The Dark-Hunters (134 page)

Her sisters had refused to elaborate on what had happened on that night for fear of prejudicing her viewpoint.

For Zarek’s crime, Artemis had banished him to the frozen wilderness.

Could Zarek merely be curious about her living arrangements or was there a more sinister reason for his question?

“Would you like something to drink?” she asked him.

“Sure.”

“What do you prefer?”

“I don’t care.”

She shook her head at his words. “You’re not very picky, are you?”

She heard him clear his throat. “No.”

“I don’t like the way he’s looking at you.”

She arched a brow at Sasha’s angry words in her head.
“You don’t like the way any man looks at me.”

The wolf scoffed.
“Still, he hasn’t taken his eyes off you, Astrid. He’s watching you now. His head is bent down, but there’s lust in his eyes as he stares at you. Like he can already feel you under him. I don’t trust him or that look. His gaze is too intense. Can I bite him?”

For some reason, knowing that Zarek was watching her made her hot and shivery.
“No, Sasha. Be nice.”

“I don’t want to be nice, Astrid. Every instinct I have tells me to bite him. If you have any respect for my animal abilities, let me put him down now and save us both ten more days in this cold place.”

She shook her head at him.
“We just met him, Sasha. What if Lera had deemed you guilty on her first encounter with you all those centuries ago?”

“So you believe in goodness again?”

Astrid paused. No, she didn’t. Most likely Zarek deserved to die, especially if half of what she’d been told was true.

And yet Acheron’s quote haunted her.

“I owe Acheron more than ten minutes of my time.”

Sasha scoffed.

She poured Zarek a cup of hot tea and took it over to him. “It’s rosemary tea, is that okay?”

“Whatever.”

When he took it from her hand, she felt the warmth of his fingers brush hers.

An incredible rush went through her. She felt his surprise. His heated need. His unsated hunger.

That truly scared her. This was a man capable of anything. One of almost godlike powers.

He could do anything he wanted to her …

She needed to distract him.

And herself.

“So what really happened to you?” she asked, wondering if he would breach his Code of Silence and tell her that he was wanted by the others.

“Nothing.”

“Well, I hope I never come across Nothing then if it’s capable of putting a hole in my back.”

She heard him pick up his tea, but he didn’t speak.

“You should be more careful,” she said.

“Believe me, I’m not the one who needs to be careful.” His voice was sinister as he spoke those words, reinforcing his lethalness.

“Are you threatening me?” she asked.

Again he said nothing. The man was a total wall of silence.

So she pressed him once more. “Do you have anyone we need to call and let them know you’re okay?”

“No,” he said, his tone hollow.

She nodded as she thought about that. Zarek had never been granted a Squire.

She couldn’t imagine being banished the way Zarek had been. At the time of his incarceration, this area of the world had been very sparsely populated.

The climate harsh. Inhospitable. Desolate. Bleak.

She’d only been living here a few days and it had taken some getting used to. But at least she had her mother, sisters, and Sasha to help her adjust.

Zarek had been denied anyone.

While other Dark-Hunters were allowed companions and servants, Zarek had been forced to endure his existence in solitude.

Alone.

She couldn’t imagine how he must have suffered over the centuries as he struggled through his days, knowing he would never have a reprieve of any kind.

No wonder he was insane.

Still, it was no excuse for his behavior. As he had said to her earlier, everyone had their problems.

Zarek finished his food and then took the dishes to the sink. Without thinking, he rinsed and cleaned them, then set them to the side.

“You didn’t have to do that. I would have cleaned them.”

He wiped his hands dry on the dish towel she had on the counter. “Habit.”

“You must live alone, too.”

“Yeah.”

Zarek watched her draw near to him. She moved to his side again, intruding on his personal space. He was torn between wanting to stand beside her and wanting to curse her nearness.

He decided on pulling away. “Look, could you just stay away from me?”

“Does it bother you for me to come near?”

