LYNDI
Lies.
A sadistic twinkle gleams in his deep, green eyes as I step backward into the dark hall. All I want to do is go, but knowing the stairs are close behind, I stop. My heart races as he seizes the opportunity to lunge at me. Instantly, his big, strong hands are grasping my arms tightly as I twist to escape.
I kick at his leg. “Fucking let go!”
Unrelenting, he peers down at me, making my blood boil. “What the hell do you want from me?” I spit.
“Mm, still deciding,” he says, as if I have no choice in the matter. Angrily, I yank harder this time, my arms burning under the reinforced strength of his grip.
“Fucking psycho!” I sneer, but he is unmoved.
“I know the truth hurts,” he says flatly.
“You’re crazy!”
“What did you expect, Lynds?” he shrugs. His cold, methodic voice in my head—I warned you. His pale face is frozen in shadow, accentuating the long, angular lines of his chiseled features. His wavy brown hair has fallen over his face, and he leers at me with one burning, green eye rimmed in black shadow. It’s like the falcon eye of Horus scorching my soul from above.
“Fine,” I say, feigning defeat. “You win, Xavier. So, just let me go.”
When I try to twist away, he only tugs me closer, my head hitting against his hard chest. An unwanted electric shock of heat flashes through me just as my phone rings. “I…need to answer,” I hiss breathlessly into his chest.
“You have red in your hair,” he muses, releasing one of my arms to touch my head. Seizing the opportunity, I jerk my arm upward, slapping his face. The violent sensation sends adrenaline rushing through me, my heartbeat thudding in my chest. “Enough, Xavier!”
I’m just getting started, he mentally hisses. He moves inhumanly fast, snatching my hand and firmly clasping my wrist before I have time to think. His eyes gleam darkly as I struggle to get away, with a frustrated groan. He seems to like it when I fight. Okay, so I won’t give him the satisfaction. I take a deep breath, consciously relaxing my body, cold, calculating rage bubbles inside me. He may be stronger, but I can outwit him.
“Are you done now?” he asks.
“Are you?”
“I should be,” he whispers, his expression softening. Like a stunned spectator, I’ve no time to react as his mouth smashes into mine. He parts my lips, sighing into me. Surprisingly, his kiss is possessive, but not...angry. Oh, but mine is. I respond by biting his tongue, and he groans, grabbing my ass firmly in his hands. Wanting him to stop, my teeth relax enough for his tongue to glide smoothly over mine. His lips smash harder, his intoxicating scent and taste overwhelming me. The fucking demon tastes as good as he looks. His relentless kiss feels like consumption, a slow, devouring hunger making my panties wet. God, am I this desperate? This must...stop—
“Mm,” he groans, and somehow the vibration of his words hits right between my thighs, tickling my pussy. “I can’t do this…” I rasp as his arms wrap me; I’m convinced he’ll never let me go. I hate how part of me doesn’t want him to. A dizzying thought washes through me. That I’m his prisoner now, trapped in this mansion forever, like a fucking—
R-R-RING!
This time, I ignore my phone. Against the will of my befuddled mind, a familiar longing builds inside me as he sucks on my tongue, cupping my sex with the warmth of his hand. Mm, god. He presses our bodies tight together, his hardened bulge hitting my lower belly. He lifts me, my legs wrapping around his waist for support as he slams forward, hitting my sweet spot. A moan escapes my lips as he thrusts the bulk of his cock against my clit, making me ache with guilty need. I knock my head back, and a cold chill comes over me as something changes suddenly in the room. This flutter of icy breath hits my lips, with a faint flowery taste mixing in—what the? “Isn’t he delish?” whispers a female voice in my ear.
My eyes shoot open in shock.
“Get the fuck out!” snarls Xavier over his shoulder, lowering me to the ground.
I scan the murky edges of the room. “Who?”
“Fucking ghost girl,” he growls—not a human imitating a dog kind of growl, but like an actual dog.
I narrow my eyes, looking again for the girl. I heard her. Tasted her while I was up against the wall. "Who?"
“Nobody,” Xavier hisses. He wipes his wet mouth with the back of his hand, jaw slack. His canine teeth look longer and sharper than before, and his eyes emanate a feral glow in the low light. The man is…
“Supernatural,” comes the female voice again, further away now. She giggles, drifting as though her back is turned. But where the hell is the body to match the voice?
