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Treating me like Wilhelm and I are one and the same, both of us your enemies" "What would you haveork out between us in the end? Pretend that Roth doesn’t exist so that you and I can pick up where we left off all those years ago?" Claire glanced down, feeling foolish for having wanted hiht never offer her again, even in the flimsy haven of a dreaers "We can’t change anything that’s happened, Claire I won’t stand here and give you lies to ive you promises that I know I can’t keep" "No," she said "You’d rather run away" Hisdarkly "You think I wanted to leave you"
Not a question, but a quiet accusation "Would it matter if I did?" she tossed back at hi froo "Never mind, don’t answer that I wouldn’t want to press you into saying so she’dthere, she pivoted, about to walk off and leave hile step away, his fingers wrapped around her arm and he held her in place He moved in front of her, his face taut and deadly serious "Leaving you was the last thing I ever wanted to do" He scowled, his grip holding her tighter,her farther into the heated wall of his body "It was the hardest godda I’ve ever done Ever, Claire" She stared up at hilimmer of his eyes In the next moment, he bent his head down and kissed her, theirShe never wanted to stop She didn’t think she could let go of hiain, even if only in her dreaainst herher lips "I want to be with you now
Ah, Christ, I have needed to be with you for so long" Because it was a dream, wishes often need only be whispered to make them so In an instant, Claire found herself pressed down on the soft, cool grass, Andreas’s nificent body poised above her They were naked now, clothing having fallen away as if it were made of mist But even in dreams, Andreas’s skin arm and firm to the touch His broad shoulders and thick ared abdo and perfect in itsthe length of him She remembered all too vividly that Andreas’s perfection extended farther down, as well Because it was a dreae of all the reasons they should not be together She knew only the calling of her heart, and as her palm ca of his heart, too His pulse ha fast, heavy, hot with need Claire looked up into eyes that burned as bright as any flaht, tormented mask "Yes," she hissed, almost incapable of words She sucked in her breath as the broad head of his cock nudged her, cleaved her With a slow push of his hips he was sliding inside her, burying hiloriously deep thrust Claire cried out, arching up to take all of hiht, his length touching her very core
"Oh, yes," she panted as they found a fah they’d never been apart He was a ferocious lover; she knew that about him already and reveled in his animalistic intensity Every hard stroke rowl sent a shiver coursing through her veins He knew just how toevery ounce of pleasure from her body Claire felt the first trehtning in her blood She couldn’t contain it, had no strength to resist Andreas’s ers into the thick muscle of his shoulders and hold on as he steered her toward a splintering climax She didn’t know if he followed her there All she kneas the incredible wave of pleasure that rushed over her then the sudden hollow grief of realizing Andreas was gone Claire called out to hiarden sanctuary where they’d lain together was gone, as well She was sitting in theher eyes "Andre?" She got up and started walking, holding her aret her bearings She didn’t know this place She couldn’t ent stink of s unidentifiable that filled her nostrils and choked her throat
Coughing, Claire stepped over the scorched vegetation She stu on a charred black luround Horror washed over her even before her senses processed what she was seeing It was a child A dead child, burned beyond recognition "Oh, my God" Claire backed away, repulsed Stricken "Andreas!" She swiveled her head and cried out with relief to see the broad green lawn and the stone-and-timber mansion that had been Andreas’s Darkhaven estate seated at the top of a gently sloping incline Claire ran toward the house She was naked and cold, terrified and confused by what she’d just seen outside "Andre?" she called frantically as she walked along the back of the ht or movement inside "Andreasare you in there?" She went around to the front, her arms wrapped around her nudity as she cliant entry She knocked on the door It eased open on silent hinges, but no one waited for her inside Claire stepped over the threshold and into a strange mausoleum of white Everywhere she looked--the floors, the walls, the furnishings--all of it was pristine, snohite And quiet as a tohtened Where are--" He ehostly foyer He was naked like she was, his eyes still burning a his mouth He stalked forithout a word and hauled her into a bruising, unyielding grasp
Kissed her with so much heat and desire, her knees al to feel safe again, he drew back fro her out of his reach, that she stu wet and slippery was under her feet She slid in it an instant before the coppery tang of spilled blood registered in her nose "Oh, er white but veined ore The walls and furnishings were no longer pristine and colorless either Now everything was ruined, bullet-riddled, bloodied Furniture and wall art toppled, broken, all of it in shambles "Oh, no Oh, God no" She didn’t knohat to ic child outside, but there could be nohere Claire looked at hi that he was showing her the destruction of his home Destruction called for by Wilhelht at the country house She put her hand out to Andreas in support, but he didn’t take it His expression was hard, condelanced down, she sahy Blood coated her fingers and palms She was splattered with it all over her front, even her hair was sticky with it And there, at her feet, was the lifeless body of a little boy-- one of Reichen’s nephews’ sons, unfire Still more bodies lay elsewhere in the mansion, on the first floor, halfway up the staircase, near the door to the cellar down the hall She was standing in the center of a ine in the worst of her nightulfed in white-hot, deadly heat Flanite the walls and furniture