More than she could imagine. When she was near him, it was easy to forget what he was. Easy to pretend he was a human being who could be normal.

But that wasn’t him.

That had never been him.

“Yes, it does,” he said, his tone low, threatening. “I don’t like people to get near me.”

“Why?”

“That’s none of your damned business, lady,” he snapped at her. “I just don’t like people to touch me and I don’t like them to come near me. So back off and leave me alone before you get hurt.”

The wolf growled at him again, more fiercely this time.

“And you, Kibbles,” he snarled at the wolf, “had better lay off me. One more growl and I swear I’m going to geld you with a spoon.”

“Sasha, come here.”

He watched as the wolf went instantly to her side.

“I’m sorry you find us so bothersome,” she said. “But since we seem to be stuck together for a bit, you could try and be a little more sociable. At the very least civil.”

Maybe she was right. But the bad thing was, he didn’t know how to be sociable, never mind civil. No one had ever wanted to converse with him either in his human life or his Dark-Hunter one.

Even when he’d first signed on to the Dark-Hunter.com Web site to chat ten years ago, the other, older Dark-Hunters had thrown a fit and attacked him.

He was in exile. The rules of his banishment required that none of them speak to him.

He’d been banned from posting on the bulletin boards, the chatrooms, even the private loops.

It had only been by accident that he’d stumbled across Jess, who had been in one of the gaming rooms waiting for his Myst opponent to arrive. Too young in Dark-Hunter years to know he wasn’t supposed to talk to Zarek, Jess had greeted him like a friend.

The novelty of it had made Zarek vulnerable and so he’d found himself talking to the cowboy. Before he knew it, they had somehow become friends.

And what had that gotten him?

Nothing but a bullet hole in his back.

Forget it. He didn’t need to talk. He didn’t need anything. And the last thing he wanted was to be sociable with a human woman who would call the cops if she ever found out who and what he was.

“Look, princess, this isn’t a social call. As soon as the weather lets up, I’m out of here. So just leave me alone for the next few hours and pretend I’m not here.”

Astrid decided to back off a bit and let him get a little more used to her.

Little did he know, he was going to be trapped here a lot longer than a few hours. That storm wasn’t going to abate until she wanted it to.

For now, she would give him time to reflect and regroup.

There were still other tests he would have to pass. Tests that she wouldn’t relent on.

But there was time for that later. Right now he was still wounded and betrayed.

“Fine,” she said, “I’ll be in my bedroom if you need me.”

She left Sasha in the kitchen to watch him.

“I don’t want to watch him,”
Sasha snapped.

“Sasha, obey.”

“What if he does something disgusting?”

“Sasha!”

The wolf growled.
“Fine. But can I have one small bite of him? Just to give him a healthy respect for me?”

“No.”

“Why?”

She paused at that as she entered her room.
“Because something tells me that if you attacked him, it is you who would get the healthy respect for
his
powers.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Sasha! Please.”

“Fine, I’m watching him. But if he does
anything
disgusting, I’m out of here.”

She sighed at her incorrigible companion and lay down on her bed to try and get a little rest before she began her next battle of wills with Zarek.

Astrid took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She connected again with Sasha so that she could check in on Zarek. He was standing at her front window now, looking out at the snow.

She saw the ragged tear in the back of his shirt. Saw the weariness on his face. He looked daunted and at the same time determined.

There was an agelessness to his features. A wisdom that seemed somehow at odds with his sinister appearance.

“What are you, Zarek?”
she wondered silently.

The question was morbidly followed by another. In the next few days, she would know exactly who and what he was. And if Artemis was right and he was truly amoral and lethal, she wouldn’t hesitate to let Sasha kill him.

4

“Wake up, Astrid. Your psychotic criminal is playing with knives.”

Astrid snapped awake immediately to Sasha’s voice in her head. “What?” she asked out loud before she’d realized it. She sat up in her bed.

