Immortal Fire (6 page)

Chapter Ten

She made no move to cover her
bare breasts while she leaned on her elbows waiting for Donovan to explain. His
hot gaze slid down from her face and paused at her breasts. She’d be lying and
he wouldn’t buy it if she claimed not to want him anymore. Her nipples were
still erect, still aching for his touch. With her legs crossed at the ankle in
a casual pose, she hid how moist she had become just from his earlier teasing.
And the black leather, of course, straining at his pectoral muscles was not
helping matters. He needed to speak now before she lost all control.

“I have a gift,” he began, and
then leaned down to cover her with the sheet. She bit back a grin. “I bring out
the best—or worst, depending on your perception—in a person. When my ability is
engaged, I force a person to show their true selves. If they have a power, it
comes out. If they are immortal and they’re hiding it, their secret is
uncovered.”

“Oh.” Despite herself, she was
impressed. He was without a doubt powerful. Then she grew angry. “So you did
that on purpose, to force me to be a demon.”

“I didn’t force you. You are a
demon.”

“I’m not!” He smirked, and she
relented. “Fine, half demon, but nothing more. Up until I met you, everything
was fine. I followed after my human side. I don’t want this.”

”You have no choice.” He began to
pace back and forth to the window and to the bedroom door. He seemed to search
the corners of the room with narrowed eyes, and he sniffed the air. At his
sides, he flexed his fingers. Tension appeared to tighten his jaw.

She rose, wrapping the sheet
around her and frowning at him. “You told me there’s always a choice. Is it
dependant on what you want? Exactly what is it you want from me, Donovan? I’m
tired of the avoidance.”

His smile was tight. “You are a
very powerful woman, Kai. You—” He spun away from her and faced the middle of
the room. Kai followed his line of sight. She saw the man as he approached from
the underworld, and stared when he stepped through to the room in the physical realm.
“I told you to wait!” Donovan roared.

Black eyes full of fire and
hatred turned on them. Donovan stepped in front of Kai, but she moved out from
behind him. “Who are you? Donovan’s partner in this mess? What do you want? I
assume it’s not to kill me. Surely not to gain power over my father?”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” His
voice, deep and threatening, made her mouth go dry. She took a step back, but
he followed and stretched a hand out to grab her. Fear closed her throat when
his long fingers curled around her wrist. “I do desire power over your father
and every demon lord for that matter. They rule a vast kingdom, the
underworld.”

“Let her go,
Gethin
,”
Donovan warned.

Gethin
sneered. “If you had done your job, Donovan, I wouldn’t have to interfere. One
task! Get her to trust you so we can manipulate her! You couldn’t do that
right.”

Kai gaped. “What?” She yanked on
her arm which
Gethin
still held. His black nails bit
into her skin. She shrieked, and
Gethin’s
sleeve
caught on fire. He jerked away. Kai spun on the balls on her feet and ran
toward the door. Before she could get it open, a hand came around her waist,
and she was slammed against a hard chest.

She tried to scream, but the
man’s hand covered her mouth. A deep voice muttered a spell in her ear, and the
room went black as if someone had snuffed out all light. She fought the tight
hold, but couldn’t break free. Although her skin must be boiling hot, the grip
on her didn’t lessen nor did her captor cry out in pain.

No shift in the air and no
movement indicated that they had traveled, but a familiar scent caught Kai’s
nose, and she knew where they had somehow been transported. Mrs. Dew’s shop.
The rough hands released her when the room lit. Kai stumbled to the floor and
shoved Donovan’s hand away when he would have helped her.

“Get the hell away from me,” she
snapped. A pressure at the back of her neck made her bow her head in pain.
“Ah!”

Mrs. Dew appeared from nowhere.
“What’s this? Donovan!” she scoffed. “A demon in my shop? You know what they
are, how they betray you.”

Kai glanced down at herself. Her
skin was red, her nails grown out, and running her tongue across her teeth, she
discovered they were pointed.
Damn it!
When the pain in her head stopped, she would skin Donovan alive. But it only
increased.

“Mother,” Donovan began.

