in time.

“Sleep, Lena, I’ve got you,” I replied, holding her tighter. Before I knew what I’d done, I kissed her pulse that ticked wildly. “Nothing can touch you here, you’re safe,” I watched as she closed her eyes and her breathing grew even with sleep.

*~*~*

~Magdalena

I awoke alone, stretched out on a huge bed that was as soft as silk. My eyes snapped open, and I looked around the room. I was in Lucian’s bed, my body still naked and battered from last night. I sat up slowly, pulling the covers up with me to hide my nakedness. I ached; even sitting up hurt too much.

I moved sluggishly, taking inventory of all the aches I felt, or could see. There were a lot more than I had initially thought last night. Between my legs, the soft flesh was sore, painfully so. Bruises covered my inner thighs, and after peeling away the gauze and tape, I saw that the bullet wound was nothing more than a thin angry red line, and not deep. The side where Todd had cut me had scabbed over as the skin began to heal. As it had after the fire, the cream did an amazing job of healing. The burns should have taken weeks to heal, and I knew that somehow Lucian was using something more than the cream to speed up the healing process.

I looked at myself in the mirror, noting I had bruises on my lips and my chin, as well as the side of my face, where swelling made it look worse than it actually was. I’d felt no pain when I’d fallen asleep, dulled by the adrenaline, no doubt. Today I hurt like hell, and moving took a huge effort on my part.

I slipped into the shower, noting that someone had left a change of clothing for me. Taking extreme care with my aches, I cleaned up, then briskly toweled off and slipped into the sweat pants; a floral pattern of roses covered them, so most likely my mother had left it. The shirt was baggy, so I tucked it into the sweats and slipped on the zip-up jacket that matched the sweats. I tied my hair up into a high ponytail, which made me wince in pain from the large bumps and cuts on the back of my head. He’d smashed my head against the ground, and yet he’d begged me to kill him, to stop him from hurting me. It didn’t make sense.

It still seemed unreal, as if I’d watched it happen to someone else instead of living it. I wasn’t ready to deal with what happened. I knew distinctly that I hadn’t been the only victim. Todd had been fighting something off, even as he’d attacked my body. Strangely enough, I didn’t feel violated, nor did I blame myself for what had happened. I had heard it was a common thing that victims did after being raped.

I entered the kitchen, ignoring the fact that the noisy room went silent the moment I entered it. Lucian was there with the man who’d been with him last night, the only two who knew exactly what had happened. My grandmother and family were there, along with several elders from the coven who looked at me with pity. I didn’t fucking need pity.

“Magdalena, are you alright?” my mother asked as I poured coffee and turned to look at them better. It was time to deal with this, and sometimes a good offense was better than always being on the defense.

“No, I’m not. Neither is Todd, and what happened was awful, but I need you to understand that I am not the only victim here. I was attacked, so don’t ask me if I am fine, because right now I can’t give you that answer. I felt something in Todd; he didn’t want to do what he did. Someone was controlling him; he practically begged me to kill him. That’s what we should focus on.”

“I felt everything that happened to you,” Kendra said softly, her eyes filling with tears. She was speaking about the rape, and I wasn’t willing to go there. Not yet.

“Learn to turn it off, Kendra,” I replied crisply. Probably more because I was embarrassed by what she’d felt. My body being violated violently; I hadn’t wanted that for her. No one should ever feel something like that, ever.

Sometimes, with the bond Kendra and I shared, it was hard to separate from each other. I felt her, as if she was an extended part of me, as she did with me. I hadn’t been able to close the bond during the attack, which meant she knew every vile detail of what had happened to me, as if had happened to her. 

“What happened to you…it’s,” one of the elders started to say, her gentle gray eyes watching me carefully.

“It shouldn’t have happened. It sucked. I’m dealing with it in my own way, and I’ll thank you all to not treat me like a piece of fine china. I won’t shatter. I do, however, need you to know that Todd saved me. He deserves to be buried with honor for his sacrifice. Without it, you’d be getting ready to perform my burial instead of his.”

“He tried to harm someone from one of the original families; he will not be buried with the honor of the ancestors,” another elder replied carefully.

“You’re not hearing me. Todd didn’t have a choice; it wasn’t him. Something had control of his body, somehow. I don’t understand it exactly, but from the moment I stepped into that clearing to the moment he died, he’d begged me to take his life to save my own. Does that sound like someone who wanted to do what he did? He knew I’d picked up the gun and yet he didn’t stop me from killing him, and he could have, easily. Todd allowed me to win, and that right there should alert us to the real problem. I felt something else inside of him, something dark and evil. Focus on that instead of the things that can’t be changed, like what happened to me. You can’t change what’s been done, but we can prevent it from happening to anyone else.”

No one said anything. They just looked at me as if I’d gone off the deep end. I set the cup of coffee down on the counter and fought for control of my emotions. The electrical pulse in the room that alerted me to Lucian gave me strength. Why it did, I wasn’t sure. Every time I’d awoken last night crying, he’d held me through it, whispering soft words against my ear until I’d fallen asleep. He didn’t have to do it, but he had. He’d been my comfort through the storm as I struggled to fight through the nightmares. 

“Listen, I know the laws. I know if a person is used by possession or compelled to do something, it can be forgiven because they weren’t in control of their own actions. He deserves this. He fought it long enough to be sure I won. For that, he deserves respect.”

“Dark magic, as you described, would have caused a ripple; we’d have felt it, Magdalena,” my grandmother whispered, her blue eyes locking with mine.

“Are you sure about that?” I asked. “You didn’t feel Benjamin, and he’s dark. He was outside the manor house right after the fire; did any of the elders who arrived during and after the fire
feel
him then?”

“This is true, we did not feel him,” Grandmother said as she wrung her hands in worry. “But if what you say is true, it means someone is powerful enough to prevent us from sensing their presence. We must start the Awakening immediately. We are more powerful when our full potential is standing with us.”

“This is all quite shocking; however, I don’t think we should make hasty decisions. If we start the Awakening early, it could create a ripple effect in the generations to come. The timing has always been chosen because magic always flows strongest at Beltane and Samhain, and the postulants would get more of a boost of power by holding the ceremony at one of those two times. Preferably Samhain, as the veil between worlds is easier to cross. It takes less magic to call the ancestors to us, which leaves more to protect those who are receiving their powers.”

“We should tell Helen,” the other elder said, stopping the silver haired woman before she could expound more about the potential effect on future generations.

“We are under attack; we must start the preparations. This cannot continue to go on, and you know why, Nancy. It could be connected to the past, and the same reason the records of what happened to the generations who came before us were so spotty,” Grandma said, her eyes closing briefly before she looked at the others.

“What are you talking about?” I asked as a chill ran up my spine.

“You shouldn’t discuss coven business so openly!” one elder hissed, his eyes moving around the room carefully.

Grandmother nodded to the other elder and spoke. “Call the assembly, Nancy. We must bring this new information before the high priestess immediately. We must ensure that we protect the children from whatever is hunting them, quickly.”

Kendra wasn’t interested in the elders; instead, her eyes took in each visible bruise, and she winced, reliving each one of them. I closed my emotions off, knowing she would feel it the moment I shut her out. Her eyes went wide with surprise, and I looked at her. I’d only done it a few times before, completely closing myself off to her. I turned on my heel and left the room, heading to the cottage to make sure Luna was safe since I hadn’t shut the door when I’d heard Todd’s screams last night.

“Magdalena, you will attend the assembly. Your marks will show the others that the need for haste is not something that can be put off,” my grandmother said, stopping me in my tracks.