A mental image from Sasha flashed in her mind. She saw Zarek in her kitchen, rummaging through the drawer where all her cutlery was kept.

Zarek pulled out a large butcher knife, then tested the edge with his thumb. She frowned at his actions.

What was he doing?

He set the knife aside and returned to the others in the drawer.

Sasha growled.

“Shut up, Scooby,” Zarek snarled. He cast a feral, vicious glare at Sasha that held more venom than a rattlesnake farm. “Did I ever tell you how much I love pooch stew? There’s enough meat on you to last me for a week.”

Sasha moved forward.

Halt!
she snapped mentally at her companion.

C’mon, Astrid. Let me bite him. Just once.

No, Sasha. Stand down.

He did, but he was very grudging about it. He stepped back, his eyes never leaving Zarek, who pulled a small paring knife out. Zarek fingered the blade again, looking at Sasha. She could see the gleam in Zarek’s midnight eyes that said he really was considering using the knife on her companion.

Finally, he returned the butcher knife to the drawer, then took the paring knife into the den.

Astrid’s frown deepened as Zarek went to her kindling pile by the hearth and pulled out a large piece of wood. He took it over to her couch and sat down.

Ignoring Sasha, who followed him every step of the way and finally ended up sitting near Zarek’s feet, Zarek started to whittle the wood.

Astrid was transfixed by his unexpected actions.

He sat there for countless minutes in total silence working on the piece. But what amazed her even more than his patient, silent demeanor was the way the wolf he was carving took form. It went from a piece of a limb to a remarkable likeness of Sasha in very little time.

Even Sasha had cocked his head to watch.

Zarek’s hands moved the knife over the wood with an expert grace. He paused only at times when he looked up to compare the piece to Sasha.

The man was an extremely talented artist and his talent seemed completely at odds with what she knew about him.

Intrigued, Astrid found herself getting up and returning to the living room. Her movements broke her mental connection with Sasha. Walking always did. She could only use his sight whenever she was perfectly still.

Zarek looked up as he felt the air behind him stir.

He paused as his gaze fell to Astrid and she took his breath away. Unused to having people in a house with him, he wasn’t sure if he should greet her or remain silent.

He opted to just watch her.

She was so feminine and beautiful. Kind of like Sharon, only there was a sense of vulnerability about her that Sharon lacked. Sharon possessed a smart mouth that could rival his own and her years as a single parent had left her with a very hard edge to her. But not Astrid. She had that gentle kind of softness that would cause some people to take advantage or victimize her.

The thought sent an unexpected jolt of anger through him.

Astrid moved forward into the room and was headed straight for the ottoman he’d moved out of his way earlier.

His first thought was to leave it and let her fall, but he barely moved it out of her way in time. She missed the ottoman, but did, however, stumble into him, causing the knife to slip.

Zarek hissed as the extremely sharp blade cut deeply into his hand.

“Zarek?”

He ignored her as he rushed into the kitchen to tend the throbbing wound before he dripped blood all over her polished hardwood floors and expensive rugs.

Cursing, he dropped the knife into the sink and turned the water on to rinse it.

She followed him into the kitchen. “Zarek? Is something wrong?”

“No,” he snapped, washing the blood from his hand. He grimaced as he saw the depth of the injury. If he were human, he’d need stitches for it.

Astrid moved to stand beside him. “I smell blood. Are you hurt?”

Before he realized what she intended, she took his hand into hers and felt it with her hands. Her touch was feather light as she gently touched his wound and yet the sensation of her hand on his floored him. It felt as if someone had hit him in the gut with a sledgehammer.

She was so close to him that all he had to do was lean forward and he could kiss her.

Taste her neck.

Her blood …

No woman had ever tempted him like this.

For the first time in his life, he wanted to taste someone’s lips. To hold her face in his hands and ravish her mouth with his tongue.

What would it feel like to be held…?

What the hell is wrong with me?