Dark Fire (11 page)

She had wanted to kiss him. She admitted it. She touched her swollen lips, a little awed. No one should be able to kiss like that. It was like falling off the edge of a cliff, soaring through the skies, touching the sun. It was like burning, going up in flames, until there was no more Tempest Trine, no thinking individual, only mindless, impossible passion.

"Darius, did you understand what I said?"

"Did you understand what I said?" he countered softly between his white teeth. "I know it is not an easy thing to accept one such as me, but I have given my eternal allegiance and protection to you, and that is no small thing, Tempest. It is for all time."

"It isn't that I can't accept what you are. I don't even know what that is yet, really." She squirmed suddenly. "Put me down. Please. I feel very-" She broke off, not wanting to admit to feeling defenseless, but the word shimmered between them all the same. "Please, Darius. I want to talk about this and not feel at such a disadvantage."

His hard mouth curved, taking away the almost cruel, implacable edge as if it had never been. Slowly he lowered her feet to the ground. She was half his size and had to tip her chin up to look at him. "Do you feel at more of an advantage now?" he asked softly, amusement in his black-velvet voice.

Chapter Five

Tempest glared at him, her green eyes flashing like emeralds. "Very funny. We have to get a couple of things straight. Maybe I'd rather take my chances here with you than out in the world right now, but not if you're going to keep dictating to me. There have to be a few ground rules. None of this… this… whatever you call this." She waved her hand to encompass everything. Kissing. Taking her blood. Seducing her. Ordering her around. Setting perimeters. All of it.

His black gaze never left her face. His eyes were as still as those of a leopard scenting prey. Avid. Burning. Intense. He took her breath away with his eyes. Hypnotized her. Cast a spell over her. Tempest pulled her gaze from his, from the seductive, black velvet trap. "And stop that, too," she said decisively, despite the fact that he made her hungry for him.

"Stop what?"

"Stop looking at me that way. It's definitely out. You can't look at me that way. It's cheating."

"How am I looking at you?" His deep voice dropped even lower, the cadence soft and husky. Mesmerizing.

"Okay, that's out, too. No talking in that tone of voice," she declared staunchly. "And you know very well what you're doing. Act normal."

His white teeth gleamed at her, nearly stopping her heart. "I am acting normal, Tempest."

"Well, then, that's out, too. No acting normal." With both hands on her slender hips, she glared challengingly at him.

Darius glanced away to hide the sudden smile pulling at his mouth. He rubbed the bridge of his nose thoughtfully. "That is a great number of rules, all of which seem impossible. Perhaps a more feasible plan might be in order."

"Don't even start with that infuriating, superior-male-amusement thing you do. It sets my teeth on edge." She was frantically attempting to backpedal, to put some emotional space between them so she could breathe. He needed to stop looking so male, too. That would help some. Suddenly dizzy, she sat down rather abruptly on the carpet of pine needles. Surprised, she blinked up at him.

Darius hunkered down beside her, cupping her face in his palm. "Just do as I ask, and everything will be fine, honey."

She caught at his thick wrist for support. "Did you listen to anything I said?"

"Of course I did. I can repeat your nonsense verbatim if you like." He wrapped an arm around her, so that she could lean into the shelter of his body. "Just sit here for a moment. You will feel better soon. I may have gotten a bit carried away, but your blood does not need replacing."

Her green eyes widened. "Don't even think about it, Darius. I mean it. I've read books. I've seen movies. I refuse to become a vampire."

His mouth quirked again. Sexy, intimate, the tiny gesture produced a rush of heat in her bloodstream, and she had to look away from him to save her soul. No one had the right to look the way he did.

"I am not a vampire, honey. The undead has chosen to lose his soul. I have endured, still alive, if lately only barely, these many long centuries."

"What are you then?" Tempest asked, reluctant to hear his answer yet excruciatingly curious.

"I am of the earth, wind, and sky. I can command these things, all things of nature. I am of an ancient race with powers and properties often mistakenly associated with those of vampires. But I am not vampire. I am Carpathian." He watched Tempest, anticipating the many queries she would likely raise in response to his pronouncement.

