For the Power (For the Blood Book 2) Read online

  Ash had pulled out more sleeping bags and a battery-operated lamp. We’d made camp at the back of the store, placing the lamp in the center like a campfire and positioning our bags around it. Energy bars and water had been consumed and now Ash was asleep to my right and Sage lay dozing to my left. Logan was snoring softly opposite, but Jace was wide awake staring at the lamp as if it were an actual campfire.

  I climbed over Ash to sit by him. “Penny for your thoughts?”

  He smiled. “Just wondering what a ‘normal’ world will be like.”

  “Well, right now, this is normal.”

  He chuffed. “Yeah, I guess it is. I just … I’m wondering where we’ll fit in once the virus has gone.”

  “You mean supernaturals?”

  “No. I mean me and the guys. The experiments that shouldn’t exist. Once the dust settles, and the humans and natural supernaturals find their niches again, where will that leave us?”

  “Your existence may have been manipulated, but you’re not a threat. You’re a new breed, and that’s kind of exciting.”

  “It doesn’t work that way, or at least it didn’t. I’ve done my research into the past, into what the world was like. Supernaturals stick to their own. They thrive on factions. The vamps stick with the vamps, the Claws with the Claws, the fey to the fey, and so on and so forth. Where does that leave us?”

  He had a point. “Dwelling on it now is a waste of mental energy. When the time comes, we’ll deal with it.” I grinned. “And having a hand in saving the world should give you major brownie points.”

  He ducked his head to hide a smile. “Always the practical one, aren’t you?”

  I shrugged. “It’s a darned curse.”

  He gnawed on his bottom lip. “Look, I’m sorry about the way Logan’s been acting.”

  “You mean his hot and cold attitude toward me?”

  He nodded. “I wasn’t going to say anything, we agreed not to, but maybe if you know the truth you can stop yourself from despising him so much.”

  My curiosity sat up, ears perked. “Go on.”

  “A few years back there was a girl …”

  “Aha, I knew it. Logan was hurt by her, right?”

  He blinked across at me. “God, no. If only that was it.” He licked his lips. “Julia was … She was beautiful, inside and out. We saved her from a Feral Claw attack, and she ended up staying with us at the bunker. She offered to feed us and she … She became more than a donor to us all.”

  My pulse skipped. “You were sleeping with her? All of you?”

  Jace squeezed his eyes shut. “When you put it that way it sounds sordid, but it wasn’t like that. We loved her, and she loved us. We were happy.” His tone was choked.

  My scalp prickled because obviously something had gone wrong, something had happened to her, because she wasn’t with them any longer. “What happened, Jace?”

  He met my gaze with dull blue eyes. “Noah killed her.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Noah killed her …

  His words took a second to process. “What? Why? How?” Even as the words fell from my lips, my mind solved each question. “He lost control, didn’t he?”

  Jace ducked his head. “It was awful. When we found her … When we found them, she didn’t even look like herself anymore. She was a husk. He drained her dry, Eva. Every last drop. And the fucked-up thing is, when we found her, she had her arms around his neck, as if in her final moments, she’d simply submitted to her fate.” He shook his head. “I don’t even think she fought him.”

  The fool had thought he would stop, that he would come to his senses. She’d believed that love was enough.

  “Shit, Jace. I’m so sorry.”

  It explained a lot. It explained the animosity between Logan and Noah. It explained the little digs, and why Logan kept warning me off Ash. An ugly, twisted emotion filled me.

  “Did Ash love her too?”

  Jace smiled softly. “Ash loved her, Eva. He was kind to her, but it was nothing like the way he is with you. He was never instinctively territorial with Julia. Julia grew on him over time, but it seems with you, the attraction, the emotions have grown exponentially. You seem to have activated his ogre genes. “

  The pinch in my throat eased. So what if Ash had been with someone else. They all had, but that was before my time.

  “Logan loved Julia from the start,” Jace said. “He was a different Fang around her, and Julia loved him back. She said she loved us all the same, but it was obvious that she loved Noah the most.”

  “And you? How did you feel about her?”

