“What the hell?”
Levet waddled forward, his wings twitching as he studied Roke with open curiosity.
“A magical snare. Sacrebleu. I’ve never seen one so strong.”
Roke flashed his fangs, futilely struggling to escape.
Damn, but he hated magic.
“Why didn’t you warn me?” he snarled.
“I did,” the gargoyle huffed in outrage. “I told you it was a bad idea.”
Okay, he hated magic and gargoyles.
“You didn’t tell me there was a trap.”
“You are chasing a powerful witch. What did you expect?” The damned beast dared to smile. “Besides, it’s such a fine spell. It would have been a pity to spoil Sally’s fun.”
“I swear, gargoyle, when I get out of here—”
“Are all vampires always so bad-tempered, or is it just you?” a light female voice demanded, the scent of peaches drenching the air.
Roke swallowed a groan, a complex mixture of fury, lust, and savage relief surging through him.
None of it showed on his face as he turned to study the tiny female with shoulder-length hair that was a blend of deep red tresses streaked with gold. She had pale, almost fragile features with velvet brown eyes and full lips that begged to be kissed.
“Hello, my love,” he said in a low, husky voice. “Did you miss me?”
Sally Grace had been well aware that she was being hunted.
Not only hunted . . . but hunted by a first-class, grade A, always-get-my-man predator.
And she should know all about predators.
She’d been prey since her mother had tried to put an end to her existence with a particularly nasty spell on her sixteenth birthday. No one understood the difference between an okay hunter and one you didn’t have a hope in hell of shaking off your trail better than she did.
Still, she’d managed to elude him for the past three weeks.
Twenty-one days longer than she’d expected.
Now she intended to hold her ground.
No one was putting her back in a cell.
Planting her hands on her hips, she pretended a confidence she was far from feeling.
“Why are you following me?”
His beautiful eyes shimmered a perfect silver in the moonlight.
Of course, everything about him was perfect, she acknowledged with a renegade rush of awareness.
The exquisitely carved features. The dark hair that was silky smooth. The hard, chiseled body that should only be possible with Photoshop.
And the raw, sexual magnetism that pulsed in the air around him.
There wasn’t a woman alive who wouldn’t secretly wish he’d handcuff her to the nearest bed.
A pity he was a coldhearted vampire who would happily kill her if her magic hadn’t tied them together as mates.
She shivered despite the heavy sweatshirt and jeans she wore to combat the cold.
“Is that a joke?”
She tilted her chin. “There’s nothing funny about our situation.”
“I agree.”
“Then why don’t you return to Chicago?” she demanded in frustration. “I’m perfectly capable of tracking down my father without you.”
A dark brow arched. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“The last time you went rogue we ended up mated.” His lips twisted as he stopped struggling and instead stood there with his head held high, pride etched onto his beautiful face. As if he was above noticing her tedious spell. “Forgive me if I don’t entirely trust you.”
Sally flinched, her eyes narrowing. Dammit. She didn’t need any reminders that she was a major screwup.
Not when she was tired and frustrated and in the mood to punch something.
Really, really hard.
“Sacrebleu,” a voice rasped, drawing Sally’s attention to the tiny gargoyle standing at Roke’s side. “You may have a death wish, vampire, but I do not. I believe I will speak with Yannah.”
Sally blinked, effectively distracted by the question.
Yannah had been a strange travel companion. The small demon had happily zapped Sally to each of her mother’s properties so Sally could search for clues of her father, but she’d rarely spoken and had spent most of her time zoned out as she mentally communicated with her mother, who also happened to be an Oracle.
Sally had been almost relieved when Yannah had abruptly announced she had to go home.
She was used to being on her own.
It was . . . comfortable. Familiar.
Tragic, achingly lonely, but familiar.
“She left,” she informed Levet.
“Left?” His heavy brow furrowed. “What do you mean left?”
“One minute she was standing next to me complaining about the dust, and the next—” She waved a hand.
“Poof,” Levet finished.
“Exactly.”
Without warning the gargoyle was stomping away, his tail twitching and his tiny hands waving in the air as he muttered to himself.
“Aggravating, unpredictable, impossible female.”
“I feel his pain,” Roke drawled.
She turned back to stab him with a glare. “Not yet, but keep it up and you will.”
The silver eyes shimmered. “Release me.”
Sally wrapped her arms around her waist. She could feel his anger through their bond, but more than that she could feel a seething frustration that was echoed deep inside her.
That scared her more than his irritation.
“Why should I?” she bluffed. Yeah, look at her. All badass just so long as Roke remained trapped in her spell. “You’re trespassing on my property.”
He glanced toward the cottage. “Yours?”
She shrugged. “It was my mother’s, and since I’m her only heir, I assume her various houses are now mine.”
“She had more than one?”
“What do you think I’ve been doing the past three weeks?”
The silver gaze returned to sear over her pale face. “Running.”
She sniffed, refusing to admit that running had been a large part of what she’d been doing.
