Into the Darkness (2 page)

An exhilarating ride later, Jared said,
“Here we are,” as he turned into a gravel road leading up to a parking lot nestled in the woods. A seemingly plain and simple house waited off to the side, the wraparound porch glowing from the many lit windows.

“My-oh-my, pulling out all the stops, are we? What’s the occasion?” I threaded my fingers through his after I climbed from the car.

“Have to take care of my girl.”

I let my body lean against his as we made our way to the restaurant
’s porch, the dark woods around us deep and quiet.  Like they always did, my eyes swept to the side, searching.

“What’s up?” Jared asked, following my gaze.

Adrenaline pierced my chest.
Stop looking for imaginary people!

“Oh, nothing! Spooky, though, huh?”

Jared squeezed my shoulders.
“Nah, biggest thing up here is a raccoon. I’ll protect you!”

“I don’t know, I hear those raccoons
are feisty.”

Laughi
ng, we entered the restaurant.

I
walked out an hour and a half later with a firm hold on my stuffed tummy. “Why do I always hate myself after a good meal?” I mumbled.

“I feel pregnant.” Jared
slipped on a light jacket against the chill of the evening. “Let’s just hope it doesn’t turn gassy.”

“Eww
, Jared! You’re so gross!”

“
Good thing I have a convertible or I’d fart you out of the car.”

“Would you stop?” I
slapped his arm playfully. “Where to?”

“We’re not going to a carnival, I’ll tell you that much. Dancing is out, too. God, I’m
stuffed!”

As we stepped off the porch, happily swaying into each other, something tickled my awareness. Almost as if someone called my name, I glanced off to the right, my gaze trying to pierce the syrupy shadow
s between the trees. A small tug in the center of my chest jerked my body sideways.

Shadows moved, shifted. A huge expanse of shoulder swiveled. A leg stepped to the right. A body tucked further into the darkness, the shadows wrapping it in a nearly invisible cloak.

It was like walking into the kitchen after you’d just left it, having had to close a randomly opened cabinet door, and then seeing every cabinet suddenly standing wide open. A shot of pure adrenaline punched me.

Someone was
there!

“Oh my God…”

An overwhelming desire to join that person washed through me. I couldn’t think through the intense need to go to him. Like an alcoholic after a binge, my heart hammered and my hands shook; the desire to walk that direction so strong, I couldn’t focus.

“What’s up?” Jared asked, stopping with me. “Do you see something?”

The man was looking back, I knew he was. Just as I knew it was a man. And he was
right there.
The answer to my questions was so close. Waiting there, not moving. Staring. I had to get to him. I had to touch him, see if he was real.
Had to.

“Let’s go for a walk,” I murmured, my feet jerking to a start.

“What? Sasha, are you okay? What’s…
?” Jared’s words ended in a hiss.

My skin prickled,
a surge of fear blasting, and then sliding right off me.

“Just a peek…” I heard myself say.
The pull gripped me, had sweat drenching my hairline. “Have to…”

“Sasha,
no!”

My
body whipped around so fast tree branches and stars blurred in my vision. Jared had my arm and started dragging me toward the car.

Clothes rustled
by that tree, a boot scraped against the dirt, the unseen person shifting, seething at Jared’s manhandling me. Wanting me out of harm’s way.

How could I possibly know that?

“C’mon, Sasha. This is…we need to go.” Jared hurriedly shuffled me toward the car. “
Quick
.”

“But…” I
was shoved into the seat, the door slamming a second later as Jared jogged to his side of the car. The key jammed into the ignition and we were off, tires splashing gravel at the line of parked cars. “Careful!”

White knuckles gripping the steering wheel, Jared took the turn into the street way too fast, nearly running the car off the road into a steep ravine. “Jared, look out!”

He swerved, our vision going white in the face of an oncoming car. His car squealed as he jerked the wheel. Tires on the right side dropped off the lip of the road. I clutched at the dashboard, trying to pull a Superman and direct the car with superhuman strength. Jared jerked the wheel again, his chest heaving, hard lines around his eyes. We took another turn too fast.

“
Jared! What’s going on? Why are you so freaked out?”

As if waking from paralysis, Jared glanced over, eyes quickly going back to the road. He rolled his shoulders. His knuckles
slowly returned to normal color. “I don’t know. Wow. That was weird. All of a sudden it felt like we were going to die or something. Like, get killed kind of die, not like…you know.”

I didn’t, but I didn’t say anything, because I’d had the opposite reaction.
Secret box.

The farther we got from the restaurant,
driving faster than we should’ve, the more relaxed Jared became. The hard lines around his eyes softened, and his smile peeked through. He reached for my hand as he took a curve, reentering the noise and clutter of civilization.

“Almost there.”

I couldn’t help but think his crazy reaction was to what was in the woods. Did he feel it? Did he feel that tug, too, but instead of exciting him, it scared him?

