Scorched by Darkness: Eternal Mates Series Book 18 Page 15

  “Mad bastard,” the vampire muttered, earning a glare from Hartt.

  “Takes one to know one,” he bit out, unwilling to let Grave talk crap about his friend. His brother. “If you have a problem with Fuery, I can gladly tell him for you.”

  Grave arched a dark eyebrow at him, an unimpressed edge to his blue eyes, and then huffed and pushed away from the table. He strode to the windows, clasped his hands behind his back and stared out of it. Apparently, the King of Death didn’t want Fuery banging down his door but wouldn’t admit it. Hartt could understand why. Revealing weaknesses was something he was reluctant to do too, mostly because it would tarnish his reputation.

  “Describe what he looked like.” The vampire looked back at him and Mackenzie.

  “He was blond,” Hartt said and frowned as Mackenzie spoke at the same time as him.

  “Black hair—” Mackenzie broke off and looked at Hartt.

  “Well, which is it?” Grave turned his back to the wall and leaned against it between two tall sash windows, folding his arms across his chest and pulling his crisp black shirt tight across his shoulders.

  Hartt waved Mackenzie on when she looked unsure whether to go first. “I have the feeling that the reason Rosalind sensed magic on me is because he altered his appearance, and that you’re about to tell me he had neat, short black hair, a tall and slender build, and crimson eyes.”

  “Not crimson eyes. They were blue.” Mackenzie frowned. “I’m guessing because we were meeting in public places. Stuck up English accent?”

  He nodded, the weight in his gut growing heavier. “He didn’t bother to change his appearance dramatically for you because you’ve never met him. There was no need to pretend to be someone else. At least it confirms we’re dealing with the witch I fought in London. I don’t think it can be anyone else.”

  Grave pushed away from the wall. “I cannot say I have ever met him.”

  “Understandable,” Hartt put in. “Like he never met Mackenzie before hiring her. He had decided you were enemies before ever laying eyes on you. Me? I didn’t become his enemy until we killed the mortal huntress he had been working for and almost killed him.”

  Something hit him.

  Mackenzie looked at him, a flicker of confusion crossing her features as he reached for her. He seized her wrist and pulled her forwards, so she slipped from her seat on the table.

  She placed her hand over his and looked up into his eyes. “What has you so jittery?”

  “I have to warn everyone. The guild… Underworld. They’re all on the lookout for a male with the description you gave me… the way he had appeared to me. If he can use magic to alter his appearance, then he can use it to get close to my friends. Close enough to kill them.” He tugged on her hand, but she stood firm, even dared to glance at the vampire.

  He growled at the male, a reaction he couldn’t hold back, just as he couldn’t stop his fangs from descending or his ears from flaring back against the sides of his head as aggression flooded him, filling him with a need to fight the vampire.

  Because she wanted to remain with the male, was picking the bastard over him.

  Mackenzie arched an eyebrow at him. “You seriously expect me to walk into a rival guild that probably wants me dead?”

  He frowned at her. “You seriously expect me to leave you alone with the vampire who killed you?”

  Her eyebrows pinched hard, her mouth flattening and the corners of her lips turning downwards. She was silent for seconds that felt like hours, and then sighed.

  “I suppose you have a point. I should go back to my guild anyway. Syn knows about the witch, but—”

  “You’re coming with me,” he interjected.

  A little too harshly judging by the arched brow she tossed at him again, together with a pointed look that said he was being a controlling dick. He didn’t mean to be, but the thought of parting from her roused something dark inside him, something that reacted fiercely and flooded him with a desperate need to keep her with him at any cost.

  “I might.” Her frown stuck, and the edge of wariness her eyes gained hit him hard, made him want to release her and let her do as she wished even as he wanted to lock his hand tighter around her wrist and stop her. She was genuinely worried someone at his guild might try to harm her. He could understand her reluctance. He would feel the same if she demanded he go to her guild. She sighed. “I’ll go with you if you swear none of your people will try to hurt me… especially this Fuery fellow.”

