Blood Torn (Blackthorn Book 3) Read online

  ‘With everyone knowing where to point the finger? No one wants an inter-locale outbreak. That’s what will happen if they come after us.’

  ‘Maybe they’re just biding their time.’

  ‘Maybe.’ He paused for only a second. ‘What were you talking to Rone about earlier?’

  Her heart skipped a beat. ‘Just getting acquainted with the pack. Being friendly. Is that not allowed either?’

  ‘It didn’t look friendly to me.’

  ‘It’s very early days to be jealous, Jask.’

  ‘Considering you talk in your sleep, not at all.’ He glanced at her again, a glimmer of playfulness leaking through the only thing to ease her tension just slightly. ‘So let’s try again,’ he said, turning his attention back on the ball. ‘What were you talking about?’

  ‘I told him what I thought of him for not letting me go when I asked him to.’

  ‘So you won’t need to talk to him again, then?’

  ‘Is that a direct order?’ she asked, finding it hard to curb her indignation that he still thought he could control her. ‘Worried I’ll start corrupting your pack? Oh no, hold on – they’d have to be desperate, right?’

  She surprised herself at how heavily his comment from earlier still weighed on her mind when it had no place holding any weight at all.

  And, from the look in his eyes, the unintentional exposure of hurt had surprised him too.

  ‘I was tired earlier,’ he said. ‘Irritable. I shouldn’t have said that.’ He caught the ball as it bounced back, only this time he discarded it back onto the mattress. ‘You’re a beautiful girl. It’s just a shame about the attitude – and the whole serryn thing.’

  As he caught her eye, her stomach flipped. Stunned by the lack of mocking in his tone, struggling to come up with a retort, she dropped her gaze.

  In the sudden silence, she realised just how accustomed she had come to the beat of the ball. Its absence now created a sense of flatlining and all the panic that came with it.

  She looked up as she sensed his approach, the shadows enveloping him. She tensed as he pressed his hand against the wall beside her shoulder.

  ‘Only you don’t act like a serryn,’ he added.

  She dared to look him in the eyes. She had to. ‘Met one to know, have you?’ she asked, a question that hadn’t occurred to her until then.

  ‘No. You’re my first. But I know enough about them to know there’s definitely something not right about you.’

  ‘And what would make me right, Jask?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe a little less sensitivity.’

  She raised her eyebrows slightly. ‘You think I’m over-sensitive?’

  ‘I think you feel far more than you should.’ He stared searchingly into her eyes. ‘I don’t think you’ve been at this very long. In fact, I’m fairly sure you haven’t.’

  He eased her hand from behind her back. But until she knew his intention, she didn’t protest.

  He held it up, palm facing him. With the same hand that held hers, he used his thumb to gently prise each of her fingers from their clenched position to expose the flesh beneath.

  ‘I hear that the more vampires you have sex with, the stronger you get,’ he said.

  She’d read of it too. But she’d read many things about serryns she’d yet to test the theory of.

  ‘So, as I’d class your attempts against me on the wasteland, in the bathroom, not least on the way to the poolroom as futile, maybe that tells me something too.’

  He eased back her ring finger, just enough to make her flinch.

  She kept her defiant glare locked on his, determined not to show her panic at what she sensed was the pending torture she had anticipated.

  She needed to get out. And not just because of that. He was getting too close. Far too close. And if that was the real reason he’d brought her down there – to interrogate her – then she was rapidly heading towards being screwed. Not least if he decided to drop the well-behaved lycan act fast before she found an exit clause.

  Because if he did decide to turn on her, if he did decide enough was enough and he wanted answers, she had no doubt he knew exactly how to get them.

  ‘There’s one way to tell, you know,’ she said.

  ‘Which is?’

  Before she had time to think it through, before she had time to regret it, she lifted herself onto tiptoes until her lips were less than an inch from his – those firm and shapely masculine lips that she had longed to taste.

