Sacrifice Me: The Darkness (Episode 3) (3 page)

“He said things,” I repeated. I hadn’t
wanted to mention my mother, but it was becoming impossible to hide
from him. “He told me my mother was dead.”

Rend’s eyes snapped to my face, questioning.
“What?” He shook his head. “Your mother? How would
a guy like that know your mom?”

“I have no idea,” I said. “I
haven’t seen her in three years. She took off on my eighteenth
birthday without so much as a note to say goodbye. Now this creepy
guy tells me I look like her and that she’s dead. He threatened
me, Rend. He told me his associate had his eye on me and that they
were going to play games with me. He told me I’d make a good
sacrifice. I couldn’t just let him walk away after that. I
wanted answers.”

Rend grabbed his hair into his fist and paced the
floor in front of me. “This doesn’t make any sense,”
he said. “What kind of sacrifice?”

“I don’t know. He said I would have to
die.” My voice came out like a scared third grader’s,
high-pitched and terrified. “I couldn’t just let him
threaten me and then walk away. I had to follow him.”

“Dammit, Franki, he wanted you to follow
him. He was playing with you,” he said. “And you just
walked right into it. He could have killed you. What if he had taken
you out of here? I might not have been able to find you.”

“I didn’t say it was the smartest
thing I ever did, but he really got to me.”

“You should have come to find me before you
went after him,” he said.

“Look, I know you said you want to protect
me, but you can’t possibly keep an eye on me at all times,”
I said. “And just because I agreed to work here does not mean
you own me. I am still free to make my own decisions, even if they’re
stupid ones. Even if I end up dead, it’s my life to lose.”

I was yelling at him. Here he was sticking his
neck out for me and I was yelling at him. The guy got under my skin
in more ways than one.

Anger flashed in his eyes and he moved so close,
my back pushed against the wall. He placed his palm flat against the
wall beside my head, leaning in.

“Why are you so determined to drive me
insane?”

“Why do you care what happens to me?”
I asked, breathless.

“I don’t know,” he said, his
eyes locked on mine. “I haven’t been able to get you out
of my mind since the moment I first saw you standing there at the
bar.”

My heart pounded in my throat and I couldn’t
help myself. I looked down at his lips again, just inches from my
own. There was no denying how much I wanted him.

“I don’t let women get to me like
this,” he said, his voice low and rough. “You’ve
got me all mixed up.”

His hand traveled slowly down the wall, grazing
the edge of my shoulder and arm. I could feel the heat of him even
through the jacket.

I never wanted a piece of clothing gone so badly
in my life.

“I want to protect you, Franki,” he
said, softening. His hand moved to my hip. “You’re making
that incredibly difficult.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

His eyes were as black as night, the silver
running through them like stars, flashing in the near-darkness.

“I’m in a very dangerous position
here,” he said. “I run this place with a strict code.
When a woman comes to work for me, I vow to protect her from the
dangers she may encounter here. In order to do that for the entire
staff, I have to keep my head on straight. I have to watch out for
them at all times, the best I can. I can’t get involved on a
more... intimate level.”

I shivered at his words.

“Then why are you standing so close to me?”
I said.

The air in the space between us was electric. I
wanted so badly to touch him. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and
close that small space that kept us apart.

“Because I can’t seem to help myself
around you,” he said, his eyes darting across my face, studying
every inch of my expression.

My body ached for him. How could such little space
feel like a cavern between us?

My mouth went dry while other parts of me grew wet
with need.

Just touch me
, I begged with my eyes. I
thought I might die of anticipation.

“Tell me I’m wrong to feel this way,”
he said. “Tell me you’re only here because I forced you
to be here and that if you could, you would walk right out that door
and go back to your normal life before you ever found this place.”

“I can’t,” I said. Whatever I
thought I wanted before now, I knew I couldn’t walk away. Not
just because of the danger or because I wanted the truth about my
mother. I was here because of him.