  He clenched his jaw as he realised Fuery was the real reason she was afraid of coming with him. She had good reason to fear him, or she had in the past.

  “Fuery will not raise a hand against you. I swear, he won’t even speak harshly to you. I will see to it.” He ached to lift his free hand and touch her cheek, wanted to chase her fears away and see trust in her eyes, not wariness.

  “I could go with you,” Grave offered with a hint of amusement in his voice.

  Because the vampire knew exactly how Hartt would react to that.

  Hartt bared fangs at him, barely tamped down the urge to launch across the room at the male and beat him to a pulp for trying to remain near Mackenzie.

  “I can’t teleport both of you,” he bit out.

  Not a lie. Teleporting Mackenzie was liable to drain him badly enough since she was powerful. He couldn’t risk trying to teleport the vampire too. It would be too much for him, would tap him out and leave him vulnerable to his darker side, and would prevent him from being able to teleport to London to warn the others.

  The best he could manage these days without provoking the darkness by draining himself was two average people, or one powerful one. He had learned that the hard way by teleporting Fuery and Harbin together. He had almost passed out. It had taken him hours to recover.

  He feared he didn’t have hours to warn the others.

  The witch was clever, had no doubt been keeping tabs on him and Mackenzie to see what progress they were making. By now, he was probably aware that Hartt and Mackenzie had teamed up with each other and the vampire. Hartt feared that meant he was liable to turn his sights on others, striking at them to weaken their side.

  Or to provoke one of them into reacting.

  Hartt wanted to believe he would be able to keep a clear head if the witch targeted anyone at the guild or Underworld, but deep in his heart, the oily darkness was already writhing, seething with a need to hunt the male down and take out anyone who dared to stand in his way.

  He was a liability, and to stop himself from being that, he needed to speak with everyone.

  And he meant everyone.

  Gods, he wished he had one of those phones now in Mackenzie’s hand. Her thumb danced over the tiny on-screen keyboard, the message she sent appearing above it. A reply came in almost instantly. With such a device, he would be able to warn everyone without having to face them.

  Borrowing her phone wasn’t an option either. He didn’t know the telephone number for Underworld. Harbin knew it since he liked to keep in touch with his older brother, but he was away from the guild on business and tracking him down in Hell would take too much time.

  Which meant his only option was visiting Underworld in person.

  Still, he didn’t feel ready to leap right in at the deep end, so he focused and teleported with Mackenzie to the guild. He landed with her in his office, an attempt to buy her a few moments to prepare herself that didn’t really work out.

  Fuery shouldered the door open less than a second after he had appeared and dropped the stack of papers he held, scattering them across the polished stone floor. He turned incredulous eyes on Hartt as he spoke in the elf tongue.

  “What is she doing here?”

  “We are on the same side, Fuery.” Hartt released her and held his hands up, hoping to calm his friend as he spoke in the same language, one Mackenzie wouldn’t be able to understand since his species closely guarded knowledge of it. “The reason Rosalind could sense a spell on me is because the client�
�� is a witch. You were right. Something is off about this contract. The witch we fought in London is after us, Mackenzie, and Lord Van der Garde of the vampires. He wanted us to kill each other off, and then he was no doubt going to kill whoever was the last man standing.”

  “What are you saying to him?” Mackenzie lunged at his wide dark wooden desk, grabbed a letter opener from it and brandished it like a dagger, the gleaming silver tip pointed at Fuery. “Is he threatening me?”

  Fuery raised an eyebrow at her and spoke in the elven tongue. “She threatens me?”

  Hartt frowned at both of them, and said in English, “Fuery was not threatening you.”

  He placed his hand on Mackenzie’s and lowered it and the blade, and looked at Fuery.

  “She was not threatening you. She was defending herself. She has been through much.” He released her hand and hoped she wouldn’t bring her makeshift dagger up again. “Speak with us in the mortal tongue, Fuery, or Mackenzie may misunderstand.”

  And would probably stab his friend, and then all hell would break loose.