“I said, fuck off, ghost-girl,” snarls Xavier, a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth, the sharp tips of his canines protruding between closed lips.
I blink my eyes. My freaked-out instincts agree with the ghost or whatever the hell that was. Everything about this place is supernatural, including Xavier.
“You mean…” The blood leaves my face as the shock of the moment settles in, knocking the wind from me. I open my mouth to speak, but words take a moment to come. “A real…ghost?”
Xavier huffs mockingly. “Answer your stupid phone.”
The ringing stops as I clutch my phone in my hand. I pause on Xavier’s strange image—the blood on his mouth, the dots of light in his eyes—recalling what he said about my father. Lies.
“Everything about this place is messed up,” I say, backing away from this crazy man and crazy moment that almost went too far.
“You’re not wrong,” he says from behind as I turn away.
I stop, looking back at him. “It’s not true about Damon. If those dragons are full of drugs, he didn’t know. He didn’t know there was a key.”
He shakes his head reproachfully. “You are pathetically naive. And Damon is a dirty rotten liar.”
I narrow my eyes angrily, not wanting to believe it. Then I remember what Xavier said back in the room, a thickening plot shaping in my mind as I connect the dots. He said I’m leverage. So, this is all about Damon, then.
“Mr. Layne,” calls a voice from the hall, which I recognize as Jasmine.
“Time to get out of here, princess,” quips Xavier, the lights flicking on as he enters the hall.
I glance at my beeping phone. It’s Amy texting an emergency symbol. Either she’s being dramatic, or something is wrong.
“Finally!” she yells over a noisy crowd as I descend the stairs, phone to ear. Jasmine frowns with disapproval as I pass by.
“What’s wrong, Amy?”
“Have you seen Katie?”
“No, I’ve been—“
“She’s missing!”
The fear in Amy’s voice fills me with alarm.
“She has to be somewhere,” I say, trying to calm her down. “I can help look—“
“Not that simple,” she cuts in. “We got separated in the dungeon. She got through VIP; we didn’t. There was a skeezy guy following her.”
“Well, what can I do?”
“I don’t know. You’re a special guest here. Can you ask somebody?”
My eyes flick to Xavier, his muscular arms crossed while he speaks with his PA.
“Enough,” he says to Jasmine, dismissing her before she disappears into an elevator. His green eyes glint when he looks my way.
“My friend is missing," I say, feeling stupid.
When he approaches me this time, I step just out of reach.
“Define missing,” he smirks on cue, stepping forward.
I match his step backward. “They can't find her."
He shakes his head. “It’s a big place. There are many private rooms. Maybe she’s lost on purpose.”
“No. They were planning to stay together. She’s in the downstairs VIP.”
His eyes narrow. “How far down? If she's in the dungeons, it could take a while.”
"Dungeons?"
His eyes darken like a warning, and he sighs, contemplating. He pulls out his phone and taps on the screen.
Shit, maybe Katie is in danger. Let’s not forget all the news stories about missing or dead people associated with Layne Manor. Dread pits in my gut.
“Where are the dungeons?” I ask Xavier, and he looks up from his phone. Seeming irritated, he motions for me to follow as he heads off. God, is there no escaping him? The last thing I want right now is to follow Xavier Layne down another dark hallway.
But it seems I have no choice.
XAVIER
“Try to keep up,” I grumble, leading Lyndi into a part of the mansion I had no intention of taking her. At least, not yet with her taste and scent so fresh on my mouth and hands.
I had intended to get some answers out of her about her father, not seduce her. But to have her so close proved far too distracting. I’m not used to feeling out of control like that. I knew this woman would be fucking trouble.
I shouldn’t enjoy listening to the soft fall of her steps on the carpet behind me. Like a meditation, something calming comes over me as I attune to her every move, leading her down the dark corridor toward my secret passageway.
I’m not helping her locate her stupid groupie friend out of sympathy. I don’t know what Jax sees in Katie, but we’ve never shared the same taste in women. Regardless, I’m helping because it just happens to be a full moon. Bad things can happen on full moon nights. Or good things, depending on your perspective.
Her footsteps speed into a nervous shuffle as we reach the shortcut to the underground, an old smuggler’s tunnel system on which the original mansion was built.