Kai shrieked. “Mother? She told
me she had never heard of you.”

“Why isn’t it dead yet, forced
into the abyss?” Mrs. Dew demanded.

Terrified of the thought, Kai slunk
away. The pain was worse. She screamed and would have crawled under a table as
if that would protect her from the unseen attack, but Donovan bent down on one
knee and tugged her back. “Baby, you must calm down or her spell will kill
you.”

“You brought me here to die.”
Tears welled in her eyes. “You knew this would happen. Why are you trying to
ruin my life? And don’t call me baby!” She swiped at his face, tearing it a
little.

“Down, demon!” his mother yelled.

“Mother, please,” Donovan
grumbled. “Let me handle this. Go and mix up a potion or something.
Please
.”

If the pain weren’t so great, Kai
would have laughed. Nothing tore a cool, sexy male off his alpha train like his
mother.

Mrs. Dew shuffled out of the
room, mumbling something about disrespectful children being cast in the abyss
behind evil demons and slammed the door she’d passed through. Donovan turned
back to Kai.

“Listen to me. It’s very
important. Calm yourself. Know that you are safe, and no one here will hurt
you. Unless you do that, you will suffer. The pain will get worse until you are
consumed.”

“Not helping!”

“Kai, you’ve got to do it. Now
concentrate.”

She closed her eyes. Her head
felt like it had caught fire, the blue fire of some heavy duty magic. She could
almost see it in her mind with Mrs. Dew shouting, “Be gone, demon.” How could
she possibly calm down when such a threat was all around her? Know that she was
safe? He had to be kidding.

Kai slumped over onto the floor.
“There’s got to be somewhere else, Donovan. Please. I’m dying. Help me!”

He let loose a string of curses.

“Do something!” She thought she
commanded her mouth to yell, but her voice was a whisper. “Take me past the
front door. Please, just until I pull myself together. It hurts. I believe you
don’t want to hurt me.”

Coming to a decision, he whipped
her up into his arms and marched her out through a curtain. Through half closed
eyes, Kai saw that they were inside the front of Mrs. Dew’s shop. The lights
were turned off, and the open sign faced them. She recalled that the place only
opened at night.

The bell above the door jingled.
A fresh breeze blew in, clearing her head of both the odd smells and the
pressure. Kai elbowed Donovan so that he dropped her. She landed on her hands
and knees. “Bevin!”

Her bodyguard appeared in a flash
and sent Donovan flying backward to land on the ground. Kai leaped onto his thin
shoulders and muttered, “Home.” The next time she opened her eyes, she was
lying on her bed. She breathed a sigh of relief, before dropping into a deep asleep.

* * * *

Kai opened her eyes several hours
later. Every joint and muscle in her body ached. She forced her limbs to
stretch as she sat up. The events of earlier in the day washed over her, and
despair hit. She’d manifested the demon. Her skin, her teeth, even fire had
come from her. How she could have willed
Gethin
to
catch fire, she didn’t know. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that he
wished her harm.

What depressed her more was that
Donovan had been in league with that evil
person, that
he had intended to win her trust. To do what?

A soft knock sounded at her door.
She was in no mood to deal with her mother’s ever sunny disposition. “I’m
sorry, Mom, I’m not feeling well. Can we talk later?”

The door opened a crack, and
Mitzi peered in. Kai frowned. Tears glistened in her ex-best friend’s eyes.
“Kai, I know you don’t want to see or talk to me, but I had to take a chance. I
want to explain.”

“Do you know what happened to me
today, Mitzi?” Kai demanded. She stood and stomped over to yank the door wide.
“Donovan and his partner tried to kill me.”

“No!” Mitzi’s eyes grew wide, and
she shook her head in disbelief. “He couldn’t have. He wouldn’t. I-I . . .” She
covered her face. “I made a big mistake. I only wanted what’s best for you, Kai.”

“You don’t know what’s best for
me, Mitzi.”

“I’m a poor judge of character.”

“You said it.”