“You have no idea how much I wish you
would,” he said.

His words burned me. How could someone want me to
stay and want me to go at the same time? How could he stand here
teasing me like this? Telling me he wanted me, too, but that I could
never have him?

“Then tell me to go,” I said. “Or
tell me you’ll never let anything happen between us and that
I’m stupid for wanting you. But don’t stand here like
this and tell me you won’t kiss me because of your own pride or
some arbitrary rule you set for yourself long before I walked through
your door.”

I don’t know where I’d found the
courage to tell him what I was feeling, but the words poured out of
me.

“I don’t like to play games,” I
said. “So, if you’re going to kiss me, you’d better
do it before I go insane from being this close to something I can
never have.”

He didn’t move at first. His breaths were
fast and shallow, and his eyes darkened.

Then, with a swiftness that made me gasp, he moved
the edge of the jacket aside and grabbed my hip with his hand,
pulling my body toward his.

His other hand moved up behind my neck, both
gentle and strong at the same time. A low moan rumbled in his chest
as he dipped his head toward me, his kiss finally landing on my lips
with a fire that ignited an even deeper need inside me.

My hands circled his neck and I lifted onto my
toes, wanting to be closer, always closer. My fingers slid up the
back of his neck, gripping his hair as his fingers dug into my hip.

Our lips and tongues met and parted, joining then
drawing back, opening and closing in rhythm as we explored our first
taste of each other.

His thumb moved back and forth against the bare
skin at my waist as his hips pushed against mine.

Passion erupted beneath the surface of my skin,
his every touch, every kiss, setting off a wave of fireworks deep
inside me. God, I never knew a man could make me feel this way. I
never wanted it to end.

All I wanted was more.

A deep moan escaped Rend’s lips and he
pulled himself away from my kiss, pressing his forehead against mine,
his hands still holding me with passionate force.

“I shouldn’t be doing this,” he
said between breaths. “I’m supposed to be protecting you,
not putting you in greater danger.”

“How does kissing me put me in danger?”
I asked, moving one hand slowly down his neck and around to his face.

I wanted to touch every part of him until he was
mine by memory.

“You have no idea what kind of man I really
am,” he said. “If you knew, you wouldn’t open
yourself up to me like this.”

I thought about what the other girls in the
dressing room had said. How he was known for tearing men in two with
his bare hands. Maybe I should have been afraid of him, but fear was
the last thing on my mind.

He moved his hands from my body, and I nearly
whimpered at the loss of his touch. He shook his head, then slipped
out of my grasp, turning from me.

That’s when we both noticed the orb of
light. It’s dim amber glow had been amplified to a bright
sunlight.

“How did you do that?” he asked.

I laughed. “Me? I didn’t do anything.”

“I could never create a light this bright,”
he said. He moved his hand under the orb and moved it toward us.

I giggled, watching the light. Had I made it
brighter?

But then my eyes opened to the space around us. My
heart nearly stopped as I looked down the long hallway, now lit up
from the bright glow. I fell back against the wall in shock, covering
my mouth with my hand.

“What is it?” he asked.

I shook my head in disbelief. This wasn’t
possible.

“Franki? What’s wrong?”

“I dreamed of this place,” I said. “A
hall of doorways.”

I walked forward, studying the door closest to us.
It was made of a sturdy wood, just like in my dream. On the surface
of the wood, there was a carving of a serpent, its fangs outstretched
as if it were about to strike. I ran my hand across the carving to
make sure I wasn’t imagining this place.

Rend touched my hand, but I pulled away. I needed
to see if it was here.

I started down the hallway, my eyes searching each
image for the one that had haunted me.

Rend followed as I practically tore down the
hallway.

“Franki wait, there’s a reason this
place is off-limits to staff,” he said. “Don’t open
any of these doors.”

“I just need to see,” I said, not
slowing down.