  His smile was lopsided. “I was head over heels for her. For that year and a half she was with us, she became my world. It almost destroyed us when she died. Logan blamed Noah for a long time, but eventually they began speaking again, and we agreed that we would never form that close a bond with another female again. Her death almost killed Noah and Logan’s relationship. Gina was the perfect pick. From the start, we all knew there would never be more to our relationship with her than feeding. But with you …” His gaze traversed my face. “When Ash brought you back, we knew you were dangerous. If we weren’t starving for blood, we’d have let you go immediately. When you set the temporary terms to our agreement, it was a relief. But now …”

  “Now Logan is concerned that I’ll hurt Ash. That if something happens to me, then Ash will be broken.”

  Jace frowned. “Well, that’s a part of it, but surely you realize that the main reason is—"

  The backpack beside Jace crackled with static. Jace scrambled to get it open just as Noah’s voice, clear and comforting, poured out of it.

  “Jace, Logan, come in. Over.”

  Jace grabbed the radio and depressed the talk button. “Hey, Noah. I’m here. Over.”

  “How are things going? You should be at The Shack by now. Did you make it okay? Over.”

  How to answer that? Luckily for me Jace had the radio. “We made it fine, Noah. A couple of hiccups on the way, but we’re all accounted for. Over.”

  A beat of silence. “Why do I get the impression a couple of hiccups amounts to fighting for your lives. I’m glad you’re all right. I wish I could be with you. Over.”

  “We miss you too,” Jace said. “Just a few more days and we’ll be there. How’s Gina?”

  Another beat of silence. “She’s not doing well. I’ve confined her to her room for now. She’s weak. I’m not sure she’ll make it until you guys get back with the cure, but I’m doing everything I can to keep her alive.”

  Jace’s throat bobbed. “Yeah, just … make her comfortable. We’ll be back as fast as we can. Over.”

  No one said what we were all thinking, that unless we found a vehicle that could traverse the rough terrain at the next bunker, then it would be a several-day journey back to base.

  “Stay safe. Over and out.”

  Jace tucked the radio back into his pack. “We should get some shut-eye.”

  Yes. I needed time to mull over the revelations of a few minutes ago, and my body ached for sleep. The sleeping bag was warm and cozy. The guys had all loved one woman. Not uncommon for a woman to be shared by a group of males in this new world, but what Jace described sounded safe and warm and perfect, and that wasn’t how it always panned out. The women didn’t usually get a choice. Julia had been one of the lucky ones, but she’d been ripped away from them by fate.

  Logan’s wariness, his animosity made sense now. Good to know it wasn’t personal. My lips tingled with the memory of the kiss we’d shared in the hall of mirrors. He’d said I wasn’t to his taste. Had he been making sure he wasn’t attracted to me? Making sure they didn’t fall into the same pattern they had with Julia?

  No chance of that happening. I’d need to reassure him somehow. Long minutes ticked by, and Ash’s even breathing, which usually lulled me to sleep, wasn’t helping tonight. Fuck it, why was I still awake?

  “I can’t sleep either,” Sage said softly from beside me.


  I rolled onto my side to face the massive djinn. “I think my body is in overload mode.”

  Sage’s eyes glowed like twin flames in the gloom. “Jace’s revelations?”

  “You heard?”

  “I have excellent hearing.”

  “Yeah. It’s a lot to process.” I tucked an arm under my head.

  “It’s not the only thing you need to be pondering. What happened out there, Eva?”

  I’d successfully pushed that question to the back of my thoughts. Funny, because I was usually all about the information and understanding how things worked, but there was a resistance in my mind, a block that urged me not to dwell too hard on what was happening inside me. It warned that delving would reveal something broken.

  “You can’t ignore it,” Sage said softly. “Don’t be the person that suspects they’re sick but buries their head in the sand until it’s too late.”

  Was that what I was doing? “Are you saying I’m sick?”

  Sage pushed back the lip of his sleeping bag and reached down to grip the bottom of his T-shirt.

  The pulse in my throat throbbed. “What are you doing?”

  His smile was lopsided and knowing. “I need to show you something.”