Kai relented and turned to stroll
back to her bed. She dropped down, running fingers through her hair. What was
she going to do now? She could visit
Ove
and ask him
for help, maybe get a group of demons to hunt Donovan and
Gethin
.
Her stomach knotted at that thought. Despite all he had done, she didn’t want
Donovan dead. And the demons would most certainly slaughter him, leaving no
remains. She’d witnessed their handiwork years ago when
Ove
learned of another coop against her. That had been when he insisted she have a
permanent bodyguard. She sighed.

Mitzi sank down beside her. “What
happened?”

“Oh nothing.” Kai sighed. “Just
that Donovan’s partner, some freak named
Gethin
tried
to attack me. I sensed he had serious dark powers, and even Donovan seemed
nervous about him. I don’t know what
Gethin
was going
to do to me, but Donovan got me out of there, only to land me at Mrs. Dew’s
shop where I was attacked all over again.”

“What!” Mitzi changed in a flash
to her cat form and leaped onto Kai’s lap. She knew that was her friend’s way
of comforting Kai. Nothing calmed a person like soft fur to stroke. And
tickling behind Mitzi’s ears didn’t hurt anything either.

She went on. “Yes, remember how
she had a spell to keep Bevin out? Well, it was kicking my ass too, because I
was manifesting the demon side to me. And get this, she’s his mother!”

Before Kai could continue, her
cell phone buzzed on her nightstand. She glanced at the display to see that it
was Donovan. Remembering his plot, she ignored it. After five rings, she tossed
Mitzi aside and picked it up to answer. “What!”

“Wait, Kai. Don’t hang up,” he
pleaded.

His voice did things to her
insides. A flash of him stroking her with his tongue slid into her mind. She
caught her breath, trying to fight her desire.
Damn it!
“You have nothing to say that I want to here, Donovan. You
have no excuse or explanation.”

“True.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I want to help you.”

She frowned into the phone. “Oh
so now you want to protect me? Bull! I know I’m safe as long as I stay here at
my house. I know no matter what magic
Gethin
has, he
can’t penetrate the spell protecting me.”

“So you’ll live as a prisoner in
your home forever?”

Her bravado faltered, but she
said nothing.

“I can train you to use your
power. Kai, you’re stronger than you think. Maybe you could even be more
powerful than
Ove
.”

“Leave my father out of this,”
she demanded.

“Why? He’s the one that hired me
and
Gethin
.”

She surged to her feet. “That’s a
damn lie!
Ove
would never—” She stopped.
Ove
had admitted on several occasions that it was in his
nature to betray, to do whatever was in his evil plans. He’d cheated on her
mother, turned his back on Kai long ago. But if he were out to get her, why get
a demon to protect her? “I don’t believe you,” she muttered with no fire behind
the words.

“Then give me the chance to prove
it. You can stay in that house where it’s safe and have no life, or you can
come out and be a target and a victim the rest of your life. Or, you can fight
back. If you fight, I will stand beside you. It’s your choice.”

Chapter Eleven

Donovan glanced over at Kai again
as he drove, his attention drawn by her powerful presence, not to mention, her
sumptuous figure. What was he doing? He had his own agenda when
Ove
approached him. Now, within the space of a few hours,
he’d done an about face just because he’d made the poor decision to sleep with
Kai. Sure, it had been unbelievable, like no other sexual experience he’d ever
had in his life. But that didn’t excuse him from forgetting why he pursued her
in the first place.

“So, what’s this about?” She
turned to him, her beautiful eyes questioning. “You don’t strike me as a demon.
They’re all bad. I’ve never seen one of them do something that didn’t benefit
him, or that wasn’t a command from someone of higher rank. Unless I’m missing
where training me can be good for you?”

He gripped the steering wheel
tighter to keep from stroking her midnight hair. “In some ways it benefits me,”
he admitted. “And no, I’m not a demon.”

“A shape-shifter?” Her brow
wrinkled. “But your mother is a witch. She has magic and does spells. You
admitted that.”