  Her heart pounded, a shiver raking down her spine as her mouth finally met his.

  She wanted to run her fingers through his hair, plaster her other hand against that hard chest as she consumed him.

  But this wasn’t personal.

  She expected him to shove her away, to withdraw at the very least, but he didn’t.

  But he didn’t respond either other than to take the pressure off her finger.

  And she needed him to respond.

  In the seconds that passed, as his lips gradually became more pliable, as he allowed her tongue to meet his, she almost forgot herself. His lips were surprisingly smooth, his mouth warm but fresh, his breaths enticing against her lips. And when he did finally reciprocate, her heart leapt at the connection.

  She almost forgot everything as he eventually re-struck the balance, pressing her against the wall, both hands flat against it either side of her head. And as he kissed her back with perfect pressure, took control, his tongue overpowering hers, she did forget her intention.

  But from the way she instantly sparked, from the heat pooling between her legs, she couldn’t risk lingering any longer than she needed to.

  Mid kiss, she bit, puncturing his lower lip.

  Jask winced, his fingers instantly meeting his bloodied flesh as he recoiled, allowing her to slip past him.

  She backed up towards the open cage door as he spun to face her, his shocked gaze meeting hers.

  But regret and guilt were the last emotions she needed to feel, despite them consuming her.

  She spat his blood from her mouth. ‘I’m not that desperate either,’ she said, before turning away towards the open door.

  She needed to stop shaking. She needed out of there.

  But she’d barely pivoted 180 degrees before he caught hold of her upper arm.

  She looked back at him as he too spat the blood from his mouth. Only there was something deeply feral about the way he did it – almost as feral as the look in his eyes.

  Her stomach flipped.

  He didn’t need to say anything. The grip he had on her arm told her all she needed to know. There was making a mistake and then there were almighty Phia-style fuck-ups. And this was most definitely the latter.

  Yet as he glared at her, all she could ask herself over and over again was why she didn’t feel the slightest bit afraid.

  Damn it if he didn’t press every single one of her lethal little buttons.

  Her arousal surged as he licked the inside of his wounded bottom lip, his gaze unflinching. But no more so than when he tutted in a way that was entrancingly sexy, not helped by his eyes betraying something behind the anger.

  ‘Apologise,’ he said softly.

  ‘I’m sorry I didn’t bite harder.’

  He exhaled off the back of a fleeting smile that should have chilled her to her core. But as Jask backed her up against the bars, all she could feel was the heat accumulating at the pit of her abdomen again, let alone between her legs.

  As her back met metal, he clutched the bars either side of her shoulders, trapping her. ‘Apologise,’ he said again, his tone lower.

  Her pulse throbbed in her ears, but she didn’t dare take her eyes off him. She lifted her lips to his. ‘I’m not going to apologise and I’m sure as hell not going to beg for mercy. So do something about it or walk away.’

  ‘You’ve flipped the lid on that self-destruct button so many times that you can’t even close it anymore, can you?’

  ‘You think you’ve got me w
orked out? Well, ditto. Twice you’ve walked away from me, Jask. You’re all talk, all threats, but when it comes down to it, you can’t come up with the goods.’

  He leaned an inch closer. ‘And what goods would they be?’

  ‘We both know what I’m talking about. What is it, Jask? Can you only do it with lycans? Are they easier to please? Are you scared of me? Or is it being unleashed that scares you? Only I know the responsibility of this pack weighs heavy on you. I know it controls you. I know you’re itching to break free.’

  ‘Because you’d know all about responsibility, wouldn’t you, serryn?’

  ‘That’s just it, isn’t it, Jask? The real reason I get to you so much is because you envy me. I remind you of what you could be. What you used to be. A time before the regulations when you used to be able to run wild – have what you wanted, when you wanted. Only now you make everyone toe the line because it makes it easier for you to do the same, doesn’t it? Because your rules aren’t just about keeping your pack safe; they’re as much about keeping yourself contained. You despise me because there’s a need in you and I remind you of it. I irritate you because I take you places you don’t want to go. I make you feel things you don’t want to feel. It’s not me who has self-hatred issues – it’s you. So tell me, what are you hiding from, Jask?’

