Illicit Desire: Outlawed Realm, Book 2 (24 page)

Grabbing her arms, Lukan broke Arez’s hold on him and spoke firmly. “We can’t stay exposed here. The only way we can survive is to go deeper into the cave. Don’t fight me on this.”

“I’m not.” She bounced in place. “I’ll do whatever you ask. I won’t let anything harm you.”

Lukan wasn’t certain whether to laugh at her foolish bravery or sigh at her concern for him. He settled on a brief hug and an even shorter kiss, then stuffed their food and blanket into the backpack.

“What are you doing?” she asked when he went to the pile of skulls.

He turned one and then another in his hands, noting the tissue that still clung to the bones, proving the slaves who’d died here had done so recently.

“If Vakar’s men come to this cave looking for us, they’ll see the subhuman’s blood and these skulls.” Lukan placed them near the opening to the cave. “I want them to think that we were attacked and eaten last night. It might convince them to give up looking for us.”

He pulled his backpack over one shoulder and took Arez’s hand. Her fingers were icy, her body backlit by the outside light.

A bird shrieked. A not too distant howl followed it.

“It’s our only chance until Nikoli finds us,” he said. “Come.”

Without further pause, he led her into the darkness.

Chapter Thirteen

It’s not working.

Nikoli moved his hand over his device’s screen repeatedly, but the instrument refused to open a portal. He paced between the kitchen table and the stove, then stopped suddenly and glanced around.

He was in Bakshi’s house, the inventor Andris had fed on and killed.

How had he gotten here? Was he dreaming?

His mind answered by showing him Regina standing in the doorway to the room. Nude, she held their clothes in her arms as she had when they’d been inside the home months before. Then as now, rubber gloves lay on one of the counters. Next to them were the cleaning supplies they’d used to remove their fingerprints should the police come here to investigate Bakshi’s disappearance.

“It’s time,” she murmured.

They had to escape. If not, Nikoli knew Regina would die. Frantically, he tried to get his device to work. The screen remained blank.

From above, there were clicking sounds as something landed on the roof. Bats. Andris, Sazaar and the other vampires had found him and Regina.

Face lifted, she opened her arms in invitation to them.

“Regina, no!” Nikola shouted.

She ignored him. “Come in,” she whispered to the others.

Andris entered first, changing from bat to human form, his long, blond hair shimmering in the pale moonbeams streaming through the skylights. He moved swiftly, his feet not seeming to touch the floor as he went to Regina. Grabbing her hair, he pulled her head back to expose her throat.

To his side, Sazaar and the other vampires opened their mouths wide, revealing their long canine teeth. They hissed like feral cats.

Andris made a sound of contentment at his dominion over them, his fangs longer and deadlier than theirs. Playfully, he ran the needle-sharp tips over Regina’s pale flesh.

She reached out to Nikoli, her face frozen in sudden terror.

Two vampires held his arms, keeping him from protecting her. He struggled to get his device to open a portal, giving him and Regina a chance to escape. The instrument grew warm in his hand, then hot, burning his skin.

Forced to drop it, Nikoli struggled against the vampires, desperate to reach Regina.

Andris watched, then smiled cruelly, his features and body morphing into that of a middle-aged man. Sheehan.

“She murdered Bakshi,” the cop said to Nikoli. “We’re arresting her. You’ll never see Regina again.”

Sheehan’s voice came from everywhere and nowhere. “Take her away.”

No—stop.

Gasping, Nikoli woke, pushing himself up from his worktable. For a moment, he wasn’t certain where he was or what had happened. Perspiration bathed his throat and the front of his tee. His chest pumped with his ragged breaths. The materials for his device lay in neat but useless rows on the table.

He ran his hand down his face and checked the clock on the wall. He’d slept for several hours?

Shit. How could he have wasted so much time when Lukan and Arez’s safety depended upon him? Regina’s too. If Sheehan and Goddard returned here—or rather when they did…

Nikoli knew he’d have to take her someplace where the cops would never be able to find her. Even if that meant another dimension.

His hands shook as he returned to his device, rebuilding it, beginning with the very first component. He was nearly halfway through when he finally noticed the papers to the side… Regina’s note on the first page.

I found this on the net for you. I don’t know if any of it will help.

Page after page discussed portals between dimensions, theories the scientists on her side proposed but hadn’t yet proved, means by which they intended to travel from one realm to the other. Their ideas were as inadequate as their materials. Even so, Nikoli smiled at the work Regina had done. Her devotion gave him more confidence than all the praise he’d received from his colleagues and father on E2. It made him determined.

He worked even faster now, replacing and rearranging the components in a way he hadn’t considered before. Absorbed by his efforts, he wasn’t certain how many minutes or hours had passed when he heard tapping sounds coming from behind.

“Nikoli?”

He put down his device and went to Regina, taking her in his arms, not wanting to spend another moment out of her embrace.

She held him as tightly as he did her. “Are you all right?”

“I slept too long.” He buried his face in her silky hair, relishing its clean scent, the same as her skin. She’d showered and dressed in a prim blouse and pants, her work attire. With Sheehan and Goddard hounding her, Nikoli knew Regina wouldn’t risk missing her appointments today, causing the cops to speculate even more. He ran his hands down her back, enjoying the feel of the silky fabric and her body beneath it. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“You were exhausted. You needed to rest. I know you want to save Lukan and Arez, but you—”

“I’m not only doing this for them, Regina, I’m doing it for you. If Sheehan and Goddard return, you’ll need a safe place to go. One where they won’t be able to find you.”

She stiffened within his arms, then pushed against him so she could see his face. “What about you?”