Did I have proof the shadows were real
?

My mind raced as w
e sped along a deserted road on the outskirts of town. The cracked sidewalks and dingy overhangs were devoid of the usual homeless. Which was weird, but not altogether noteworthy. The current predicament, however…

Should I ask him
if he saw anything? Or felt something? Would I sound crazy?

But what if he’d been noticing my weird reactions to empty air
lately and was scared for me? What if he was trying to save me from myself?

Did that thought, in
itself, sound crazy? Oh God…
am I crazy??

I sucked in a nervous breath to ask when t
he tire jounced over something in the street and exploded like a cannon. We swerved wildly, Jared ripping his hand from me as the car careened left.

I watched in horror as a tree enlarged
within the confines of the windshield. A breathless split-second and my body slammed forward with a shriek of twisting metal. The car flew sideways, slamming against the curb, rocking back and forth like a lullaby.

There was one moment of absolute quiet except for the hissing steam spewing from the radiator.

“Holy crap,” I said, out of breath. “That came outta nowhere, huh? Tree one, monkey nothing.” I struggled with the airbag.

Jared stared, wide-eyed, out of the splintered windshield.

“Hey,” I whispered softly, touching his shoulder, “are you okay?”

Like a man
who had been body snatched, his head swung in my direction. His jaw hung slack and his eyes were glazed over. God had written, “Nobody’s home” all over his forehead.

“Hey, baby.” I shook him gently. “You okay?”

He blinked.
“I just crashed my car.”

A bark of laughter escaped my mouth
before I could rearrange my face back into a mask of concern. “Yes, sweetie. But you have insurance. It’s okay. As long as you’re okay?”

Like a door on a rusty hinge, his head swung back toward the cracke
d windshield, looking out at a jumble of hood wrestling a tree.

The tree was winning.

Alright, then.

I took a big breath and glanced around us.
We weren’t in a good neighborhood and cell phone service was spotty at best. Waiting for a tow-truck here was dicey, especially in a convertible where we couldn’t lock ourselves in. Well, we
could,
but I had the sneaking suspicion villains could penetrate invisible roofs.

Walking out of here was equally bad, however. This was the worst part of town for missing persons and violence. People that walked through the streets here
sometimes turned up the next day, or even a week later, claiming to have lost their memory. Usually they were weak, suffering blood loss, and sometimes suffered from strange maladies that cleared up without the use of medicine.

Most honest, hard-working citizens cursed drugs for this, of course. And even though it often happened that normal people
—men and women both—reported these strange occurrences, it was a college town. Not much more needed to be said.

Regardless, if there was something fishy going on in these parts, I didn’t want to know about it. I had enough
fodder for my secret box. I didn’t need more crazy to wedge between me and everyone else.

But the question remained
: Walk or hang out? Stay here and let crazy find us, or hump out of here like an army man, able to run if we needed to. Able to fight. Able to…I dunno…scream or something.

I climbed out of the car, wiping my chin
of drool.
Thank you airbag, for the sucker punch.

“Sash
a, where are you going?” Jared sank further into his seat like a ground hog in a hole. He was nose diving into shock.

“C’mon, baby,” I said, helping him out of the c
ar. “Let’s find a well-lit café and call a tow-truck.”

Jared looked at his smashed car
, shaking his head in loss. “But my car is here…”

“I know, baby. We’ll just go get help, and then come back for it, okay? No one will try to steal it, I promise.”

He stared at me like he didn’t believe me. “Okay,” he whined.

Chapter Two

We took off at a fast walk,
Jared limping by my side.

“Where is everybody?” I asked myself, scanning the streets ahead of us.
Then risking a glance behind.

The street lights in this area worked as often as they
didn’t, leaving the deserted street in a murky kind of gloom. The stale hum of distant cars seemed out of place in this weird vacuum. It was like this couple of blocks was stagnant; the night holding its breath.

“Invisible men and strangely vacant city blocks,” I muttered to myself.
“Oh yeah, this is normal, all right.

I stopped at the corner of Farrel and Market, eyeing my options. Straight on was a dark sidewalk with only two working lights. Alleyways dumped out
into the street, giving dangerous street urchins multiple places to hide. If we went right, it would be safer, with limited outlets and hiding spots, but also less traffic to come to our aid if something awaited halfway down. And in this neck of the woods, something almost assuredly awaited half-way down. Jared couldn’t run, and I was barely able to support him as it was.

I opted for the hope that the larger thoroughfare would bring a car, or dare I hope
, a cab, that might help us. Or at least keep people from openly mugging us.

“Okay, baby, we’re almost there.” I started forward, muttering, “Kind of.”

Fifteen minutes into our walk, we were halfway along the still-empty street. Garbage littered the sidewalk, and old crates, half rotted, dotted the alleyways. Shopping carts stood idly by, blankets, cans, and other manner of survival items left unattended.