  He slid his shirt up over his taut abs and flat pecs to reveal a softly glowing amber disc shape at his breastbone. It was the size of a golf ball.

  “What is that?”

  “I think that’s my heart.”

  God, I wanted to touch it. “I don’t understand.”

  “When djinn cross over to this plane, they leave behind their corporeal form, they leave behind their beating hearts.” He paused as if searching for the words. “Scientifically speaking, we still have our hearts and form, but the frequency that this world exists on means that we don’t have access to them like we would back home.”

  “So, you’re forced to take hosts in order to affect this world.”

  “Yes, otherwise we are left to hover, watch, and whisper. There are other worlds where we have form. Worlds where we have power and humans live alongside us, but those worlds never interested me. Your world, however, with its fascinating dynamics and the fact we could hide and watch you like we were watching one of the reality shows humans loved so much, always appealed more to me.”

  “That’s a little voyeuristic.”

  He grinned. “You have no idea. Djinn are inquisitive by nature, desperate to amass knowledge about the multiverse.”

  “Is that a thing?”

  His smile was secretive. “You really do have no idea what wonders are out there. I’ve traveled, and I’ve seen so many worlds.” His smile dropped. “I wasn’t planning on getting stuck here. I never wanted to take a host, but circumstances gave me no choice. It’s all very well being invisible when you can leave at any time, but not for eternity.” He sighed. “I miss my home. The air heavy with jasmine and lavender, and the ability to summon fire whenever I want. But you … You’ve changed that.” He glanced down at his chest.

  “This.” My hand hovered above the amber disc on his breastbone, still desperate to touch it.

  “This isn’t supposed to be possible,” Sage said. “Not on this plane, not with a human. Only a djinn can ignite another djinn’s heart. It takes a special connection, a potential bond for it to happen, but never on this plane.”

  What was he saying? “What does this mean?”

  “I’m not sure. But I think now I may be able to tap into my elemental ability without consequence.” His gaze was warm on my face. “You did this, Eva. You gave this to me.”

  Special connection, a potential bond.

  We barely knew each other. How could this be? He was hiding something. It was written all over his face. Only a djinn can ignite another djinn’s heart.

  “What aren’t you telling me, Sage? You’re not the only one that can read people. What’s the significance of igniting another djinn’s heart?”

  His gaze was hooded. “Back in the djinn realm, when a djinn discovers a potential love match, their hearts ignite with an inner fire. It’s like a mating call.”

  My breath hitched. “But I’m no djinn.”

  “Which is why it makes no sense,” Sage said.

  Okay, so I was focusing on the obvious issue, and not on the question of whether I was a potential match for him, because the latter was a gray area in my mind, one that was easily clouded by my body’s reaction to him.

  I allowed my fingers to graze the glowing spot on his chest. His skin was warm and velvet-soft beneath my hand. “I don’t understand how I did this, or even if I really did do it.”

  “It was you. There is no other explanation. There’s something about you, Eva. Something unique in your aura—threads of silver and gold, a miasma of color. It’s beautiful.”

  “What do those colors mean?”

  He shook his head. “I’ve seen thousands of auras in my long lifetime, but I’ve never seen one like yours before. It’s truly unique.”

  The dark thought that had been circling my mind like a drain surged to the surface. I licked my lips, and he tracked the movement. “Am I human?”

  He shuffled his sleeping bag closer and leaned in to press the tip of his nose to my forehead and inhaled. “You smell human, Eva. Sweet and filled with sunshine, but you feel as if you’re more than human.”

  I tilted my head to meet his eyes. His mouth was so close that his honey breath teased my lips. “More?” My hand was still on his chest, palm flat now, and the spot heated beneath my touch.

  Sage slid his hand across my jaw, threading his fingers into my hair and angling my head. “More.” His gravelly tone was delicious friction to my senses.

  His attention was on my mouth, and mine dropped to his. Our breath mingled, my pulse fluttered then raced, and then he kissed me. A brush of his mouth over mine that sent tingles across my lips. He pulled back for a moment and returned to kiss my top lip, then the bottom one, before parting my mouth with the tip of his tongue and sweeping it across the seam of my lips as if asking permission. A soft moan climbed up my throat, and his fingers curled in my hair in response.