  Fuery stooped and gathered the scattered papers, crossed the room and dropped them on Hartt’s desk. “I will lock the guild down. No one in and no one out. But I want to come with you.”

  Hartt shook his head. “It’s too dangerous.”

  Fuery’s violet irises gained flecks of black. “It is too dangerous for you too. If the darkness takes you… I need to be there.”

  “The darkness?” Mackenzie looked from Fuery to Hartt. “What does he mean? Like what happened to you when we were fighting?”

  “It is none of your concern.” He glanced at her, lingered as she glared at him. He softened his tone. “I will be fine.”

  “Oh, yeah, because you were just peachy when you went all black-eyed and murderous on me.” She slipped the letter opener into the waist of her onyx leathers and patted it. “I’ll keep this close, just in case.”

  He huffed. “It is made of steel and would not cut through my armour.”

  “That’s reassuring,” she muttered with a sour look on her face. “Nice that you’re thinking ahead to going loco and how it would all play out.”

  Before he could take back what he had said and make her see that he wasn’t planning on allowing the corrupted part of his soul to seize control of him when he was around her, she carried on talking.

  “Besides, I’ve noticed you have a glaring weak spot when using your armour.” She leaned towards him and tapped him on his forehead.

  It didn’t go down well with Fuery. He snarled at her, baring fangs, his eyes rapidly verging on black, like storm clouds racing in to blot out the light.

  “She did not mean it.” Hartt turned to him and held his right hand out to halt him before he could attack Mackenzie. “Apparently, her tongue has become more caustic since…”

  He grimaced as he almost mentioned her rebirth, issued her an apologetic look when she gaped at him, her golden eyes wide. Revealing what she was to others wasn’t a great way of gaining her trust, and he wanted her trust, so he was going to have to be more careful.

  Fuery eyed her closely.

  Hartt went to step in front of her to shield her from his friend’s inquisitive gaze, but she moved around him, coming to stand in front of him instead. Her eyes locked on Fuery, and gods, Hartt wanted to growl and flash fangs at the male, wanted to seize her arm and drag her behind him again, where his friend wouldn’t be able to see her.

  “He trusts you?” She tilted her chin up a little, squared her shoulders in a way that part of him admired while the rest found oddly adorable. She was strong, didn’t need to act that way in front of him or Fuery. Both of them knew she could handle herself and anything life threw at her.

  Fuery nodded.

  Mackenzie looked over her shoulder at Hartt. “You trust him?”

  He nodded too. “With my life. Fuery is like a brother to me. He saved my life once, a long time ago. I owe him everything.”

  She gave him a look that said she would be asking about that later. If she did, he would gladly tell her about what had happened to bring him and Fuery together. He would share the pain of his past with her just as she had shared hers with him, and hopefully he would feel that deep connection to her again and it would calm the primal part of himself that needed to keep her close to him, her eyes on him and only him.

  She pulled down a breath that stretched her black shirt tight across her breasts and sighed it out.

  “Fine.” Her golden gaze locked on Fuery, narrowed and brightened. “But if you tell a soul, I will end you.”

  Fuery didn’t look amused by that threat, and Hartt wondered if he was going to have to intervene again. His friend looked at him, a curious glimmer in his eyes that told him that Mackenzie wasn’t the only one who wanted to question him about some things. Hartt had the feeling it wasn’t only Mackenzie that Fuery would be asking about the next time they were alone either.

  Hartt wasn’t ready to analyse the things that had happened between him and Mackenzie, or how he felt about her. Not yet. When he was sure everyone was safe, he would take a moment to think about everything that had happened.

  “I’m a shifter,” Mackenzie said with another stern look in Fuery’s direction. She hesitated and Hartt wanted to place his hand on her shoulder and tell her that she could trust them. She could trust him. He wouldn’t let anyone hurt her, would deal with anyone who placed her in danger, even Fuery. She glanced back at him and he felt sure she had sensed his need to reassure her when she smiled softly, and then she looked at Fuery again. “A phoenix.”