“But where are the inhabitants?” I mused aloud.

“Scattered or dead.”

I jumped and clutched Jared.
It was a voice out of a nightmare, rough and low. We stood in the mouth of an alleyway under a blackened street light. Darkness gaped in front of me. I could feel more than see a presence.

“Wandered a little far from home, hey pet?”
By the laughter in that voice, it was clear we were the red ball to his dodge ball game.

Darkness moved.
Coalesced. A shape stepped out of the black, huge and lumbering, circling around us. Oh crap.

Another shape stepped forward after him, just a
s big, heavy arms poised to his sides. This one passed to the left.

They were monstrous.
Both. Easily over six-and-a-half feet tall, pushing seven.

Freaking crap!

“What shall we do with you, little pet?” the first man asked, crossing behind us.

“
Oh,
yes. That’s nice.” Jared’s hands dropped away from me like fluffy clouds. His face cleared, his expression dreamy. The guy looked like he was at a sauna rather than about to get mugged by two ginormous men!

“Jared!” I whispered furiously. “Keep with me, baby.”

“She hasn’t tried to run from us, Charles. What do you think about that?” the dangerous man droned as he stepped closer, herding me toward the alley.

“That means she’s feisty, right?” Charles asked, emulating the other guy and lazily stepping closer.

My skin broke out in
goose bumps with his proximity, weird tingles creeping up my arms and legs. The sensations, largely pleasurable, hazed my brain, creeping into private places and producing an extremely terrible feeling of desire given the situation. I blinked in confusion, trying desperately to clear my head.

“
I get this one,” Charles said, taking a step closer. “Called it.”

“Figures,” the other mumbled, his attention slipping past me to a patient
and gooey-eyed Jared. “Mine has already succumbed. Look at him. He’s begging for it. Weak-willed, boring human.”

“You must l
ay it on too thick, that’s why.”

“What do you plan to do?” I asked in a
firm voice, a surge of adrenaline boosting my courage. They’d started acting like we wouldn’t fight them off. Which was just silly. Sure, they were colossal and I, solely, represented our combat unit, but I did not intend to be mugged without at least putting up some resistance. Despite the weird urges of my Stockholm Syndrome-corrupted body, I did not intend for this to be easy for them.

“Screw
you. Bite you. Maybe bleed you, depending on the time,” Charles said patiently. The other guy moved back around, aiming for Jared.

“
A whole day planned then, lovely,
”
I muttered without meaning to.

I clutched Jared
tighter, unsure why the hell he was groping me, and took a step back, trying to get Charles to step with us. My half-cocked plan was to make a hole between them large enough that I could shoot us out into the middle of the street. If I had any luck we’d get hit by a car—at least then it would be forced to stop and help.

“Smells like you like that idea,” Charles
grinned.

I
swatted Jared’s hands away from my butt. We took one more step back, each large shadow stepping with us, stalking us like predators. One of Jared’s hands reached between my legs, making me jump. Before I could turn that movement into a dart between the lumbering shapes, the Danger Shadow reached out, faster than expected, and swept Jared from my side.

“No!” I screamed, reaching for him.

Large hands swung me toward the alley. My back bumped the wall as Charles pushed in close. Six-five or more, his arms braced around me. His torso was robust and barrel-shaped, no fat to speak of.

He bent down to my neck
and inhaled deeply. “You smell like fresh rain in the forest. Seriously, why do you smell like warm, chocolate cake? All decadent and rich. Yum. I’ve never had a human that smelled as good as you. You don’t have to be coaxed.
Delicious.
”

“Gross. Get away from me!” I pushed at his giant chest, panic
thankfully starting to fight my faux arousal. 

“There’s no need to fight, little pet. You’ll like this
—they all do.” His hand landed on my shoulder with implied intimacy.

A wild urge rose up from deep inside, the part of me that always found fast cars and high-impact sports exhilarating
, unfurling gratefully from my usually carefully controlled persona. It screamed one word like a siren.

Fight!

I punched Charles in the chest as hard as I could, jarring him away from my neck. His face backed up, eyebrows dipping low. “What? Do you want it rough or something? Is that the deal? Usually humans aren’t this feisty…”

“Yes,
exactly, roughly screwing bullies on street corners is my gig,” I said through clenched teeth. I kicked his shin. A stab of pain screamed up my leg.

He
grabbed my hair and yanked my head back with an assessing glance, startling a cry.

Cue hysterics.

I slapped at his face like a five-year-old, panicking. Then turned palms into fists and tried again. My fists splashed against a hard, square jaw. Crying out, gritting my teeth against the pain, I tried to poke an eye, aiming for vulnerable spots. He didn’t seem to have any. His hand reached for my breast, completely oblivious to my kicking his shin as hard as I could.