There had been a little method to her madness.
“I’ve been searching through my mother’s belongings,” she said. “I hoped that she would have left some clue to my . . .” She bit off the word father. Did a donation of sperm actually earn the title of father? “To who impregnated her.”
He frowned. “I thought you said that witches had a spell so their private papers were destroyed when they died?”
It was true that many witches had binding spells attached to their most sensitive possessions. It gave a whole new meaning to taking “secrets to the grave.” And her mother had been more secretive than most.
Still, she had to cling to some small fragment of hope. Dammit.
“They do,” she grudgingly admitted. “But she wouldn’t have destroyed everything. There has to be a clue somewhere.”
“Release me and I’ll help you search.” He studied her stubborn expression, silently compelling her to obey. “Sally.”
“Don’t growl at me. You locked me in a cell—”
“And I let you out.”
“Only because I forced you to.”
A dangerous chill blasted through the air at her foolish reminder that he’d briefly been under her complete control.
“Sally, like it or not we’re stuck together,” he rasped between clenched teeth.
“I don’t like it.”
The silver eyes narrowed. “If that were true, then you would be eager for my help.”
She snorted. “Nice try.”
“You know that vampires are the finest hunters in the world,” he continued, ignoring her interruption. “And I’m one of the best.”
“And so modest.”
“If you were as anxious as you claim to end our mating, you would be begging for my . . . services.”
His gaze deliberately lowered to take in her
slender body, making Sally tremble in reaction. Blessed goddess. The blast of sexual arousal that jolted through her made her feel like she’d been struck by lightning.
And the worst part was, she couldn’t blame the intense reaction on the faux mating.
She’d been aching for Roke from the moment she’d caught sight of those dark, male features and the astonishing silver eyes. Not to mention the tight ass that filled out a pair of jeans with oh-my-god perfection.
“Jeez, could you be any more annoying?” she muttered, reluctantly releasing the spell that bound him. The magic was draining her at a rapid rate, and the last thing she wanted was to collapse in front of this man. Better that she pretended to be bored with the game. “You’re free. Now go away.”
The words had barely left her lips when Roke was flowing forward at a blinding speed.
“Gotcha.”
“Roke.” His name was a muffled protest against his chest as he lashed his arms around her and flattened her against his body.
“Don’t move,” he growled, pressing his face into the curve of her neck, his fangs lightly scraping her skin.
“What are you doing?”
He shuddered, his hands running a compulsive path down her back to cup her hips.
“You feel it,” he whispered against her neck.
And she did.
Not just the tidal wave of sensual pleasure at being in his arms, but the strange sensation of something settling deep inside her.
An easing of the nagging sense of “wrongness” that had plagued her since leaving Chicago.
His lips moved to press against the thundering pulse at the base of her throat.
“Do you have any idea what you did to me when you disappeared?”
Her lashes slid downward as she absorbed the stunning pleasure of his touch.
“I thought you would be happy to be rid of me,” she whispered, breathing in the scent of leather, male, and raw power.
His fingers gave her hips a small squeeze. “You wouldn’t have snuck away if you believed that.”
The fact he was right only pissed her off.
“Just because I didn’t ask for your permission doesn’t mean I snuck away.”
“Sally, whether this mating is some demon magic or not, it feels real to me,” he rasped. “To have you disappear . . .” He shuddered, revealing the genuine pain he’d been forced to endure. “Christ.”
Sally grimaced, her anger abruptly being replaced by overwhelming regret.
The mating truly had been an accident.
At the time she’d been scared and desperate or she would never have released her inner demon.
She wasn’t stupid. She knew that messing with magic she didn’t understand was dangerous. And until she had discovered the truth of her ancestry, she’d usually stuck to the human spells she’d learned from her witch mother.
But accident or not, she’d physically, perhaps even spiritually, bound this proud loner to her.
It was a sin she could never erase.
“I’m sorry,” she husked.
His tongue traced the line of her jaw. “Are you?”
“I know this mess is partially my fault.”
He jerked his head back in disbelief. “Partially?”
She was instantly on the defensive. “If your precious Anasso hadn’t thrown me in the dungeons, I wouldn’t have needed to use my powers to escape.”
He muttered a curse, returning to nuzzle a searing path of kisses down the side of her neck.
“Let’s go back to your apology,” he commanded.
Somehow her hands were on his shoulders, her fingers tangled in his silken hair.
“Fine. I regret any discomfort I’ve caused you,” she managed to say, excitement jolting through her as he allowed her to feel the tips of his fangs.
Crap. What was wrong with her? She’d never been one of those freaks who wanted to be dinner for a vampire.
Even if their bite was orgasmic.
Now she was shaking with the need to feel those fangs sliding through her tender flesh.
“And you promise not to disappear again?” he demanded, his hands slipping beneath her sweatshirt.
She shuddered, struggling to think through the haze of lust clouding her mind.