  “Eva?” He said my name against my mouth.

  He was holding back, just as he’d held back in the Wilds when I’d been under the remnants’ spell. But I wasn’t under a spell now. This was my choice, and every atom in my body wanted to taste him.

  I wound my arms around his neck and kissed him hard. Even with the sleeping bags between us, even at the awkward angle, the shape of his mouth, the pressure of his lips, and the sweet burst of flavor from the rasp of his tongue felt right. The ache of nostalgia bloomed in my chest, as if this was what I’d been missing. Jasmine-scented air filled my lungs, marble etched with looping and intricate designs painted the insides of my eyelids. Sage’s hand slipped from my hair to smooth down my front, over my breasts then up again to settle over my thudding heart.

  He pulled back on the kiss, breaking contact with a series of soft pecks that teased and taunted me. I made a sound of protest, and his chest rumbled with the threat of laughter.

  I pulled away. “You think it’s funny to tease a lady?”

  The corner of his mouth lifted as his gaze scanned my face. His grip on my hair tightened a split second before he claimed my mouth with tongue and teeth. He rolled on top of me, pinning me to the floor and kissing me so thoroughly my head began to reel.

  This time, when he pulled back, his amber eyes were dark gold and swirling with flecks of silver. “Fucking hell, Eva. That will have to be enough, because if I don’t stop, I’ll have to take you right here, right now.”

  Something wicked reared its head inside my mind, and my hand, trapped between us, reached down to skim the hard bulge at his crotch. He hissed through his teeth, and then nipped my lip, following up with a flick of his tongue.

  “Enough.” He kissed me again. “Enough.” He kissed me deeper this time. “Fuck.” He rolled away, hand over his eyes. “Sleep. We can untangle the question of your abilities in the m
orning.”

  I snuggled down into the sleeping bag and closed my eyes, lips and body tingling from his attentions. Ash slept soundly to my right. Would it bother him that I’d kissed Sage? Did it bother me? It felt natural. Like it was meant to be. Like we were meant to be. Is this how Julia had felt with the Fangs? This longing for each of them, this ache in her soul. Once the world was no longer a fucked-up mess, maybe we’d be able to figure out what we all were to each other.

  My eyes popped open, body wide awake. Something had changed. Something had woken me. The lamp was low; the batteries were probably almost out of juice. I strained to listen into the dark. How many hours had I slept? My eyes were still gritty, so not too long. I sat up slowly. Ash continued to slumber to my right, Sage snored softly to my left. Jace was curled up in his bag, and Logan …. Shit, where the fuck was Logan?

  How long had he been gone?

  A soft thud above us.

  Logan?

  Or had that noise woken the Fang? Had he gone to investigate? Idiot. Everyone knew you didn’t go to investigate strange noises without backup. Pulling on my boots, I headed into the aisles.

  “Logan? Logan?” I whisper-hissed.

  Nothing.

  If he was here, then he’d have heard me and answered. Shit. Back at our minicamp, I strapped on my sword and grabbed a flashlight before tapping Jace on the shoulder.

  “Hmmm?” He opened a bleary eye to look up at me.

  “Logan’s gone off somewhere. I’m going to check on him. If we’re not back in ten minutes, sound the alarm.”

  “Wha—”

  But I was already headed for the exit, flashlight in hand, Talwar on my back, and a terrible foreboding blossoming in my stomach.

  The foyer outside The Shack was littered with overturned metal bins and fake plants. The pitch-black darkness pressed in on me, and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the gloom surrounding the beam of my flashlight.

  “Logan?”

  My voice echoed in the silence.

  Thud, scuffle. My head whipped up. Please let that be him upstairs. We’d entered via the fire escape because the doors to the main stairs that led down here were blocked off. The lift lay open and dead. The only way up was through the fire doors. The beam of the flashlight bobbed across the dirty floor and over the fire exit. It bounded up the steps as I made my way stealthily to the ground floor. The door was smeared with brown and red and an awful smell hit my nostrils. Using the tip of my boot, I pushed the door open and ducked through onto the main floor of the service station.