Life Cycle (Preternaturals Book 4) Read online

  Cain nodded. If Tam wasn’t involved, he might be on Hadrian’s side. But she was involved. “I don’t disagree about Anthony. Unfortunately, you helped take something that belongs to me and I’m very possessive. Demon occupational hazard.”

  The vampire rolled his eyes upward. “Oh my God. You think you’re in love with her. That’s what this big torture sequence is all about. It has nothing to do with being on Anthony’s side or stopping a mad man. You just want the girl.”

  It was the wrong thing to say. It was too much truth. The demon ripped the fabric covering Hadrian’s torso, tearing away the Roman collar with it. He smiled at the expanse of bare flesh he was about to destroy. He wondered if the vampire would scar. Time for more cutting and less talking.

  He turned to his table of blades and clamps and spikes and crosses, trying to decide what to use first. It allowed him a moment turned away from the vampire to reign in his emotions and push the firey glow from his eyes. He had to stay cold for this. If he lost control he’d kill the vampire and never get to Tam in time. Finally, when his breathing was back to normal, he chose a thin, sharp blade. Jagged would hurt more, but he had plenty of time to get to that.

  He pressed and dragged the point across Hadrian’s skin, slicing it like a ripened tomato. The skin flayed open, red spilling out. The vampire hissed, but that was far from the worst Cain had.

  “Something I’m interested in,” the demon said conversationally, “is what holy water does to a priest turned vampire. I know what it does to a vampire, but perhaps you’re immune. You do still wear your clerics, after all. Surely, living and sleeping in that church, you’ve gotten curious. Maybe dipped a finger in just to see? I know I’m curious, so let’s answer the big question on everybody’s minds.”

  Hadrian let out a howl as Cain poured the water into the cut he’d just made. Smoke rose off the vampire, sizzling like an egg frying on pavement.

  “One less mystery of life to unravel,” the demon said. “Ready to chat yet?”

  “No,” Hadrian said between gritted teeth. “You may as well just kill me.”

  The demon laughed. “As if that’s going to happen. I’ll never kill you. I’ll keep you alive and torture you slowly and painfully until you talk. If you never talk and Tam dies, it’ll turn into vengeance, and you don’t want to see that side of me. Trust me.”

  If it came to that, he might even lose interest in feeding, only doing it often enough to survive. Hurting the vampire who’d taken Tam away from him would become his new obsession.

  “For what it’s worth, I didn’t want to hurt Tam. I just wanted to stop Anthony.”

  “It’s worth nothing,” Cain shouted.

  Hadrian shuddered and jerked in the chains as the demon pressed a silver cross against his chest. Part of Cain was disturbed his reaction was so strong to the witch being in trouble, but he shoved it down. The witch was his. That alone was enough to torture the filth who’d taken her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Tam groaned as she struggled to sit up, her eyes still shut against the light. She felt like she had a hangover. A cup of water was pressed into her hands as another hand stroked through her hair. For the briefest moment, she felt safety as she gulped the water gratefully down—until she heard his voice.

  “I thought you might sleep right through the full moon.”

  Jack.

  She recoiled from his hand, fighting to keep the water down.

  “Oh, don’t be that way,” he said. “You loved me once.”

  “Before you became a psycho,” Tam said. The power he’d absorbed from murdering the members of his coven was beginning to take a toll on him. You couldn’t make up crazy like this. His eyes were wild and a little unfocused. Unpredictable. While intellectually she knew she had a couple of days before he killed her, maybe time enough to find a way to escape... with Jack, you just couldn’t know.

  Despite the moon coming and its ritual significance and the kind of power boost it would give him to drain the blood from the last remaining cycler on that night, he could lose his shit and kill her at any time.

  “So this is where it ends?” Her voice was hoarse when she spoke. That was the fear coming out. Yes, she’d wanted out, but not like this, not the way Jack was going to do it. Beyond the coming pain of the experience, it twisted her stomach to think he’d done this to her sister.

  She should have known this would be where he’d take her. It was the cavern where the original ritual had been performed. If she’d been hidden anywhere but the demon dimension, Jack would have had to work harder to get her here. Irony was a bitch.

  “It seemed poetic,” he said. “What could be more powerful than completing the cycle here? You’ll die in the same place you were reborn. I saved you for last because I thought you’d appreciate that.”

  Tam grimaced. “You saved me for last because you’re obsessed with me.”

  He chuckled. “Maybe just a little. I’d still give it all up for you. I’m strong enough. When I die, I come back an adult now. With you, I might not be killable at all. Or I might die for only a few minutes at a time. I’m not sure. I’d like to find out, but I’ll keep you around. You just have to say the word. We could rule this place together.”

  She sat on a stone altar—a moat had been dug around it in the ground. They were beside the water where they’d found that stupid immortal jellyfish. It had been foolish trying to become gods. They’d thought keeping the same form, remembering everything, would be a blessing, would give them power. But in the end, all it had been was a curse that had slowly eaten away at her sense of what it meant to be human.

  She stood and jumped over the moat. Jack didn’t try to stop her. He just backed out of her way, giving her space to wander.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked. “I’ve brought some food for us.”

