Chapter ten
In the weeks that Amaya had been trapped in Levi’s mansion, she never missed her evening walks with her mother.
Despite the hard time she gave his men, they never stopped the strolls.
She was thankful because the last thing she wanted was her mother restless and agitated.
Sliding into a light pair of linen pants and a t-shirt, Amaya left her room. She spotted Raven coming up the stairs.
“Amaya. Just the person I was coming to see.”
She waited on the woman, curious. “I assume I have you to thank for the toiletries and such?”
Raven nodded. “I just found out that you were being held here. I also told them that Ms. Sophia would show up knocking all this shit over if he didn’t allow you to go to work.”
“Thank you for both. I was going to go crazy if they kept me locked in that room.”
Raven frowned. “He locked you in?”
“My mouth may have had something to do with it,” she admitted.
“Before the stone, maybe Levi could be reasoned with, but under the power of the Akachi there isn’t anything I can do to help you. Where are you headed?”
“My mom likes to walk after dinner.”
“Can I join you? That way you can explain how you got yourself into this situation.”
Amaya nodded. Having company was a good thing. She’d only had her mother and the wall to talk to in the evenings. She gathered Anita and the three of them traipsed downstairs out a side door to the back yard. The night was humid and she was glad that she’d already wrapped her hair for the evening.
Walking around the Bayi compound was way safer than in their old neighborhood.
Even though her Uncle Paul took his sister out some days, Amaya had still used their evening walks to allow her mother to get out of their small house.
Anita walked ahead of them, humming to herself, and she and Raven hung back a bit to talk with some privacy.
“So, explain,” Raven demanded.
Amaya laid out everything from the moment her uncle met her outside of her job until she found herself locked in a posh bedroom.
“I should’ve just let him kill Uncle Paul,” she muttered as she finished.
Raven gasped. “Girl!”
Her mother turned around and gave her a chastising look. Amaya held up her hands. “I didn’t mean it.”
At least she hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
“Lucas said Buru have been at your house.”
Her heart rate picked up. “Seriously?”
“Despite the fact that I don’t like the way this went down, I think, in his way, Levi is trying to keep you safe.”
Amaya rolled her eyes. “Is this your way of keeping me from asking to go home?”
Raven shook her head. “I’m not fixin’ to stop you from trying to get out of here, but I will give you something to think about. Do you think Ms. Anita will be safe at your house when you’re not there?”
Her heart clenched. Her mother had so many good days in this mansion that it was making Amaya more reluctant to leave, so Raven’s words were unnecessary.
Still, she pondered them. Going home to an empty house with no one there for her mom during her workdays would be troublesome.
But, trusting her Uncle Paul to watch his sister was no longer a viable option, and if she cut her hours any more, she and her mother would be eating ramen noodles for the rest of their lives.
“Did your mate send you to convince me to give the king a chance?”
“Guilty,” Raven admitted with an impish smile. “And not really to give Levi a chance. Bas was hoping you would stop…poking at him. His temper these days…”
Amaya sighed. “Fine.”
“I’ve never seen him this…obsessive,” Raven told her. “Mind you, I’ve only known him for a couple of years, but still. He’s single-minded when it comes to you. If it weren’t for the curse, I would almost think…” she trailed off.
“What?” Amaya’s stomach rolled in nervousness.
Raven shook her head. “Nothing, it’s silly. We both know what would happen if a Bayi and Chawi mated, so I’m sure it’s not that.”
Amaya bit her lip to keep from asking more questions. She didn’t want to mate Levi, so the point was moot, but…did he think she was his mate?
“Ms. Anita, would you like to have tea at my place?” Raven changed the subject and walked to catch up with her mother. Amaya was perfectly fine talking about something else, so she didn’t object.
“You have a house here?” her mother asked.
Raven nodded. “My mate built it. Some of the enforcers live in the cabins that are scattered around the grounds instead of the big house.”
Raven walked with them, pointing out the other parts of the compound and explaining how Levi and his coven had expelled the Buru vampires who had set up the place.
She even explained how the staff had come with the house, seemingly under some kind of spell that tied them to the place.
No one had been able to break that spell.
“How is it being back on a compound?” Amaya remembered that Raven had vowed never to go back to her family’s compound. They had bonded over it.
“I thought it would feel suffocating, but Bas is good about taking me out. It keeps me from feeling trapped.”
“Tell me about it,” Amaya muttered.
Raven gave her a sympathetic nod. “I can’t believe you were impulsive enough to make a deal with a Bayi vampire,” her friend gently chided.
“Trust me, Raven, I’m understanding my foolish decision.”
“Are you getting along any better with Levi?”
She gave her friend a droll look and Raven chuckled.
“The only person I know more stubborn than you is him,” she told her. “He’s a sweet man under all that power.”
“He should rid himself of the Akachi before it’s too late,” her mother spoke.
“I’ve warned him,” Raven said.
“How long has he had it?” she couldn’t help but ask.
“It’s going on eight months.”
Amaya frowned. That was long.
“Is your room comfortable, Ms. Anita?”
Her mother nodded. “Very comfortable, and you know, I never thought I would feel so safe in a house full of vampires. This is the safest I’ve ever felt since I left my family’s compound.”
Raven rubbed her mother’s arm.