“On my mother’s side of the
family, they are descendants of a powerful race of witches called the
Mendolray
. However, her father was of the Wren
Bai
, shape-shifting fire birds. I am a mixture to a certain
extent. That means, as you saw, I am impervious to fire, and I can shape-shift with
a limited range. For short periods of time, I can change my appearance, but I
do not have the ability that your friend Mitzi has. My magic is also limited. I
do a few simple spells my mother taught me.” He chuckled. “My only claim to
fame is that I bring out other people’s abilities. I have perfected my ‘gift’
over the years to be able to turn it off and on at will.”

She crossed her hands over her
chest, glaring at him. “And you turned it on for me.”

He nodded. “Yes. It was the only
way to force you to face who you are. You’re unique, Kai.”

“Funny, I think you’re unique.
You’re the only one of your kind?”

“No.” He hesitated to say more. He
had told her so many half truths, even lies about his family. He had no father
that he remembered, and most of his brothers had left home long ago. Sometimes
he thought that was what made his mother a little ‘off’.

If he explained everything, she’d
only think he was like all other immortals she’d met in her life. Not many in
their world, the magical creature world, didn’t know how Kai felt about all the
rest, how she’d suppressed her father’s side of her heritage all her life. Most
didn’t know why, but he did. The
Mendolray
could dig
up the dirt on anyone, and his Aunt Gloria used it as a gossiping tool.

Kai looked over at him, waiting
for him to explain.

He sighed. “The
Mendolray
and the Wren
Bai
live
in the underworld for the most part. Few live in the physical world. After
hundreds of years”—he swallowed and rubbed the back of his neck—“with the death
of my older cousin, I am now the head of both branches.”

She gasped. “So you’ve come into
power.”

He spotted a sign for a motel and
put on his turn signal to exit from the highway. They had been driving for
hours, and it was getting late. While he and the demon side of Kai did not need
to rest, her human side did. Her eyes had already developed dark circles around
them. After pulling into the hotel parking lot, he threw the car in gear and
opened his door. He glanced back at Kai. “Yes, I’ve come into power. And the
first mode of business my family lays on me is to bring them all into the human
world.”

Donovan let that admission sink
in while they stepped into the office and paid for a room for the night. He
hoped Kai wouldn’t protest the fact that he had arranged for only one. He still
wanted her, and the way she eyed his body, he knew she wanted him too. If for
just tonight they could forget about the dangers surrounding them, then maybe
they could both blow off some steam beneath the sheets.

While she strolled ahead of him,
he watched her curved ass. Good enough to lick, he thought, running his tongue
over his lips. Every inch of her body called to him, made him hard almost every
second he was in her presence.

He let her unlock the room door,
and she glanced back accusingly at him as she opened it. “Don’t think I don’t
know what you have in mind, lover.”

How he loved it when she teased him
in that way, calling him lover. Her confidence in the fact that she was
irresistible turned him on big time. He kicked the door closed behind him and
pulled her back against his erection. She wriggled her ass, making his cock
grow all the more, but then she pulled away.

“Hey, where are you going?” he
grumbled.

She rolled her eyes. “You’re not
getting off so easily, Donovan. I’m beginning to understand. I don’t sense evil
from you. It explains how you were able to call into my house. Even Bevin has
to utter a certain word to get in. And your mother hates evil. But it doesn’t
change the fact that you did form an alliance with a true evil being,
Gethin
. That terrifies me. I want to know more.”

Donovan strolled over to her,
determined to charm her into bed with him. He didn’t want to focus on the
pressures his people placed on him, the resentment he felt for
Gethin
killing his cousin. Sharing with her his ultimate
plan for getting revenge on that piece of shit warlock was his ultimate goal.
It was the only reason he had joined with
Gethin
in
the first place.

Worst of all was that her father
truly did back them for this mission to gain control of her. And while Kai
would like to pretend she didn’t give a damn about
Ove
,
Donovan saw beneath the surface to the hurt little girl who had been abandoned
by a creature who didn’t know how to love. In his own way, he had dealt with
the same thing. Non-acceptance where it mattered most.

“We’ll talk more,” he told her.
“Tomorrow. It’s late.” He slipped outside to the car and got his bag. After he
shut and locked the door, he tossed the bag on the queen sized bed and unzipped
it. When he lifted a massive book from the depths, she moved closer. He got a
waft of the sweet perfume she wore, and it reminded him of the softness of her
skin. His shaft jumped.
Down boy. Not
yet.