What was this guy made of, rocks?

I was losing the fight. Fear started to drip down my body like acid. I welcomed it, chasing away the weird, completely unnatural arousal that would not go
away
. But he wasn’t relenting and I was no match for his size. Hell, not many people, women nor men, were a match for this giant.

Tears near the surface, brain scrabbling for some way out of this, I heard,
“Stop.”

Like a whip-crack, the command echoed through the alley.
Charles froze. A dissatisfied whine came from somewhere across the way, but I couldn’t focus on that. I couldn’t even focus on Charles, still too close. My attention was sucked toward the speaker.

“Release her.”

My head dropped forward as Charles let go of my hair and stepped back quickly, dropping his hands to his sides like a kid trying not to be caught ransacking the cookies. A massive shape dominated the mouth of the alley. The glow from distant streetlights partially illuminated a breathtaking face. His body, poised, ready to fight, stood tall and firm, strength and power tempered with deadly grace.

It was him!
The guy walking under the street light yesterday!

Something inside me sparked and started to glow, the draw of him once again tugging at me.
His eyes swept past me to the other side of the alleyway. I followed their journey.

And then squeaked in horrified shock
.

Danger
Shadow stood with a ramrod straight back, his pants around bulging thighs. He’d frozen like Charles. My boyfriend, who never even wanted to have sex with the light on if he could help it, and preferred the missionary position, was railing against the stranger with a serene expression. Going to town. As the receiving end. With a man that wasn’t pushing back.

What.
The.
Fuck?

“You’
re supposed to be securing the area,” the newcomer continued, his voice tight with anger. “We’ve had territory breaches every day this past week. They’re trying to take down as many of our people as possible. I’m sure I don’t have to remind you that they have a powerful mage. So I ask you again, what are you doing here, playing around with a couple of humans?”

At this point, the
only message I could grasp was a generalized, “Something is amiss…”

“We scouted and came up empty. Whatever it was is long gone,” Charles said with strain, hand cupping the bulge in his jeans.

“You should’ve reported that information, rather than sought out pleasure,” the newcomer growled. He unconsciously flexed, his pecs becoming mountains. He sported useable, workable muscle.

“Sorry, B
oss,” the guy with Jared muttered.

Ebony
eyes flashed to me. “Why is she lucid?” The Boss’s eyes flayed Charles. “Pain is forbidden, unless requested. Judging by her shrieks, it was not requested.”

“I’m at full strength!” Charles
bleated. “I have been for a while! I’ve never met a human that didn’t go for it. I thought she was just roll-playing or something. How am I supposed to know…?”

Charles sputtered to a stop within the hard g
lare of the boss. He lowered his head. “Sorry, Boss.”

“I’m at full, too,” the guy being humped by my boyfriend noted. “You can see what it’s doing to this guy.”

Jared had spread his legs wide apart,
continuing on like a cat at a scratching post. I could not understand what my eyes were seeing. My brain simply would not process it. It was like the stress and shock was pushing me to a great enough distance that this f-ed up situation didn’t properly register.

I’d need a Vicodin when it finally did, though. I had no doubt.

“I gotta blow this load, Boss,” Charles muttered, stroking himself through his jeans. “Her scent is driving me crazy.”

“Finish on the man.
Quietly.
I wish to speak with the girl.”

Charles had his pants down and sizable
penis in his hand before he even reached Jared.

“I hope this is an incredibly screwed up nightmare,” I managed
through a gaping mouth.

The newcomer
—the Boss—stopped in front of me, not at all bothered by the all-male orgy to my right. His eyes glued to my face. “Why are you not frightened of me?”

Great question.
I had no idea. I just knew that I absolutely wasn’t. Not even a little bit. I faced off against his size, pure brawn and bulk with a killer’s grace, and wanted to melt against his thick, muscled chest. It was as strange and not normal as Jared’s sudden interest in men.

So I lied.
“Because you’re not scary.”

His cal
culating black eyes analyzed me. “You are human.”

“Ten points to you for your powers of observation. Bloody good show,
Watson,” I retorted automatically.

“How do you know me?”

“I don’t. Look, give me Jared back so I can go home and try to find some amnesia pills. This has gone on long enough. He isn’t gay, for cripes sakes—at least, he wasn’t before today!
What the hell is going on
?”

“You saw me last night. You saw me earlier this evening. You show up here, in my territory. You engage with my
crew. You have some sort of strange effect on my senses. I don’t believe in coincidence. Who are you working for? Tell me, and I may let you live.” 

A shiver started at my head and worked down my body, flash freezing
my blood. It stupidly never occurred to me that death was a variable with this man. Then something struck me. “What do you mean earlier this evening?” My mind recalled the shape near the tree; the motionless stranger, watching me as I watched him.  “That was you…”