When I saw it, I nearly fell to the floor in front
of it. I stopped, unable to breathe.

A black crow, its wings stretched wide.

I reached forward and ran my hand along the
carving, feeling each groove in the wood. It was really here.

Rend grabbed my hand and cupped my chin with his
other, turning my head toward him. He looked almost pale in the
bright light. “Franki, I need to know why you were searching
for this particular door,” he said. “This is important.”

I shook my head, feeling like I was still stuck
inside that dream. “I don’t know,” I said. “In
my dream, I was running down this hallway, chasing the sound of wings
fluttering in the distance. When I reached this door, the one with
the crow on it, I tried to go inside. That’s when I woke up.”

He swallowed and gripped my hand tighter.

“What’s your name?” he asked,
for the first time a hint of fear in his voice. It scared me to hear
it there. “Your full name?”

I studied his face, not understanding his
question. Why did my name matter? Frankie was a nickname my mother
had given me when I was very young. I hated for anyone to call me by
my full name, so I never gave it out unless I had to.

I was scared to know why he suddenly felt that it
was important.

“Mary Francis,” I said, finally.

Rend paled and dropped my hand. He looked from me
to the door, then brought a fist to his mouth and closed his eyes.

“How did I not see this before?”

He seemed to be talking to himself more than he
was to me.

“See what?”

“Your power. Your blue eyes and black hair,”
he said. “No wonder Fallon said I was risking everything by
protecting you.”

The tension in his face and jaw frightened me. Was
he mad at me? “I still don’t understand,” I said.
“What does my real name have to do with this?”

He turned to look at me, anger and frustration
shining in his eyes. “Your first name is Mary, like all the
women in your family.”

I took a step back, suddenly cold with fear.

“How do you know that?”

I knew my mother’s name was Mary Beth, but
she had never told me about the other women in her family.

“Because I know your family,” he said.
“Everyone knows about your family.”

I shook my head, my breath shallow. What was he
saying?

“You’re a crow witch,” he said.
He’d been avoiding my eyes, but now he looked up and stared
right through to my very soul. “Fallon was right. I can’t
protect you.”

My knees weakened and I nearly fell.

Rend caught me, his arms encircling my waist as he
pulled me against his body. The orb of light hovering near us dimmed
to its original amber glow, and I realized he’d been right.

It was me who had been making the light brighter.
I had no idea how, but as soon as the joy of kissing him dimmed, so
did the light.

“I need to get you out of here,” he
said.

“I need to know what’s behind that
door,” I said, trying to push against him. All my strength was
gone, though, siphoned out of me with his words.

I hadn’t taken the dark man’s threats
seriously because I believed Rend would protect me. Everyone had said
so. I’d seen the fear in the eyes of those young vampires when
he’d told them I belonged to him.

But the dark man—Fallon—had not been
scared of him.

“You can’t go through there,” he
said. “It would be the worst, most dangerous thing you could do
right now. I need to get you to a place where no one can touch you or
find you for a while.”

I gathered what little strength I could find
inside and pushed against him. I leaned against the door for support.
“I’m not going anywhere with you until you tell me what
you know about my family.”

His eyes widened and he looked both ways down the
hall. “There’s way too much to try to explain it here.”

“Give me the short version,” I said,
my jaw tensed. My breath came fast. He had to know he couldn’t
just drop a bomb like that and expect me to let it go until another
time.

He let out a frustrated sigh. “Many witches
have spirit animals or spirit objects, often tied to their family
line. Some witches are so strongly tied to their spirit animals that
they can actually shape-shift into them,” he explained. “You
come from a very long line of witches who are able to shift into
crows.”

I swallowed, my throat thick with anticipation.
How long had I wanted to know about my family?

“You are the descendant of a particularly
powerful witch called the Mother Crow,” he said. “She is
well over one hundred years old and she is one of the most truly evil
creatures I have ever had the misfortune to come across, which is
really saying something after what I’ve been through.”