  The flare in his eyes before they narrowed again, the fierce dilation of his pupils, told her she wasn’t wrong.

  He grabbed her wrists, pushed her hands above her head, forcing her to arch her back, and drew her closer to him, his sweatpants soft against her thighs. ‘Maybe you read situations better than I give you credit for after all.’

  She tried to curb her shallow breaths, arousal making her stomach hurt as he held her there, staring deep into her eyes in the silence.

  ‘But don’t try and compare us, serryn,’ he warned. ‘Serryns don’t feel. You switch your emotions off like a light. It’s what helps you do the things you do. Perform the acts you do. The dirty, nasty, sordid little acts that define just how toxic you are.’

  She couldn’t deny that he was right – switching off was exactly what serryns were renowned for. And maybe that was what was happening now – maybe that was why she dared to goad him. But he was wrong that her kind couldn’t feel, because she was most definitely feeling something. Something every bit as dark, dangerous and unpleasant to acknowledge as the room they were in. Something that was real. Just as Jask was real. Just as the situation was real. A situation that she knew was spiralling out of control.

  But she didn’t care.

  Only she did care that the connection she felt in that moment was one that she should never have been feeling with a third species. She couldn’t allow herself to feel it. But she couldn’t stop it any more than she could stand on the track and stop a speeding train.

  Something about him was too right. In that dark, dank cell, nothing else mattered. She refused to think about what she was doing. She refused to look beyond the haze that encompassed her.

  She’d fallen from that branch again, only now the dark depths were captivating.

  ‘So what are you going to do about it, Jask?’ she asked softly, caressing his lips with her uncontrollably terse breaths. ‘Are you having dirty, nasty, sordid little thoughts of your own? Only I’ve seen you with Tuly and Solstice. You’re not the type to act on them.’

  ‘Not with my pack, no. But as you keep reminding me, you’re not one of my pack, are you, Phia?’

  She broke from his gaze only to linger on the brown leather straps that held the pendant to his neck. A pendant that had glinted in the white light and captured her attention.

  She looked back into his eyes. But to her shock, to her disappointment, he pulled away again.

  Didn’t just pull away, but exited the cell.

  She felt a whole new panic. A panic evoked by a sense of loss, an excruciating sense of frustration that knotted her stomach.

  She pulled herself away from the bars and turned to face the cell door, trying to work out how the hell she could summon him back without laying herself on a platter.

  Because she couldn’t let him walk away. Not this time.

  But Jask didn’t leave the room. Instead he stood there, his back to her.

  Her heart pounded as she waited for him to turn around again. As she waited for him to say something – something that would give her a clue as to what to do next as they both remained shrouded in silence.

  Chapter Eleven

  Jask stared out of the open door – the door that led to the corridor and beyond. The door that he needed to walk through. The door that would lead him away from her.

  More significantly, the door that would lead him away from himself – from what was resurfacing.

  She’d been lucky he’d caught her looking at his pendant. The pendant that was an intentional stark reminder of what happened when he cut himself loose and thought only of the desire inside.

  Because in those moments he’d wanted Phia. As she’d stared him in the eyes and fearlessly challenged him for one final time too many that night, he’d wanted to finally confront her as himself – not the sensible pack leader.

  Corbin had been right. This wasn’t to get personal. But damn it that it already felt that way. And licking the already healing wound on his lip only reminded him of the last time someone had left him with the metallic taste of his own blood.

  He hadn’t even hesitated in what he’d done to them – their broken, torn body almost unrecognisable as human by the time he’d finished, by the time Corbin had found him, inebriated, angry and unfocused, as he had so many times over those months.

