The Phantom King (The Kings) (33 page)

Like a fire.

“You first,” he taunted, revving his bike’s engine in a direct challenge.

Siobhan gazed at him for another two seconds – and then she whirled around, kicked the stand out from under her, and shot the bike forward into the waiting desert.

Chapter Twenty
-
Two

Thane’s look darkened as he watched Siobhan tear out of the garage ahead of him, dust flying behind her back wheel.
His hands made tight fists around his handlebars as he twisted his throttle.
You’re not fooling anyone
little warlock
.
He
knew damn well she was going to use her magic to try to outrun him.
He was counting on it, in fact. And h
e
could tell s
he was using it already
.

That extra bit of defiance, her wicked sense of will, were like gasoline on the fire that was already raging inside of him.

She was his queen. He’d known it already, but Lalura’s little “gift” had thrust the truth home and slotted it into place. Thane’s realm wa
s vast and endless, but Thane
no longer had to bear its harsh expanse alone. Siobhan was capable of changing his entire world. He’d already seen evidence of it. She’d been in Purgatory all of a few minutes and her inherent leadership had begun seeping out. She’d completely taken over – helping Anime to overcome their grief and move on.

The little warlock
was
practically
made
of magic.
The ability to withstand Purgatory’s desolate influence was running through her precious veins
.
It was
in
her. She co
uld not only survive here,
she could
thrive
.
It was why he trusted her to be able to avoid every dark blotch that littered his lands
while on his motorcycle
. Skill and magic were on her side in that.
The show she’d given him on Highway 107 had been
a small taste of her capabilities. She was a natural.

He
had
known she was something sacred
the moment he’d laid eyes on her, he
just hadn’t recognized
what that sacred thing w
as.

But he did now
. And t
he knowledge that he’d found a
beautiful
being capable of spending the rest of his long existence with him
was having
a profound effect upon Thane
.

T
he fact that another man wanted to take her away from him was
having just as profound an effect.

When Marius had traversed the borders of the portal in order to reach Siobhan, something inside of Thane had reached a boiling point. And then the Akyri King had addressed her personally, threatening her with death unless she gave in to him willingly, and Thane had seen red. He
’d never lost control
before.

But in that moment, it was like
he’d literally been able to hear
a cord
inside go
snap
. It made
a stretched-taut sound
and then
a threatening silence – and then it ripped wide open and
he’d been shooting everything he had at the image of the man he suddenly hated more than he had ever hated
anyone
in his very long life.

In the wake of the barrage of let-loose magic, he and Siobhan had been thrown. At the last second, she’d been ripped from his grip and he felt everything he had ever wanted slip away. When he hit the ground and rolled, he instantly shoved himself back up, got to his booted feet, and could not even breathe
until he saw
that she had fallen only a few short yards from where he’d landed.

He was down on one knee at her side before he realized he’d moved, and the world made sense to him again when he saw the rise and fall of her chest.

Until that moment, he hadn’t realized – not
fully
– how
truly
important she was. How
essential
, and n
ot just for the world and his kingdom, but for his own beating heart.

For
him
.

Now a
conflagration
of emotions whirled and twisted and built up within him. He needed to figure out what the hell had happened to his realm when his magic had collided with Marius’ w
ithin that portal. He also wondered whether it had affected any other realm
. But he couldn’t transport any longer, not now. The gods only knew what would happen if he tried to open up another rip in time and space with all of this unstable magic riddling his landscape.

For now
,
he was trapped her
e
and
the protective beast within him
had been unleashed. And
his
red-headed, fire-blooded, wild-hearted
queen
inflamed that beast with unbridled lust
.

An evil smile curled Thane’s
lips. H
e felt his fangs prick just behind them.
She was running from him now. It was really too perfect.
His girl
gone rabb
it
in a plane he controlled like a slave. She could cast any spell she wanted, and he would only absorb it, ignore it, or turn it around to use it against her. Let her drain herself.

He kicked up his stand and tore out of the garage on a fury fit for a king. Unnatural smoke and ash billowed out behind him as his bike began to change beneath him.

When she was weak and exhausted, he would be right behind her. There would be no place left for her to turn, nowhere to run.

The engine expand
ed, the pipes elongated, and the bike’s
exhaust took on a reddish tint as if breathed by the beasts of Hell.

In the distance
, a faint dust cloud gave Siobhan’s location away. The Phantom King honed in like a dragon on dinner
, his vision sliding into stark contrasts. Overhead, the sun began to sink in the sky, painting the horizon a gradual pink and orange.
He
magically
shov
ed the sun
into fast forward, knowing that Siobhan would all too soon be forced to use her headlights in the dark. It would be that much more of an advantage for him.

He chuckled and the sound was echoed in the evil rumble of his demonesque motorcycle.

He was done playing fair.

*****

This is insane
, she thought as
she leaned and the Vincent Lightning beneath her leaned with her, carving beautifully around yet another odd and dark rip in space. They were becoming fewer and farther between and she had the sense that she would soon be seeing the last of them.

But they were the least of her worries.

T
hat was how it felt in that moment, as the sun began to set and she could feel the land’s king bearing down on her. She was certain he’d given her a massive head start, and when she looked over her shoulder, she couldn’t see anyone following.

And yet…. It was almost as if she cou
ld feel his breath on her neck, h
is hand sliding over her torso… his knee between her legs, nudging them apart.

Siobhan shook her head, trying desperately to clear it. If she didn’t escape the Phantom King, he was taking her to his bed.

Oh fuck
, she thought now, her eyes wide, her hair whipping about her like the loosed sails of a ship in a gale.
What the hell was I thinking?
What had she done? What kind of person just up and made a deal like that out of nowhere? Not her!

She felt like a teenager, and not just any teenager, but a really stu
pid teenager who had ignorantly
eaten all of th
e fruit at the bottom of the bowl
of Jungle Juice.

Siobhan
chanc
ed another glance over her shoulder,
and this time, she saw something that momentarily took her breath away and sent her heart racing.

A second cloud of dust arose on the horizon, but this one was dark, like smoke.

She knew it was him. She knew that
he
knew she was planning to use her magic to escape him and that he planned to counteract it with magic of his own – which he was clearly demonstrating now. Whatever was coming her way, it was no Vincent Shadow. It was bigger. Fast
er. And there was no way in any realm
she could outrun it.

I’m screwed
, she thought
as she turned back around and frantically tried to think of the best use for her magic at that point in time.
It was an odd desperation to be experiencing.
She felt as if she were being run down by a monster – a living nightmare. This realm, its dead, and the fact that the king bore the name “Phantom” were not helping to quell the rising sense of turmoil in her gut.

At the same time
however, a
small
part of her couldn’t help
but wonder
what the Phantom King would look like without any clothes on… rising above her, his strong arms braced on the bed on either side of her, his light
ning
eyes flashing in the devastatingly handsome frame of his face.

That was the small but
brave
part of her, the hopelessly
horny
part of her, and the part that at the moment seemed to be in the saddle of her motorcycle.

Siobhan
made a loud sound of frustration and squeezed the handlebars, gritting her teeth a
s if she could force that part of her to shut up and behave
. It
didn’t work. And both her anticipation and her fear were mounting.

Time for a spell
.

Her warlock awoke, pushed the mortal woman in her aside, and Siobhan felt her eyes heat up in her face. She glanced down and saw that her fingers were beginning to glow, heating up where they gripped the bars of her bike.
And she let it happen.