“I don’t matter. You need to be—”

“Stop it.” She cupped his face in her hands. “I’m not going anywhere without you. You can’t make me.”

She was back to being as difficult as when the vampires had been after them. At the time, Nikoli had tried to reason with her and failed miserably. He sighed now. “Do you always have to be so fucking difficult?”

Smiling, she ran her fingers down his neck. “Yep. It’s called love. Deal with it. I’m not leaving your side. Ever.” Her hand paused on his chest. “Unless you say you don’t love me anymore.”

He pulled her back into him and swatted her butt. “You know I’ll never be able to say that.”

On a soft purr, she pressed her body to his. “Well, I know you’ll never make me believe it. How’s the device coming?” she asked quickly. “How close are you to getting it up and running?”

“I have only one more component to add before I can test it.”

“You’re that far? Did the stuff I printed out help?”

Not at all. “More than you’ll ever know.”

Her smile was luminous. “So that’s good, right?”

If he could get the materials on this plane to work as well as the ones on E2, with the additional power needed to cut through several dimensions. Even if the device operated as he hoped, there was still the problem of Lukan and Arez’s exact location. How many attempts would he have to make before finding them? How much power would each failure use? What if he found them and they made it part of the way here only to have the portal close on them because the device had shut down?

At his continued silence, Regina asked, “It’s not good?”

“No, it is,” he assured her, then murmured, “Meelo and Damir are here.” They’d reached the top of the stairs and were now coming down the hall.

Regina eased back. “I let them in a few minutes ago. I called up here, but you didn’t answer. I figured you were still asleep.”

Damir and Meelo must have also been worried about that, thinking as Nikoli did that he’d been wasting precious time. Concern pinched their faces, an emotion neither had shown on E2 and clearly couldn’t help now.

“I’ll make the device work just as it should,” he said to Regina and them.

Accepting defeat wasn’t an option. Somehow, he’d find Arez and Lukan, bringing them all the way here. Somehow, he’d do what was best for Regina even if it wasn’t what she wanted.

Even if it meant their separation.

They’d had more time together than Nikoli had ever hoped. It might be all they’d be allotted. He had to content himself with that.

Not with the promise of a future that had never been meant to be.

Chapter Fourteen

Once Arez and Lukan had entered the bowels of the cave, the inky blackness both ahead and behind erased all sense of time. Arez had no idea whether it was still day or what Lukan had referred to as dusk. To her, they seemed to have been walking for hours. Yet, she wasn’t tired. Fear kept her alert to every sensation, each sound. The steady dripping of water. Lukan’s harsh exhale of air. Their shoes tapping puddles. And beneath those noises, something worse.

Periodically, she heard faint clicking noises, as though an animal was skittering over the rock, its nails scraping against it. After a long while, the sides of the cave began to narrow, pressing closer until she and Lukan could no longer walk side by side. He hadn’t stopped as she’d expected and retraced their steps. Instead, he continued to move forward.

Arez had held back.

“The deeper we go, the safer we’ll be,” he explained, using his strength to pull her with him.

She squeezed his fingers. “How far will we go?”

“Enough so that none of the predators or Vakar will find us. When we get there, we’ll wait.”

“For Nikoli?”

“Yes.”

“What if he can’t find us this deep in the cave?”

Lukan made a noise that sounded as though he was swallowing. “Then we’ll have to go as far back as we need to until he does. By then it should be safe,” he added. “The others will have stopped searching for us.”

Arez wanted to accept his reasoning as easily as she had their masters in the Palace, but she heard a thread of doubt in Lukan’s voice. Beneath it, she recognized his unease.

He was in front of her now, holding on to her hand, his body angled so his broad shoulders didn’t touch either side of the stone.

A few minutes ago, her foot had turned on the uneven ground, sending her sideways. Instinctively, she placed her hand on the cave wall to keep from falling. The rock was cool and sticky beneath her fingertips, making her skin crawl. The musty air grew increasingly humid, smelling of decay and death.

How many bones and skulls lay against the walls, a short distance from their feet? How many belonged to animals? How many to slaves? Would hers and Lukan’s soon join them? Was this the only freedom they’d ever know?

Don’t,
she ordered herself, forcing her thoughts to something pleasant. The wonders Lukan had said she’d see on Regina’s realm.

“They have these instruments that they call cell phones,” he’d said. “They’re no larger than the palm of your hand and when you put them to your ear, you can hear someone speaking even if that person is in another room or in the cars and planes I told you about.”

“What does the person say?” Arez had asked. “Are they giving orders?”

“No. They talk about anything they want. I’ve heard them. One said, ‘The traffic on the way here sucked’. Another asked, ‘Did you pick up that package at my mother’s?’ They go on for hours at a time. They never seem to get tired.”

Arez suspected it was because they ate so much.

“Tell me more about the food,” she said. “You take it from the stores in paper or plastic bags, but how does it get there? Where does it come from?”

“Fields,” Lukan said. “Vast amounts of land with no trees. People grow the food there, then pick it off the ground when it’s ready.”

She tried to picture such a place where endless jars of peanut butter and containers of Cheetos grew. “Is Regina’s house near a field like that?”

“No. She only has flowers and plants in her back yard.”

Arez wondered how they tasted. Were they as salty and creamy as the food Lukan had brought her? Did the flowers crunch like the Cheetos did?

She smiled, remembering how good those small morsels had tasted. Her stomach growled, wanting more.

Abruptly, Lukan stopped.

Immediate alarm raced through Arez. She squinted over her shoulder, thinking he saw something behind them. A wall of black greeted her, so solid she might as well have been blind. Had he heard an unusual noise? Was one of the subhumans or the werewolf following them?