“You said you wouldn’t hurt me,” she continued even as he wrapped her in his strong arms and held her to comfort her. “You said you would always see to my happiness. You lied to me, Darius. The one thing I believed was that I could always trust you, trust your word to me.”
Her words were like small blows to his soul. Did she believe that of him, that he would lie to get his way with her? He hated that she was afraid, but what other choice did he have? “I have not lied to you. It is my duty to see to your health, to see to your protection. I can do no other than ensure your safety.”
“Darius, I don’t care what you are, what kind of power you wield. I will fight you with my last breath for my freedom. You have no right to dictate to me, even in matters of safety. You don’t. You can’t ‘allow’ me to do anything. It’s my free choice. I won’t have it.”
Darius regarded her passionate face calmly. He simply held her wrists pinned together, seemingly undisturbed by her outburst. “Be calm, honey, and breathe deeply. Your fear of being beneath the mountain is overcoming your reason.”
“I won’t stay here with you, Darius. I mean it. I’ll go away, so far away you’ll never find me,” she threatened, her emerald eyes swimming with tears, sparkling like gems.
His face hardened perceptibly, his perfect mouth all at once edged with cruelty. “That will never happen, Tempest. There is nowhere you can go that I cannot find you. I would come for you, and I would never stop until I retrieved you. You are the very air I breathe. You are my light. The colors in my world. There is no life without you. I will never go back to emptiness, to darkness. You and I are tied together, so we have no choice but to find a way to make this work. Am I making myself clear?”
“Perfectly clear. You intend to be a dictator, and you expect me to be a puppet. It isn’t going to happen, Darius. I’ve been in your head; you’re not the type of man to beat a woman because she defies him.”
His free hand slid to the nape of her neck, a light, caressing touch that sent a responsive shiver down her spine and started a fire in her abdomen. It angered her that he could do that—with one touch send her body into flames even as he was denying her rights. She could not let him do this to her. She wasn’t weak; she wasn’t the type to give in simply because he made her knees weak.
“I do not have to beat a woman to make her do what is necessary for her own protection.” He said it softly, his voice velvet soft, mesmerizing. “You are not my puppet, honey. I would never want you to be. Do you not realize that it is your courage I admire? But I cannot allow you to place yourself in danger.” His arms slipped around her from behind, circled her slender body, and drew her tight against him. “The hour grows late, Tempest. I need to sleep. I want you to lie down beside me and sleep, too. Nothing will wake you. Nothing will harm you.”
“I can’t breathe down here,” Tempest said desperately, wiping at the tears spilling onto her lashes and running down her face. “Darius, let me go. Please let me go.”
He lifted her struggling body as if she were no more than a child and buried his face in her neck for a moment, savoring her scent, the feel of her skin. “There is no need to fear this place, honey. It is a place of healing.” His voice dropped an octave, taking on a compelling, hypnotic rhythm. “You will sleep in my arms, sleep until I call your name and awaken you.”
Darius lifted his head so that his black eyes could stare directly into her green ones, so that he could trap her gaze in his black ice. Mesmerizing. Relentless. She could not pull her gaze away no matter how strong her will. He felt her resistance and admired her for it, but he was unyielding. This he could not give her. He would have to face her on the next rising, but this day she would be safe.
Chapter Ten
“This is all we have.” The photograph was tossed on the table. It was of a slender young redhead standing in a stream with her arms outstretched. She was laughing, her face turned up toward the sun, while hundreds of butterflies fluttered around her.
“Matthew Brodrick is dead. The police say there’s no question but that it was a suicide. But I say differently. Matt was one of us. He knew what he was up against. He wouldn’t have taken pictures of just anybody.” Brady Grand drummed his fingers alongside the photograph, then tapped it twice. “This woman knows something. This stream is the same stream where Matt’s body was found.”
“Come on, Brady,” Cullen Tucker protested. “Look at that picture. It’s full sun. Broad daylight. No way is that woman a vampire.”
Grand’s cold eyes traveled around the circle of men.
“I didn’t say she was, only that she knew something. For all I know, she was helping Matt. Find her, and we can get at the truth.”
“The ’truth’ is, we haven’t gotten anywhere,” Cullen snarled. “You say this band is a group of vampires. The only ‘proof you’ve offered so far is some obscure quotation based on the Persian word
Dara,
referring to the troupe’s Singer, Desari.”
A low murmur of approval went around the room. Then the others shifted nervously. No one wanted to cross Brady Grand outright; he was just too mean. But they had lost six men in the first attempt against the band, excellent marksmen, and now they’d lost Matt Brodrick.
Brady looked around at the others. “Is that what you think? That I’m wrong about these creatures? What of the fact that we sent six military-trained assassins to kill supposedly defenseless civilians, and all our soldiers ended up dead, the creatures still alive and well? Tell me how that happened, Cullen. You tell me how some simple security guard single-handedly destroyed all six of our men and their remains. They had a foolproof escape plan but disappeared. They sprayed the stage with bullets, yet the band members were relatively unhurt. Explain that, Cullen, because I don’t see how it’s possible.”
“The band got lucky. Maybe their bodyguard is better than you think, paramilitary himself. What do you know about the big guy? Not too much gets by him. Is it possible the team went in with poor information? That maybe it was you who screwed up?”
Brady’s fist clenched tightly until his knuckles turned white. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “I know for certain that the singer is a vampire. I know it, Cullen. The team knew, too, or they never would have gone in to make the hit. We wanted to bleed her as much as possible, weaken her, and take her alive. Our people have wanted a live specimen to study for years. But if the only thing we can get is a dead one, than so be it.”
“All we’ve accomplished so far is to make the world think we’re a bunch of crazy fanatics,” Cullen objected. “I say we target someone else, someone not so damned popular. The cops love Desari. The merchants in every city she goes to love her. The audiences love her. If we kill her, they’ll hunt us down like dogs.”
“That’s your trouble, Cullen—no sense of commitment. This is war. It’s us against them. Do you believe they exist? With all the proof I’ve given you, do you really not believe?” Brady demanded. “After what you saw with your own eyes? Or was that just a tale to get you inside our group?”
“Hell, yes, I believe vampires exist,” Cullen said. “But not this singer. She’s just some woman with a beautiful voice and a bodyguard as lethal as anything I’ve ever seen. So she sleeps during the day. What do you expect? She works all night. So we can’t find their campsites even when we track them all the time. They’re very careful, very private. But no one ever dies. No kids are killed. They never leave a trail of drained carcasses behind. If they’re vampires feeding off people, where are the bodies? Every vampire I’ve heard about kills. The reason we can’t find these people when they camp is because their bodyguard is good.
That’s
why there are no pictures, not because we can’t get anybody on film. This guy does his job and does it well. Thus, no unauthorized pictures.”