  Fuery furtively looked around them, at the closed door behind him and the windows behind Hartt, and then murmured, “A phoenix?”

  She nodded.

  The male placed his right hand on his chest. “I swear, I will not tell a soul.”

  That pledge seemed to be enough for Mackenzie because she instantly relaxed, her shoulders drooping as all of the tension bled from her.

  “I need to warn the others,” Hartt said, and Fuery shifted his gaze to meet his, concern growing in it. He knew what his friend was going to say. “I have this. I need you to do something else for me. Track Harbin down and bring him back to the guild. I need to know he’s safe.”

  Because Hartt wouldn’t put it past the witch to target the snow leopard shifter now that they knew he had pitted them against each other in an attempt to get them to kill each other off.

  Fuery nodded. “He checked in yesterday. I know his current location and should be able to find him quickly.”

  Hartt cursed. If he had thought things through yesterday rather than getting swept up in Mackenzie, he could have caught Harbin when he was here, sparing Fuery the effort of having to find him. He looked at Mackenzie, his gaze straying to her. She had needed to talk though, and had needed time to recover from the ordeal of being resurrected. If he had realised he needed to warn the others, he would have had to come here alone, leaving her with the vampire to continue her recovery.

  Just the thought of leaving her there made him want to gnash his fangs and growl.

  “You look ready to kill something again,” Mackenzie said, dragging his focus back to her.

  He shook his head. “Just irritated.”

  He was more than irritated. He hungered with a dark need to butcher the vampire as payment for all the times he had looked at Mackenzie, and ached with a black urge to hunt down the witch and destroy him. It was wreaking havoc on his control, had him skirting the edge of the abyss.

  Or maybe it was dread that had him walking the fine line between light and dark.

  Fear.

  “He will not be pleased to see you,” Fuery said in the elf tongue, thankfully keeping their conversation private from Mackenzie and proving once again that he was deeply attuned to Hartt. Hartt could hide things from others, but never from Fuery. Fuery knew all of him, even the darkest parts he wanted no one to see. He proved that by adding, “She will not be pleased to see you.”

 
; Hartt rounded the desk and gripped Fuery’s shoulder. “I know that, but I have to warn them.”

  “You could wait for me to find Harbin, or find Harbin yourself.”

  Hartt shook his head again. “I cannot afford to waste time. I must go.”

  He broke contact with his friend and stepped back towards Mackenzie. He took hold of her wrist. She looked down at his hand on her slender arm and then up into his eyes.

  “We leaving already?” Her eyes leaped between his, the barest flicker of concern in them, and relief. “You kept your word.”

  He had, just about. “And I’ll continue to keep it. Where we’re going, no one will hurt you.”

  But he had the feeling they were going to hurt him.

  Chapter 16

  Mackenzie flinched as the big blond man who opened the metal door of the red-brick warehouse in London grabbed Hartt by his throat, twisted with him and slammed him into the wall near a piece of wood someone had nailed to it.

  “The fuck you doing here?” the shifter growled, golden fur dotted with black rings sweeping up his toned forearms to disappear beneath the rolled-up sleeves of his tight white shirt.

  Hartt tried to say something but choked as the jaguar tightened his grip.

  Something inside Mackenzie cried at her to intervene, had her hand clamping down on the shifter’s shoulder and her short claws emerging as she dug her fingers into his thickly corded muscles.

  “I suggest you put him down,” she snarled, a red haze descending and the edges of her vision shimmering as fire blazed through her, an inferno she didn’t try to hold back. “Unless you want me to hurt you.”

  The big jaguar flinched as he went to look over his shoulder at her, his golden gaze falling to her hand instead. He frowned at it as smoke began to rise, a tiny tendril of it that caught in the cold breeze that swept along the quiet alley in front of the nightclub. He wisely released Hartt and she released him, stepping to her left at the same time to bring herself closer to Hartt in case he needed back up again.

  He could have told her that he wasn’t on good terms with the people they were coming to warn.