“Not unless I believe it’s absolutely necessary.”
He made a sound of resignation. “Have you always been so stubborn?”
“Have you always been so arrogant?”
He pressed a hard, hungry kiss to her lips. “Yes.”
Chapter Two
Roke felt Sally tremble, her fingers tangled in his hair as her body arched against him.
A groan was wrenched from his throat. Christ, the very air was scented with her desire.
But even as his hands skimmed beneath her sweatshirt to find the soft curve of her bare breasts, she pulled back with a startled gasp.
“Roke . . . stop.”
He hissed, burying his face in the soft cloud of her windswept hair.
“You’re my mate.”
“No.” She sucked in a shaky breath, her eyes dark with a need she couldn’t hide. “It’s an illusion.”
He lowered his hand from the temptation of her breast, but he kept his arms firmly around her.
She wasn’t going to disappear again.
Not even if he had to handcuff her to his side.
He swallowed a low growl.
Having Sally and handcuffs in the same thought wasn’t doing a damned thing to help him gain control of his raging libido.
“It doesn’t feel like an illusion, does it, my love?” he murmured.
“It’s not real.” She licked her lips. “It can’t be real.”
Logically Roke agreed.
Physically? Not so much.
His body was ready and eager to accept that she was created to be in his arms.
His gaze shifted to the tempting curve of her neck, his fangs aching with a savage instinct to mark her as his own.
A damned shame that Styx had warned taking Sally’s blood might very well turn the mating from a magical illusion to a bond that couldn’t be broken.
Battling against his primitive urges, Roke was distracted by the whiff of granite as the gargoyle waddled back into view, his wings shimmering in the moonlight.
“I see the two of you have kissed and made up.”
He sent the pest an annoyed glare. “Go away, gargoyle.”
“No.” Sally shoved out of his arms, her face flushed and her eyes still dazed with their mutual lust. “He can help search the cottage for clues.”
His brows snapped together. “You run from me, but you’ll ask a three-foot gargoyle for help?”
She met his fierce disbelief without flinching. “Unlike vampires, gargoyles are sensitive to magic. He might find something that I’ve missed.”
“Oui, I am very sensitive.” Levet turned toward Roke, sticking out his tongue. “It is the reason women find me irresistible.”
With a flick of his tail, Levet waddled toward the cottage. Roke clenched his hands.
So much for a little one on one time with Sally.
“Shit, that gargoyle needs a muzzle,” he muttered.
“He’s not the only one,” Sally informed him, turning to follow the tiny demon into the cottage.
Roke briefly hesitated.
If he had any sense he’d get on his motorcycle and never look back.
Sally was right.
Magic was a vampire’s true weakness.
There was nothing he could do when it came to breaking the spell that bound them together. Why not head back to his lair in Nevada and wait for Sally to contact him when she had the means to break the mating?
But the thought had barely time to form before it was forgotten as he headed into the cottage.
He’d spent three hellish weeks chasing after his witch.
Until the bond was broken, he wasn’t letting her out of his sight.
Entering through the back door, he passed th
rough the small mudroom that opened into a large kitchen equipped for a witch, not a chef.
There was a massive, stone fireplace with a cast-iron cauldron hanging over a pile of wood. The open rafters were lined with bronze pans and bundles of dried herbs. And in the center of the floor, a circle had been carved into the flagstones that was large enough for two or three witches to sit in without touching.
He followed the scent of peaches into the main room of the cottage, discovering Levet flitting around the sparsely furnished space and Sally standing beside the empty fireplace, her spine rigid.
He grimaced, assuming she was trying to give him the cold shoulder. Then, slowly he realized it wasn’t annoyance she was feeling.
It was a dull, bitter pain he could feel through their bond.
With two long strides he was standing at her side, gently tucking her hair behind her ear so he could study her pale profile.
“There’s something here that bothers you?”
“You could say that.” Her lips twisted as her gaze lingered on the scorched mark on the wall. “This is the precise spot where my mother tried to kill me.”
The image of a young Sally lying lifeless on the floor seared through Roke’s mind and he struggled to contain his burst of fury. His temper had the unfortunate effect of destroying the structural integrity of any building he happened to be standing near.
Instead he concentrated on the pleasant knowledge that Sally’s mother had died a painful, probably even gruesome death at the hands of a fellow vampire.
Levet crossed the room to study Sally with a sympathetic expression on his ugly face.
“Why would your mother try to kill you?”
Sally shivered. “She didn’t know my father was a demon. Not until my sixteenth birthday when my powers started to kick in.” She gave a humorless laugh. “It was an unpleasant surprise, to say the least.”
“Ah. My mother tried to kill me as well.” Levet shrugged. “Families are always difficult.”
Sally managed a small smile that didn’t disguise the wounds that festered in her heart.
“She’s dead,” she said in grim tones. “She can’t hurt me anymore.”
Roke’s fingers brushed her cheek. “No one is going to hurt you.”