“It’s a beautiful night. There’s not a lot of people watching to do here, though,” her mother said offhand.
Amaya chuckled. “That’s for sure. You were liable to see all kinds of things in our old neighborhood.”
“I can feel him on the edges of the compound, but now that we’re not at the house, he doesn’t come close,” Anita said, sighing.
Amaya frowned and looked at her mother. “Who are you talking about, mom?”
“It’s a beautiful night,” her mother said instead. “Perhaps he’ll come see me.”
Her heart pounded. “Mom.”
Anita turned to her and her eyes were clouded. “Amaya, what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be at work?”
Her shoulders slumped and Amaya gave Raven a regretful look. “I should take her back inside.”
“Can we sit out here?” her mother asked, surprising her. “Maybe in the front,” Anita said softly.
“Okay, mom. Rain check on tea?” Amaya asked.
“Of course. Good night, Ms. Anita.” Raven wrapped her mother in a gentle hug.
Her mother smiled with no recognition in her gaze.
Amaya turned and walked her back around the house to the front.
She was surprised to see a hanging swing on the front porch.
Had it been there before? Guiding her mother gently into it, Amaya sat beside her.
They sat in silence until her mother sighed.
“There. I can feel him better now.”
Amaya didn’t know what to say to that. Instead of speaking, she rocked the swing softly.
“Mating with a Bayi could be so dangerous,” Anita said out of the blue.
“Why would you say that, mom?” Her heart sped its rhythm.
“I see the way he looks at you, Maymay.”
Her mother hadn’t called her that in years.
“The longing that male has for you…it won’t be long before one of you gives in. I worry for the consequences.”
Amaya snorted. “I have no intention of falling for the vampire who kidnapped us.”
Especially not when he kept locking her in her room.
The asshole.
She and her mother sat outside for an hour before she called it a night.
Her mother gave a little resistance, but she followed Amaya in.
There was a maid waiting at the door of Anita’s room.
Amaya wanted to question the woman, but no matter how much she spoke to the young female who brought her food to her, the woman would never talk back.
Amaya entered her room and rolled her shoulders. It had been a long day. She should take a shower and call it a night, except…
A restless buzz skimmed over her skin and had her headed to the window that separated her room from the outside.
She opened it and stepped closer, leaning against the pane, spying Levi walking through the woods towards the mansion.
As though he could feel the pull of her gaze, he looked up.
Her breath caught, and surely she was imagining the hunger she could sense from him.
He was too far away to see her face clearly and yet his eyes met hers and burned with need.
‘Come to me.’
His words echoed through her mind, strong and deep.
Her body took an involuntary step forward to answer his call.
Was it true? Did Levi keep her in some bizarre way to claim her?
The blood bond that she’d willingly entered to save her family was betraying her.
Even with the distance between them, her body was tuning itself to him.
She wrapped her hands around the window pane to stop their trembling.
‘Come, baby doll,’ he coaxed again.
She wanted to deny him, ignore the yearning in his voice, but it was impossible.
She could blame it on the bond but…that didn’t feel like the answer.
The power in his voice rippled across her mind, reinforcing his order, and nothing seemed to matter to her but answering it.
Before she could fully register what she was doing, Amaya was halfway down the stairs to answer his call.
Impulsive.
Foolish.
It was both those things, yet she continued her way to the exit of the mansion.
In the time it took to make it outside, she’d had plenty of time to change her mind, to consider her impulsive actions, but his magic pushed through all of that.
At the door, Amaya took a deep breath and reentered the humid night again, this time walking towards a male who had already disrupted her life.
“What are you doing, Amaya?” she whispered to herself as she closed the distance between them.
Before she could answer herself, she was already a few feet away from where the king was waiting.
The fire in his eyes sent answering heat through her body.
It was the first time she saw him in anything other than black.
The violet blue loungewear was loose on his body, though the thin shirt clung to the muscles of his chest. The pants hung off his trim waist, a sliver of stomach showing as he lifted his hand to beckon her forward.
Her eyes dropped below his waist, and she swallowed.
This was a horrible idea, but even that thought didn’t stop her steps.
By the time she reached Levi, his expression was greedy…reverent. She flushed under his scrutiny and her power flared in answer to his nearness. The chaos magic that surrounded him was heady and called to hers like nothing she’d ever experienced.
“Your escape attempts have tapered off.”
She sucked her teeth. “My mother’s life is worth more to me than my freedom and I couldn’t risk you making good on your threats.”
She studied his face for any type of insight into his thinking. There was a small tic of a grimace at her words, but it lasted barely a millisecond. Had she not been watching, she would’ve missed it.
“I wouldn’t have let you go if that is the answer you’re searching my face for.”
She shivered; he was telling the truth. She should be up in the safety of her room. Playing with this man could be dangerous. With no idea how to break the tense silence that had descended over them, Amaya clamped her mouth shut.
Levi hummed. “Let’s walk, baby doll.”
She didn’t answer, but her hand was passive as he grabbed it with his own.
“Levi,” she started after a moment, “what are you planning to do with me?”
He was so quiet that she didn’t think he would answer.
“All my instincts tell me that you’re mine. The man in me wishes I had done things the right way, but the monster doesn’t give a fuck. I’m still trying to sort it all out in my mind, but you’re mine, under my roof, and I have no plans on letting you go.”