The Protectors Christmas Box Set (sexy paranormal romances) (20 page)

Brendan didn’t either. He felt hot and uncomfortable and had an urge to punch something. But not Stone. He knew he’d get himself into more trouble than he’d know what to do with if he fell off the deep end and actually punched Frank Stone.

Even so, he curled his hands into a pair of tight fists. “You said it yourself. Some of us are beyond help. That despite all our best efforts, some of us are doomed to be consumed by
the darkness
,” he ground out.

“Yes, yes, I said all that. And it’s true. Some will be lost.” Stone slammed his coffee mug on the counter. “But. Not. Her.”

Brendan growled again. “She’s nothing but trouble, Stone. She’s not worth the effort it would take.”

“Horace?”

Horace was easing out of his chair. He looked ready to bolt. Stone snagged his arm. “Can you knock some sense into his bony head?”

“I doubt it, sir. He’s gotten himself all twisted up in her net that I doubt he knows which end is up anymore.”

“Is that so?” A curious light flickered in Stone’s eyes.

“No,” Brendan protested, afraid he knew only too well what the two men were thinking about him. “You’re wrong.”

“Am I?” Stone asked.

“Dead wrong.”

“Then prove it. Do your damned job and help her.”

* * * * *

He didn’t love her. They were wrong about that. Love meant having feelings of understanding and forgiveness.

All Brendan felt was anger, dammit.

She’d betrayed him and had put herself in danger with the council in the process. Why in the hell did Stone want her saved? If he found her and was somehow able to separate her from
the darkness
that was threatening to take her over, he’d be forced to bring her in front of the council. And they’d snuff out her life.

Either way, she was damned.

Why bother? Why take the risk of becoming infected himself?

He wasn’t going to do it. Stone could go fuck himself and his unreasonable demands for all he cared. He was done. Finished. He hadn’t really fit in with the rest of them, anyhow.

Brendan jammed his hands into the pockets of his wool coat and braced himself against the sharp winter wind as he plodded aimlessly through the city streets.

“I’ve been waiting for you, Fish.”

Decades had passed since he’d heard that voice—a voice he’d hoped never to hear again—yet there was no hesitation. He recognized her right away. Drawing a steadying breath, he turned to face the demon of his worst nightmares. Through the gloom, he saw her huddled next to a dumpster. Lady Czarina, the gypsy woman who had sold him to a pair of heartless monsters before he was old enough to protect himself.

Dressed in a ragged, worn flowered smock and a threadbare wool coat, she was a tiny wisp of a thing. She appeared even smaller by the way her curved back hunched. Though she couldn’t have been even five feet tall, Brendan stumbled away from her as if she were a giant, fierce beast. His heart thudded against his ribs.

He held his hands out in front of him, trying to hold her back. “What do you want with me, old woman?”

She cackled. The wretched sound broke off into a series of harsh coughs. “Don’t you recognize where you are, Fish?”

“I don’t have to play your games.” He backed further away from her. The broken little boy inside him cried out. “You hold no power over me anymore.”

Her beady, black eyes pierced him. “Look where you are, Fish,” she demanded. Though she was human, she, like Stone, had the power to control others with her voice. It was a power Brendan remembered from his short-lived childhood. It had made him feel helpless.

Nothing had changed.

Instead of running or fighting her like he wanted to do, he blinked and looked around the dark, narrow alleyway. At one end, a faded wooden sign waved in the wind. “Lady Czarina’s Mystical Curios,” he mouthed the words as he read them.

This was where he’d been found as a baby and had spent the first three years of his life. It was also the same alleyway where he’d met Dallas.

“Everything leads back to here.” Her voice scratched against his ears. “Have you taken the time to wonder why?”

He hadn’t.

“Well?” she pressed.

“I began life here,” he guessed.

“You haven’t changed since you were three, Fish. You still don’t stop to think things through!” Leaning heavily on a wooden cane, she hobbled toward him. The wood clomped against the broken asphalt at a slow, steady beat. “Don’t you see? You started here because everything ends here.”