  That same heat now flowed through his veins again. A heat that reminded him just how liberating doing the wrong thing could be.

  And there in that cocoon, for just a little while, he could unleash himself again. He could remind himself how it felt – like filling his lungs with fresh air, or a primitive yell in an empty valley.

  But Phia was the last one he should have been considering it with – not just for the sake of his pack, but for the sake of himself. The way she made him spark, something he had felt too infrequently not to recognise, only increased the risk of him taking it one step too far – and he knew what that could mean for them all if it went wrong.

  And that’s what made crossing the threshold the right thing to do.

  But for too long he’d taken the option of the right thing to do.

  And the fact it was such a risk only incited him more. Her ragged breaths and fast-beating heart echoing in his attuned ears were already too much temptation.

  He didn’t have to walk away as long as he could remember who he was now. He could prove to them both that he didn’t have to walk away to control himself. It was a gamble, but he’d just have to make sure that she backed down, not him.

  It was why he’d taken her down there after all – to test her metal under pressure. To see if she really was as inexperienced at handling herself as he thought. Time was rapidly slipping away and Phia needed to accept that she was vulnerable before he could even begin to tame her. And this was the perfect place and opportunity for both.

  He closed and bolted the door, slid the viewing window shut, creating a private, dark little space that would echo the one now throbbing back to life inside of him.

  He walked back towards her, closed the cage door behind him and looked his prey square in the eyes.

  For the first time, she took a step back.

  It should have been enough. He should have walked away, having gained the upper hand that easily.

  But as his tingling lip reminded him, she hadn’t let him off that kindly.

  ‘Backing off already?’ he asked, his tone laced with taunting as he continued to close in on her.

  ‘You’ll back down before I do.’

  Despite her wariness, she still had the gall to fight.

  He smiled fleetingly. ‘Okay, so I was wrong – you don’t read situations as well as I’ve given you credit for.
’

  ‘So what’s this? Your idea of foreplay?’

  ‘Nowhere near.’ He closed the gap between them, heard her pulse pick up a notch despite her efforts to the contrary. He strolled around the back of her, wondering how long she’d be able to handle it before turning to face him. ‘Question is, are you going to beg me to leave?’ He raked her hair back from her neck to purposefully caress her ear with his breath. ‘Or invite me to stay?’

  Her breaths were more ragged, his proximity behind her clearly having had the effect he had hoped for.

  But she didn’t turn around. She didn’t even step away. ‘Are you looking for a get-out clause, Jask?’

  He lowered himself a little to place his palms flat against her cool, firm thighs just below the hem of her tunic. A sensual and intimate move he had not yet allowed himself.

  And it felt dangerously good.

  As he slid the fabric upwards, he could feel her subtle tremor, the goosebumps now swamping her skin nothing to do with the chill of the room. Stood fully again, he lifted the tunic up over her behind so her exposed flesh met the brushed cotton of his sweatpants. Wrapping an arm around her waist, he gripped one wrist to trap her against him, against his arousal, while he slid the back of his free hand down her cleavage.

  ‘No,’ he said against her ear again. ‘I’m offering you a final opportunity at yours.’

  Instead of laughing, retorting with abuse or finding an excuse to break away, she slid her free hand into the limited space between him and the small of her back. Easing her hips forward just the fraction that his restraint would allow, she weaved that same hand into his sweatpants and into his shorts.

  His erection jerked as soon as she made contact, as soon as she dared to coil her chilled fingers around his heat.

  He involuntarily caught his breath, but so did she.

  ‘Call my bluff, Jask,’ she said as she dared to squeeze, ‘and I’ll call yours right back.’

  He loosened his hold just enough to allow her to turn around to face him, but she didn’t withdraw her hand. As he kept her hand at the small of her back, she smoothed the palm of the one that still held him lightly over the tip of his erection. Spreading his wetness with an easy glide down his full length, she stopped only to grip him at the base. She even dared to press closer, her lips almost touching his.