  Tam’s head whipped around, trying to figure out if he was kidding, but he seemed sincere. For the moment, his fantasies of world domination and ultimate power must have taken a backseat to his fantasies of riding off into the sunset. Lucky her.

  “I’ll just go get it,” he said.

  Jack disappeared down a dark path that she knew led to the entrance of the cavern. No sense in trying to escape, yet. He’d gone toward the only exit.

  As she paced, she tried to think of how to play it. Could she stomach seducing him after what he’d done to her sister?

  Probably not. But if she could... wouldn’t it buy her an opportunity to get away? He might drop his guard if he was thinking about their future together, instead of eating her internal organs. Such a fine line with him.

  Then what? She was back to running, stuck in this form. But she could get back to Cain. It was odd that should be her thought. Shouldn’t she want free of him? She put her hand against the mark he’d left on her throat with his fangs. It tingled when she touched it.

  She wanted to believe it was just their blood connection that made her feel this way, but she’d felt it before their blood had exchanged, and she still felt like she had a choice—even now. Being with Cain wasn’t some magical foregone conclusion, and she was sure it was the same from his end. They weren’t drone-like slaves. The mark hadn’t been in effect long enough. And anyway, he’d initiated it.

  She wondered if she’d start getting the dreams Anna had gotten with Luc. Seeing into Cain’s past was a prospect that both intrigued and terrified her, but the bond was still so new, and it hadn’t been done like Anna’s had. Perhaps she wouldn’t dream at all.

  With regards to the demon, she was torn. At times, Cain seemed oddly normal, but then, she knew how that worked, how one hid their age and tried to pick up on the current trends of the times to blend in. If they both dropped the affectations they’d picked up over the centuries, they’d be like a couple of old fossils. Nobody else would understand them. And wasn’t that what she liked about him? That they were like the last two members of a secret club that had found each other long enough to do the secret handshake?

 
She was still angry with him for trying to lock her up in the caves. For her protection or not, it was a shitty thing to do. She thought about the tarot spread again. Maybe she was meant for Cain and he for her. It didn’t matter now. It was too late. And no matter what she wanted to be true, she couldn’t decide if he was toying with her or not. As long as he’d been around and resisted settling down, he must have figured out all possible permutations of mind games.

  What he said and what he meant could be opposite things. Even what he did and the intention behind it could be that way. Her experience with Jack had killed her optimism for men. She just didn’t want to be some stupid girl waiting for Cain to ride up full of self-righteous vengeance to sweep her away like a fairy tale. It wasn’t like they had the big epic love. Ninety percent of their time together had been a grudge fuck—or a power struggle, using sex as the weapon they had both learned to wield.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  Tam jumped, too lost inside her head to hear Jack’s return. His voice came out soft and needy, like he was still planning a white picket fence and evil babies. Even the idea of seducing him—even if it would take her back to Cain, and even if Cain wanted her back—made her skin crawl like little ants.

  “Nothing,” she replied. My demon lover seemed like the kind of answer that would get her spleen ripped out in short order. Because no matter how sane and puppy-like he seemed this second, things could shift at any time.

  “No, it’s something.” He moved toward her and put a hand on her arm, closing his eyes.

  She tried to pull away, not sure what he was doing, but then she remembered one of the coven’s witches had seen visions when they touched things or people. But it was too late for Tam to stop her thought train or get away from him.

  His expression was closed and cold when he opened his eyes. “I see.” The jealousy over no doubt seeing her in the demon’s arms was only barely concealed beneath the surface. “Well, I guess you’ve made your choice. You’ve ripped out my heart, Tam. Do you know that? So I think I’ll eat yours when the moon is right.”

  “It meant nothing,” Tam said, taking an instinctive step back. The moment she said it, she knew how deep the lie ran. And so did Jack.

  “Save it, you little whore. I knew you’d been with others, but this... a demon? And you think to judge me? At least I’m still human.”

  Jack hadn’t been human for a long time.

  She wanted to throw an energy ball at him so badly she could barely contain it, but escalating to that kind of violence with a sorcerer much stronger was too foolish even for her short temper. Instead, she used words.

  “Please tell me you’re kidding. You’ve violently murdered all our friends, the only people who understood who and what we are because they were the same, and you think I’m the bad one for having a little sex, no matter who the partner was?”

  Even if she’d thought to play the role of seductress to get out of this mess, and even if Jack wouldn’t be onto her game, she’d lost her stomach for it.

  She didn’t know why she defended her actions. He was treating her like she’d betrayed him, like she’d cheated on him. Apparently her leaving him hadn’t been a strong enough indicator that they’d broken up.

  “You know we’re not a couple,” she said.

  “Not now, we aren’t. Until about three minutes ago, I still thought it could work.”

  “Then you’re delusional. You killed my sister! You killed nearly all my friends. You thought I was going to roll over and cuddle with you after that?”

  Jack rolled his eyes. “Your lover is a killer, too. He’s killed more women than you could count.” There was still the note of jealousy in his voice, like he wanted to play some martyr role. Like he was the victim in all this and somehow the good guy.