She grabbed his hand. Her fingers dug into his skin like sharp talons. He tried to pull away, but she sunk her nails in deeper.

“I’m a seer. Damien had thought me a joke since I was merely a human, but he was wrong. I have the sight, Fish. And I saw your future.”

“Let go of me.” He didn’t want to hear anything she might say. He didn’t want anything to do with this witch. “You’ve done enough harm to last a lifetime.”

She refused to release him. “I did it for you. Oh, I knew Damien would destroy me for it. But I couldn’t let you stay. Don’t you understand? I thought sending you halfway across the country would be far enough to save you.”

“Do you know where you sent me?” His voice strained from the raw pain that would never fade. “Do you know what they did to me?”

She looked away. “
Yes
.”

She knew and she’d sent him anyway?

“Damn you, old woman.” He ripped away from her. Her long nails slashed the skin across the back of his hand.

“
The darkness
hungers for you, Fish. There aren’t many of your kind born under the same star sign. It makes you more sensitive than most. Among other interesting traits, you possess a strong sense of empathy.” She paused and gave him a meaningful look. “Perhaps, too strong. If you don’t leave now,
the darkness
will get what it’s been craving all along. You are fated to be devoured by it. Tonight.”

“
You lie
.”

“Then why am I here? Why are you here?” She shook her head, sending her shaggy head of hair scattering from its haphazard styling. The silvery strands looked as if they’d taken a life of their own as she gave Brendan a piercing glare and pointed her craggy finger down the deserted alleyway.

“Why is
she
here?”

* * * * *

Something was chasing her. Something enormous.

Good God, it was getting closer. Dallas darted down the darkened alleyway, praying she would find a place to hide. Whatever was coming after her, she had felt its hot breath tickling her neck just before she’d started running.

Tears had stained her cheeks. They’d dried all sticky and cold. She would still be curled up in a tight ball, crying her eyes out over Brendan’s rejection if not for the heavy footsteps she’d heard coming toward her bedroom.

In a moment of panic, she’d darted out her apartment building and into the street. The footsteps had remained right on her heels.

She’d run for what felt like hours. Her body was aching and her lungs were on fire. And there was nowhere else to go. She had to hide. She prayed there would be a dumpster or perhaps a discarded box she could crawl into. The thought of sharing a space with mice or rats didn’t bother her. Not at all. She would take vermin over whatever horror was coming after her.

She needed to find someplace, anyplace to hide. It was her only hope for surviving whatever was coming after her. She ran blindly into the shadowy alley.

“Brendan…”

The sight of him waiting for her at the end of the alleyway…glaring at her…stopped her dead in her tracks.

* * * * *

Despite the rage inside him, his cock grew tight at the sight of her. It felt as if she brightened this corner of Chicago like a crisp, spring morning. And for a fleeting moment, he grabbed onto a morsel of hope.

Her curvy hips called to him. Unlike any woman he’d ever known, she had crawled into his heart. He didn’t just want to protect her—he wanted to have a future with her.

Which was impossible. He had learned time and again that life wasn’t like that. Whenever anything good came to him, he simply needed to hold onto it for as long as it lasted. And not hope for a lifetime.

Dallas wasn’t any different. She wasn’t his to keep…or to love. She’d shown him that only too painfully well this afternoon. Keeping her close would lead to not only his destruction, but hers as well.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded.

She remained in the middle of the alleyway. She was probably too frightened to come closer and too damned stubborn to run away. It was that stubborn streak that made him want to scream at her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t realize the trouble I’d cause. I was trying to…trying to…” A delicate blush kissed her cheeks. She sighed. “I was trying to get your attention.”

“You got it.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “What do you plan to do with it?”

“Your voice is as hard as a wall.” She sobbed.

“Leave her to suffer her fate, Fish,” Lady Czarina urged. “She’s just another bitch in heat.”

“Fish?” Dallas choked. Her gaze bounced from Lady Czarina’s deeply lined, slightly gray face to Brendan. “You’re
the fish
?”