In mere seconds, all Claire could see was fire The screa She jolted herself out of the drealiness of it Sickened and tre, she sat up in the bed and threw aside the quilt and sheets No blood on her now No cinders Just the cold sweat of true terror and the anguish of having witnessed Andreas’s horrific nightmare for herself Claire expected him to wake up and offer her some kind of explanation or comfort He had to kno shaken up she was now But he kept on sleeping, lying still and breathing unruffled on the floor next to the bed He let her weather her deep distress alone, as if he’d wanted her to be disturbed--horrified--by what he’d shown her Perhaps he’d wanted her to be horrified by him in some way as well Claire waited until her pulse leveled out and her body stopped tre, then she inched down under the covers and counted the hours until dusk
Chapter Thirteen
Fucking place is dead tonight," Chase muttered as he scanned the crowded dance club and apparently found little to his liking "Should have hit the north side of the city like I told you, instead of wasting our tirin at Brock, the third member of their patrol "You wanna see dead clubs, let ot ht?" Chase grunted
"No wonder you juet out of there and co your nuts off before all thoselike prime pieces of ass?" At Brock’s low chuckle, Kade curled his lip back off the points of his fangs and saluted both of the Breed ers "Well, this has been fun, but I’m outta here," Chase announced He scrubbed his hand over his stubbled jaw, his blue eyes looking a bit dodgy and unfocused under the edge of his black knit skullcap "Got an itch that won’t get scratched hanging out in this pe Good luck with the ent a nod "See you back at the co for the club’s exit When he was gone, Brock blew out a low sigh and shook his dark head "That son of a bitch has got a serious proble around all the tiency-installed stick shoved up his ass?" Kade drawled, looking at the big warrior who’d been recruited into the Order out of Detroit around the same time he’d come in fro Chase--or Harvard, as he was soree Chase was a coh warrior, one of the best, in fact He was a crack shot and one hell of a man to have at your back in colacier
"I don’t knohat his deal is," Brock said "But he’d better watch his step, is all I’ot one foot in the grave and the other one eager to follow He just doesn’t give a shit about anything, and that is dangerous Not only to himself, but to anyone who needs to count on hilanced out across the bar and dance floor A couple of young feave therin, the one that never failed to net hiuy had moves, no doubt about it
Not that Kade was any kind of slouch He eyed the pair of lovelies as they sauntered through the crowd, locked on to the two vauidedhis own sights on the brunette with the legs that went on forever under her short red leather miniskirt It took all of three seconds for Brock and hi outside with the lot, it only took another three for Kade’s nose to twitch with the prickling of his Breed senses coeance He s frolance to Brock told hi of spilled hu the wo in their wake as the two of the there The lone working security light mounted to the roof of the place shone down on erass But the scent of blood per for Kade and any of his kind "There," he said, spotting the dark stain in the dirt a few feet away from him Spatters in close proxi stretch of ragged chain-link fence The bleeding hue over there, and the trail of heround made it clear that whatever had happened, the victiet too far before he or she bled out completely "This isn’t only hurim "The attacker was Breed
He spilled some of his own blood in the process" Now that the warriorother than basic Ho none of the foul odor left behind by the addicts of their race "Who else would be idiot enough to feed this carelessly and let his Host stagger off like a stuck pig?" Brock shook his head, but suspicion darkened his steady, obsidian gaze Although he didn’t say it, Kade read the quiet doubt in the bigway" "Soht with hiers, but to bleed out a human and break one of the Breed’s most essential laws? When he said he had an itch that needed scratching, he sure as hell couldn’t have ravely "Maybe we’d better go have a look, just to be sure" They took off, following the blood trail across a vacant lot and down a narrow alley The deeper they went, the more serious the blood spill became Spatters turned to pools, some of them spread wide and smeared froed to get up and run some more The trail led them to the entrance of a junkyard at the end of an industrial area The place was gated, but the padlock and heavy chain that secured it had been loosened There was just enough room for someone to squeeze inside And soe of the gate left no question about that "Coh for Brock and hih He heard the rush ofaround a pile of scrap and rubbish Two rottweilers, big as tanks and mean as hell "Holy shit!" Brock’s shout was all but drowned out by the savage barks and growls of the oncos No animal alive could take a vaht of a co, furious canine wasn’t cause for a little alars braced wide as the pair of rotties swiftly closed the distance on him He stared them down, eye to eye They slowed then stopped, both of the into a cower at his feet The hounds whi heads low as their dark eyes searched out his favor "Get out of here" They loped off, as docile as puppies Brock gaped "What the hell was that?"