She tipped her head. "So, have there been many?"

"I do not understand the question." He appeared genuinely puzzled.

"Women like me. Do you collect women so you have a ready food supply?" She asked it flippantly because his proximity was making her blood rush.

His fingers tangled in her hair. "There are no other women. There have been no other women. You belong to me. Only you."

She wasn't certain she believed he'd had no other women, but she found she wanted it to be true. "Gee, do I feel lucky," she said. "It's not every day I get bossed around by a vam-Carpathian. I've been on my own and taking care of myself for as long as I can remember, Darius, and I like it that way."

His hand had slipped to the nape of her neck, his attention caught by the softness of her skin. "It seems to me you have not done a particularly good job of it. Face it: You need me."

She batted his hand away, afraid of the fire pooling low in her body. He wasn't safe. Nothing about him was safe, not even casual conversation. "I don't need anyone."

His black eyes burned over her face, hard possession in the set of his mouth. "Then you will learn to do so, will you not?"

Her heart jumped at the soft, warning note in his voice. He could sound so menacing when he chose. Fear flickered in the depths of her eyes, and her green gaze skittered away from his dark one. "Darius, I really am afraid of you." The admission came out under her breath.

For a moment she was certain he hadn't heard her, but then his hand stilled on the nape of her neck, hot and possessive. "I know you are, Tempest, but there is no need for it, and you will get over it."

A flutter of anger gave her courage. "Don't be so certain I'll just let you take over my life."

"If you feel you can do no other than attempt to defy me, by all means, you are welcome to do so, but I warn you, I am not an easy man to cross." His voice was velvet soft, and all the more menacing because of it. There was a hard strength in his fingers as they circled her soft throat.

"Since I'm already afraid of you, that isn't exactly news, Darius," she said, her heart thumping in rhythm to her words. "It isn't as if I haven't been afraid before.

It isn't exactly a new experience for me. But I've always managed." She tilted her chin defiantly.

Darius bent his head close, his eyes like glinting ice. "You are afraid of the loss of freedom, Tempest, not of me. You are afraid of the untamed passion in you that rises up to meet the passion in me. It is that, not me, that you fear."

She pushed at the wall of his chest with both hands. He didn't budge. "Well, thank you very much for that analysis," she snapped, all at once stormy. "What would the others think if I told them you were acting this way?" she challenged. "Are they so far under your thumb that they'd help you?"

He shrugged with casual, fluid grace, reminiscent of a leopard stretching. "It would not matter to me one way or the other. It might break up our family, it might cause bloodshed, but in the end, the outcome would be the same. I will not give you up, Tempest."

"Oh, shut up," she said rudely, exasperated with him. "There isn't much to like about me once you get to know me. I'm always in trouble; it just happens. I'll make you crazy."

His hand closed over her fragile wrist, his thumb finding her pulse unerringly. "You already make me crazy," he replied softly. "You will do as I say soon enough, and then I will not have to worry so much."

"It isn't going to happen in this lifetime," she announced, glaring at him. "And as I have only this one, you're in for a big disappointment."

His laughter was low and amused, rife with that mocking male superiority that said she would be easy enough to handle. "Come on, honey. The others will be rising soon. We have miles to travel this night to stay on schedule. The cats will need to feed before we go." He did not add that all of his family would have to do the same. He sensed her deep fear that he wanted her to use for sustenance, that perhaps he intended the rest of them to use her, also. He wanted to reassure her but knew mere words would not help.

He reached down and pulled her to her feet. She was so unexpectedly light for a woman with such an iron will, and he was so enormously strong, he felt he might fling her into the sky if he wasn't careful.

The moment she was standing, she jerked away, wiping her palms on her jeans, glaring at him. He might rule everyone around him, but she wasn't about to stand for his nonsense. She wasn't going to become a food supply for anyone. And she certainly wasn't going to have some male fantasy figure dominating her life. She might have a penchant for trouble, but she wasn't stupid.