“It’s not a name I gladly answer to.” His chest ached from the anger he was wrapping against his heart. “I’ll thank you not to use it.”

“You!” She pointed at the old crone. “You’re the gypsy witch who took my money. What’s going on here? You told me to not fall in love with the fish. Why?”

“That’s not what I said.” Lady Czarina’s voice cracked. “Get out of here, Fish. There’s still time.”

“Time for what?” Dallas asked.

“For me to not get involved with you,” he bit off. “You’re a disaster. A fucking walking disaster.”

A thundering boom-boom, sounding like a giant’s steady footsteps shook the ground. Terror flashed in Dallas’s eyes. “It’s coming.”

“What’s coming?” He couldn’t stop himself from asking.

“I don’t know.”

The darkness
was growing by leaps and bounds. Brendan could feel it swirling all around them. Whenever her fear spiked, its strength flared.

“Fight it, Dallas. Don’t let it push through you like this,” Brendan warned. “It’s playing with your fears.”

“How do I stop it?”

“Leave her,” Lady Czarina shouted. “She’s doomed.”

No, he wouldn’t leave Dallas, not when she needed him. Not when he…

Dallas pressed her fists to her ears and screamed.
The darkness
leapt with joy. It was winning and taking Dallas into its own personal hell.

“Stop it,” Brendan said, putting the full force of his power in his words. He hoped he could use his force of will to chase
the darkness
away. Nothing happened. His power wasn’t nearly strong enough to battle the all-consuming invisible monster.

It licked at Brendan, teasing him and whispering promises in his ear, vowing to take him next.

“No!” he shouted as Dallas crumpled to the ground. Her chest was pressing in on itself. Her breaths turned short and erratic.
The darkness
was taking her apart from the inside out.

Brendan rushed forward to help her. Lady Czarina’s nails dug into his hands. “Save yourself. She’s not worth your life.”

Maybe not, but dammit, he couldn’t let Dallas die like this. He wouldn’t.

He loved her
.

He pushed the old crone away and went down on one knee. Opening his arms, his heart overflowed with the emotions he’d fought so hard to keep at bay. Dallas deserved to live. Even if it meant sacrificing himself, at least he would die knowing that she’d finally be safe from the suffering she live with nearly all her life.

Drawing in a deep breath, he lowered all his mental and physic shields, opening himself wide open.
The darkness
whooshed into him, slamming through his chest with the force of a leaden fist.

What he had done was going to kill him, but it wasn’t enough to stop
the darkness
from devouring the woman he loved. He reached out with his mind and pulled the full power of it
into his soul, sacrificing himself for Dallas’s benefit.

His past roared to life. He toppled over and huddled in on himself. All the ugly games and pain he had endured rushed back to him. The past tortured him with fresh anguish until he couldn’t make out the difference between the present and memories.

“Do something,” he heard Dallas cry.

“There’s nothing to be done,” Stone said.

Brendan shook his head with fury. Stone wasn’t supposed to find Dallas. He’d take her back to the council and she would be destroyed.

“Get her away from here,” Brendan managed to grind out before the pain and rage consumed him. He swelled with hatred. Murderous impulses screamed through his thoughts.

It was done.

Destroy
.

The lonely thought pushed to the forefront. Destruction was a task
the darkness
relished. And if Brendan wanted to destroy himself, he felt confident
the darkness
would help him do the deed. Soon, the all-consuming rage and loathing was chewing at his soul. Devouring him.

With his last ounce of strength, he raised all his mental and physic shields that he’d once used to keep
the darkness
at bay.
The darkness
immediately sensed the trap. It bucked against the barriers that were now holding it inside a doomed body.

Brendan knew at that moment he’d won. Though his soul was going to be obliterated into nothingness, that mysterious dark force
was good and trapped and would be snuffed out along with him.

* * * * *

Blood trickled from the corner of Brendan’s mouth. Dallas stuffed her fist in her mouth to hold back a scream. She had to get to him. She had to do whatever she could to help him, but Frank Stone had wrapped his arms around her waist and was pulling her away.