She kicked her shoes off and
climbed on the bed. “What’s that book about?”

He laughed and winked. “Not
reading material. Trust me.” He sat down on the side of the bed and began flipping
through the yellowed pages. The spell he needed was on page three hundred
forty-nine. One of three he knew that would work for him. He had brought the
book along as a precaution. He’d learned it by heart long ago. “This is a
protection and covering spell. Casting it won’t hide us for long from someone
like
Gethin
, but it should shield us for at least a
few hours.”

“Interesting.” She scooted
closer, distracting him.

He frowned. “Baby, go over there
to that chair.” He pointed. “Or go and take your shower. I’ll be shit at casting
this spell with your soft breasts pressed against my arm. I’m liable to screw
this up.”

She smirked but stood up with her
hands on her hips. “You realize I am not your baby.”

Studying the spell, he waved his
hand. “I’ve already claimed you. I have only to charm you, and you’ll fall into
my arms.”

That riled her. She swung away,
stomped to the bathroom and slammed the door behind her. He chuckled. What he
said was true, but the mighty Kai would not like to admit it. And he knew he
was in for it when she returned and he was ready for sex. She’d give him a hard
time, but ultimately he would win. That made it all the more fun. The
challenge.

* * * *

Kai glared into the mirror in the
bathroom while she removed her clothes. Damn it,
she
ran the show. She told her men what she wanted and when she
wanted it. She chose them, not the other way around. And she set the schedule.
For Donovan to tell her that he had claimed her, as if she was nothing more
than property lying about for a man to decide to take her, just pissed her off.

For a moment, she’d felt sorry
for him. When he mentioned recently becoming head of his family, she’d heard
the uncertainty in his voice, saw the slight fear in his eyes. She’d thought of
him as a vulnerable human.

“But don’t forget,” she griped at
her reflection. “He’s a damn immortal. From the underworld no less.”

She twisted on the shower and
soon steam filled the air. She had always loved her water nice and hot. Only
now with all that had happened did she wonder if it was hotter than a human
could stand.

A fire bird. That was weird.
Donovan could withstand her fire because of his heritage, and he was a type of
hybrid of his people—one of the few who could draw out other people’s powers.

A flash of blue lit the space
beneath the door. Kai wrapped a towel around
herself
and opened the bathroom door. “What was that?”

Donovan glanced up from the book
and grinned at the sight of her bare legs. He licked his lips. “
Mmm
, nice.”

“Get your mind off my body,
Donovan. We are not having sex.”

“You’re telling me your sex drive
has suddenly lessened?”

She bit down on her own lips. He
had removed his clothes as well and sat there in only his boxers. The bulge
between his legs was obvious. At the moment, she wished her gift included
parting material with her mind. She would have given herself something
interesting to look at. Donovan’s smirk told her he knew the direction her
thoughts had taken. She grumbled and slammed the door closed again. Spare her
from men who were too damn confident for anybody’s good!

Tossing the towel on the side of
the sink, she stepped into the shower and closed her eyes as the water cascaded
over her bare skin. Stress and worry rolled away. She felt around for the
strawberry body wash she’d brought with her and squirted some into her hands.
Before she could soap her body, hands gripped her wrists. She gasped.

“Relax,” Donovan muttered behind
her. “Let me wash you.”

She wanted to resist him, but
just his touch on her wrists sent shivers along her body. She was powerless to
stop what was between them. At least during this unsettling time, she didn’t
have to be frustrated because her physical desires went unfulfilled.

Donovan waited for her consent,
and she nodded. He ran his hands over hers, taking most of the suds, and then he
caressed her breasts. A moan burst from her. The last shred of resistance
evaporated with his pinching her nipples between slippery fingers.

“Just once,” she mumbled. “One
orgasm.”

He laughed, his hands roaming
lower. “One for every wash.”

“Donovan,” she protested. The
words died on her lips to be replaced with moans and pants when his hand glided
between her thighs. Kai was all his for the time being.