Darius glanced down at her transparent, expressive little face as they walked back toward the camp. She could not hide her thoughts from him anymore, now that he realized the differences in her mind. His earlier troubles served him right for being so complacent and sure of himself in his dealings with her. She was an unusual mortal, yet he hadn't considered that he would have to delve deeper than he normally would. Aside from thinking too much, Tempest had an interesting mind, a way of focusing in on one thing only and blocking out everything else.

She stumbled a little, and he slipped an arm around her shoulders despite her little shrug of retreat. By nature, Tempest was accepting of others. She also understood the way animals reasoned, their survival instincts. So it would require her only a step or two to accept the Carpathian way of life.

Darius knew she could accept it as long as it didn't encroach on
her
way of life. Tempest lived like a nomad. That was essentially the same way his group lived, but she preferred a solitary existence. She understood an animal's way of life, had strong survival instincts herself, but she had less understanding of people and why they did the things they did. Growing up in a crack house, with mothers selling their children for drugs, selling their own souls for the drugs, she had decided at an early age that she wanted little to do with people, and nothing had happened since to change her mind.

Rusti inched away from the warmth of Darius's body. She didn't like the way he made her feel, that out-of-control rush of hungry need. He was too dangerous, too powerful, far too used to getting his way in all things. She liked her quiet, independent life. Solitude suited her. The last thing she needed was to be caught up in Darius's bizarre troupe of followers.

She sighed, unaware that she did so. She couldn't stay with the Dark Troubadors. The sanctuary they had seemed to offer was rapidly turning into something she wasn't equipped to handle.

Darius glanced down at her bent head, the faraway, pensive look on her face, the sadness reflected in her large eyes. He laced his fingers through hers. "There is no need to worry so much, honey. I have sworn to protect and care for you. I do not take such oaths lightly."

"This isn't exactly something a person can prepare herself for, Darius. Even if you're a… a Carpathian rather than a vampire, whatever you are isn't altogether human. I know that when you communicate mentally with me."

"Are you so certain that
you
are completely human? When I merge my mind with yours, I observe brain patterns different from those of ordinary mortals."

She winced, looking as if he'd struck her. "I know I'm different. Believe me, you aren't telling me anything I haven't heard before. You can't call me anything I haven't already been called. Freak. Mutation. Frigid. You name it, I've heard it."

Darius stopped abruptly, forcing Tempest to do the same. He brought her hand to the warmth of his mouth. "I did not mean it that way. I admire what you are. If either of us is a 'mutation' from the norm, Tempest, it is me, not you. I am in no way human. I am an immortal. And I can assure you that you are neither a freak nor frigid. Your heart and soul were simply waiting for mine. Not everyone can hand themselves over to just anyone. A few know that the giving of the treasure of one's body, one's intimacy, is sacred, meant solely for the one they were made for, their other half. Perhaps those who taunted you were jealous of that knowledge in you because they were in far too much of a hurry to wait or because they held themselves too cheap."

Her long lashes hid her emerald eyes. "I'm not a virgin, Darius."

"Because some man forced himself on you?"

"I think you have a false impression of me. I'm no angel, Darius. I've stolen cars, souped them up, gone for joy rides. I've always rebelled against so-called authority figures, probably because the ones I knew left a bad taste in my mouth. It always amazes me how the most self-righteous people, the ones forever preaching and pointing fingers at others, often do the most underhanded and dishonest things. Once I could support myself, I came up with my own code of honor, and that's what I live by. But I'm no saint, and I never have been. The places I come from don't breed saints."

Darius was becoming familiar with every nuance of her voice. She sounded slightly sad, accepting of her brutalizing childhood but angry with herself for trusting others during those terrible years. Trusting them and having them let her down. That was why she preferred the solitary existence she had chosen, and he could sense her determination not to give it up, despite her need to. The job as mechanic to their traveling band had represented the ability to support herself and be free from the demands of intimate, prolonged contact with other people. He was taking that away from her.