“It’s pitch black,” she complains, fumbling with her phone. I sometimes forget that not everybody can see well in the dark.
I slow my steps, then grab her hand when she trips. She doesn’t try to pull her hand away as I guide her deeper into the passageway to the old tunnels. She tightens her grip. I don’t like clingy people, but damn, having her clutch my hand tightly like her life depends on it… It feels strangely good. I don’t know why.
“What’s in the dungeons, Xavier?”
I can hear the fear in her voice.
“It’s just the Lair’s after-hours dig where I’m expected to appear for VIP members—management's way of whoring me out to fans. I usually skip out, but…”
But Katie may have wandered too far below, and I don’t want blood on my hands. Not again. The thought of it tingles my spine; my wolf’s hackles rise.
Speaking of…
How the hell could Lyndi hear the ghost, feel her even? It’s no wonder I avoid the goddamn West Wing!
Most guests barely notice the phantom footsteps, attributing the rattling of shudders and doors to their imaginations. Nobody ever claims to have heard her speak, to have felt her touch. Not even the avid ghost hunters who have stayed at the mansion.
But when my mouth was busy corrupting Damon’s daughter, and the fiend decided to join in, Lyndi’s eyes popped open, pupils dilated, her every sense attuned to the presence that haunts these halls.
Lyndi is receptive. Empathic even. From the first time I laid eyes on her, not only was she easy to tap into, but she was highly responsive to my dragon’s ability, my subtle voice in her mind.
Yet my voice didn’t register in the background of her subconscious, as with other normie non-shifters. I was at the forefront, and she was lucidly aware, eyes locked with mine, listening as if I were speaking to her aloud.
The unsettling part was when she heard my thoughts against my will. Highly unusual, especially for her kind. But that’s not what bothers me most.
It’s her ability to hear the ghost that complicates things.
Making Lyndi no longer mere leverage but a liability. I can’t have her communicating with an entity privy to the mansion’s dark secrets.
I used to think of ghost-girl as a victim, but I don’t think that anymore. She was crazy while living; she’s even crazier now that she’s dead. Sometimes, it feels as if this groupie/stalker of a fan purposely died here as a communion, forever tying herself to the place she haunted while living.
But I’ve no time for this kind of bullshit.
Especially with Father still in Europe, I’m expected to keep the fort running in his stead. Keeping secrets dead and buried is usually his shit-show to manage, most of which he’s brought upon himself. As for the dead girl, that’s a whole other can of worms.
Dropping Lyndi’s hand, I stop at the black door and enter the keycode before motioning her inside, the clatter of voices and music thrumming within.
When she hesitates, I put my hand on her shoulder. “The entrance is down the hall.” She shudders under my touch, instigating me to pull her closer.
“What are you—“
Her soft lips yield to mine, my tongue penetrating her delicious mouth as she momentarily surrenders. I wrap my arms around her waist, and she pushes against my chest.
“I…have to go,” she says breathlessly.
“Go find your friend, but I want to see you before the night’s over. We need to chat.”
“You mean about Damon?”
Leverage, she thinks, rolling the word in her mind, puzzling over it.
I subtly nod, my eyes dipping briefly to her lips, her sweet taste lingering on my tongue.
She tucks in her bottom lip, suddenly distracted by her ringing phone.
I’m only minimally worried on her behalf. When a groupie goes missing here, that usually means she’s holed up with a musician in one of the tunnel’s many well-appointed enclaves.
But then again, it is a hunter’s moon tonight. Anything could happen. So I motion the nearest bouncer to help her, but then I grab her hand as she heads off, pulling her back with my mouth to her ear. “Go solve the great mystery, Lyndi. But don’t forget your curfew.”
She spins around. “Curfew? The contract didn’t—“
“Fuck the contract. My rule.”
“What? You’re seriously enforcing a curfew on me?”
“That’s right. I expect you to return to your magical princess suite by midnight.”
“Or else I lose a glass slipper?”
“Wrong princess. You’re more the pretty, overly curious peasant girl searching for something better, but all she finds is a dark cell.”
“And you’re the beast,” she mutters, jerking her hand away.
She isn’t wrong.
Not a fairy tale kind of beast. I’m much worse.
Then what are you, Xavier?
I’m a soul-sucking demon—don’t you forget it.
I can almost feel the shiver down her spine as my words creep into the private corners of her mind.