  “You chose power over me, Jack. You think I don’t know Cain has killed? You think I’m stupid enough to whitewash it? I know what he is, but I also know he’s not human. It’s what he has to do to avoid suffering.” The demon couldn’t really die, after all, just starve and suffer indefinitely if he went on a hunger strike. “You had a choice. Besides, Cain hasn’t killed anybody I love.”

  She didn’t feel like getting into the grayness of the Anna situation. Since Anna had come back as Luc’s mate, and Tam hadn’t really lost her, and Cain hadn’t had completely evil motivations, she tried to just skirt right around that issue. Either way, it wasn’t like what Jack had done to her sister, or the rest of their coven for that matter.

  Part of her wished Jack would just go ahead and kill her to spare her and get it over with so they wouldn’t have this stupid argument like an old married couple for the next two days. That might be even more painful and annoying than the ritual.

  ***

  Cain stepped out of the caves, wiping Hadrian’s blood off his hands. The vampire had lasted longer than he’d expected, nearly a human day. He hadn’t killed him, even though Hadrian had finally given up the information he needed. He wanted to leave him to suffer more. And if Tam didn’t survive, he wanted to start on him again. He tried to shut out that possibility.

  The others were waiting impatiently when he got back into town. Greta had fallen asleep curled up next to Dayne, and a few of the others seemed like they were about to drop as well. About a hundred of his demons were gathered, waiting for word. Among them were Daria and Jackson, several of the demons who had guarded Tam, and some who apparently didn’t think she was all that bad. Either that, or they understood the value of stopping Jack before the world slipped into complete chaos.

  Cain cleared his throat, and a few of those who had been snoozing sat up. “I’m going to need everybody to rest or feed. Whatever you need to do to replenish. The vampire finally gave up Jack’s location as well as other information. I was very persuasive. We’re going in tomorrow night.”

  “Tomorrow night? Why not now?” Anna demanded. “Luc, are you going to let him...”

  Luc shook his head at her in warning, and Cain continued, used to the woman’s histrionics by now. “We can’t fight him before tomorrow night. He has to start the ritual. It’ll be his one weak moment when he’s absorbing her power. He’ll be unable to defend himself, and that’s when we’ll all strike.”

  He worked to keep his face indifferent. It had become exhausting wearing this mask. Jack might not kill her before the full moon, but he could be doing anything to her in the meantime. It wasn’t hard to imagine what The Cycler might like to do with his former lover. And Cain couldn’t stop him from hurting her. He’d lose the battle and the war if he did. Still, the demon wanted nothing more than to blaze in and rip the bastard’s head off.

  “If he’ll be so weak, why does it take us all?” Anthony snarked, not happy with having to play the minion role.

  “Do you want to take any chances? We’re going to go in and annihilate him. I don’t do losing. We have plenty of firepower to bring him down, but it’ll take a lot to kill him. There are only two ways they die for real, by the hand of one of their own, or by a very strong and old preternatural being, using their power. I can throw a bunch of fire at him, but I can’t actually do him in. Do any of you girl demons want to fuck him?”

  They all made faces. It was just as well. As strong as The Cycler had become, odds were bad any of his succubi could successfully do it, anyway.

  “So that means I’m going to need demons to throw distractions at him, vampires to drain him, and magic users to block him. He’ll be weaker during the ritual, but he won’t be dead. I don’t want to make the mistake of underestimating him. This whole time he’s led us around on a leash, not worrying we’d catch or stop him. I’m tired of games.”

  Anthony looked like he was going to protest again, but instead he sighed and said, “I’ll gather some vamps and my magic users.”

  “So you don’t need us?” Cole asked.

  “You’re welcome to join us,” Cain said, “but I don’t need any shifters in this fight. Therians can stay out of this if they li
ke.”

  “What about Jane?”

  The demon knew Cole wouldn’t stay behind if his girl was fighting, and werewolves might get in the way this time. Jane was young anyway. “She can sit this one out, too.”

  “I want you to stay at the penthouse until we get back,” Dayne said to his werecat.

  “Fine by me,” Greta said. “But be careful. Don’t be on the front lines.”

  “I can’t make promises,” the sorcerer said.

  In reality, Cain’s plan was probably overkill, but he was taking no chances when it came to Tam. He’d given up pretending he didn’t have feelings for her. He’d deal with that—or go back to denial—when she was safe. He was sure they’d have a screaming match later to make everything feel normal again.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The light from the full moon shined down on Tam through the opening at the top of the cavern. Jack had tied her down and was getting all his carving tools and magical accoutrements ready.

  He looked up at the light pouring in from the opening. “Just like old times.” He whistled a jaunty tune as he lined up his knives. “I would say ‘this won’t hurt a bit,’ but there should be honesty between us in these last moments. Don’t you think, my dear?”

  Tam gathered saliva in her mouth and spit on him as he walked past. He just laughed.

  “Nice try. But we’ve made it this long without killing each other, I intend to get the most out of this ritual by doing it right. The moon only needs to move another fraction and we’ll be ready to begin.” He was more chipper than she’d seen him since he’d taken her. For the most part up until this point, he’d kept her well fed, keeping her in a cage while she slept, but mostly he’d just watched her with disgust and glared—still not over the demon lover thing.