Chapter 1
CHAPTER 1
H elena’s piercing eyes seared into me. Her curiosity had warped into accusation. One moment they had Peter, the Dark Caster, imprisoned in a cell, and the ability to move freely between my world and the underworld. Moments later, they were the ones imprisoned in the underworld, Peter was gone, and I was left in his place. The only thing they knew was that I was the reason.
Despite my denials, Helena didn’t seem convinced that I wasn’t a co-conspirator. Her desperate need to learn the truth behind their imprisonment was clear in her graceful feline movements. Every time she moved, I did the same, cautiously, to keep her in my line of sight.
“Your human has caused a lot of problems,” she said, snapping her eyes from me to Dominic. I could feel the collective weight of Dominic’s and Anand’s eyes on me, but I was too wary of Helena to risk looking at them. After all, she was the one who’d casually suggested taking off a finger and murdering me just on the mere possibility it would fix the problem and return the escaped prisoners. If I was the reason we were imprisoned in the underworld, and if she believed freedom could be gained by my death, there wasn’t a shadow of doubt she would kill me.
“This is my problem to deal with,” Dominic provided, his voice a grave command. Before she could respond, his hand braced around my wrist like a cuff and he was navigating me up the stairs. The more I struggled, the firmer his grip became.
The clench of his jaw made the muscles of his neck bulge. His silence was ominous.
“You know I had nothing to do with this,” I explained as he marched me through the palatial home. The foreboding nature of his silence pricked at my survival instinct. I needed him to say something. Soothe my fears. Assure me that he knew I had no role in what had happened. Provide a plan of action. Something. Instead, he hauled me through the house as if I was a suspect. I hated that my mind kept going to his room of torture in his farmhouse. And the room at the entrance of the home, which he wouldn’t allow me to fully see. My imagination went haywire.
“Dominic?”
Screw this. I’m not going any farther with him until I know where his head’s at . Gripping my socked toes into the marble floor for traction didn’t even slow him. It only reminded me of when he’d taken on a roomful of people in a macabre display of violence. At least his claws weren’t out. Not yet.
I went limp. He wasn’t going anywhere with dead weight. A flit of amusement curled his lips. In a flash of movement, he swooped me into a bundle and tossed me over his shoulder.
“Put me down right now!” I demanded.
After a few minutes, he did. After throwing open the door of a room, he lowered me to my feet. Unsteady, it took me a few moments to straighten to my full height. The several inches he had on me, I felt.
“Don’t you ever do that again.”
Banked fire raced across his eyes. They were dark amber, his eyes. They drank me in and he made his unspoken challenge, swallowing the space he’d allowed between us.
“Or what, Luna?” he asked, drawing out my name in a taunt.
“You know I had nothing to do with this, right?”
Canting his head, he studied me. In an attempt to keep space between us, I’d inadvertently backed myself into the wall. His arms caged me in.
“Do I?”
As a distraction from his intense gaze, I took a look around. The room was more spacious than the one they’d placed me in during my stay. Minimalist décor. A cognac-tan contemporary chesterfield sofa in front of the wall-to-ceiling window. Alabaster walls. Two slim dark wood bookcases in each corner. Bold scenic large art pieces on the walls that didn’t distract from the view of the garden. Open French doors to his bedroom. I could only see the bed that stayed true to the simplistic style, but moodier. Dark steel-gray platform bed, larger than the typical king size. Fluffy duvet with contrasting darker coverlet. Three pillows lined across it. I assumed this was his living space. Everything about it was distinctly him.
“Luna,” he said, coaxing my attention back to him.
“You do. Why would I do anything to lock myself in the underworld with your violence-positive sister and prisoners so heinous that they were sentenced to be here? I don’t want to be here.”
Still silent, his hand enclosed my neck. Not tight, yet I was fully aware of it and how easily that could change. His thumb ran lazily over the pulse in my neck that was pumping erratically. It wouldn’t have been so frightening if he was more relaxed. Tension and wrath were in every slightest movement of his body. He was trapped in the underworld. A caged animal. He’d probably never been restricted.
“Tell me what happened again.” He leaned in, his lips inches from mine and his thumb still languidly moving.
Rehashing everything that happened, I gave him minute detail, hoping he’d find answers where I couldn’t. It wasn’t like the incident when I’d unintentionally released the prisoners from the underworld. Then, it was apparent something had happened. One minute, I was perusing a weird book; the next, it pricked me, drew blood, and I was looking down at blank pages. This was entirely different, so he got the entire minute-by-minute replay of my mundane day. My day at work, details of what I ate for dinner, that I cleaned my apartment and had conversations with my brother and Emoni. The day had ended with me winding down with a cup of ginger tea and air-popped popcorn. Dominic knew in intricate detail the title of the rom-com I watched and that it had become my top choice over my previous favorite fantasy genre, having now had my fill of the supernatural world. Pushing down any form of embarrassment, I told him how apprehensive I now was about reading a book and how close I was to using my e-reader instead.
His eyes traveled over me. “Why did Peter choose you?” he inquired, but the question wasn’t for me, just an internal speculation that he’d allowed me in on.
“I don’t know,” I said before his hand slipped from my neck and eased to my waist, under my shirt, the warmth of his touch slinking over me. Lavender filtered into the space, a somnolent feeling of peace fell over me, and I found myself relaxing into complacency.
No the hell I’m not. My hand shot out to punch him. He grabbed it and pushed it against the wall, then my other hand received the same treatment before I could make an attempt with it.
“Luna, Luna, Luna,” he drawled, a sharp edge in his tone rounding off. “Why so violent?”
“Me? You just had your hand around my throat,” I hissed.
His lips still curled. “Did you believe I was about to choke you?”
I wasn’t confident enough in saying no to respond.
“If I wanted to choke you, I would have. I was just making sure you were telling me all I needed to know.”
His thumb was back on the pulse of my neck.
“That’s not how you take a person’s pulse. You press two fingers to it.” I demonstrated it for him. “And you could have just explained that.”
“I’m not used to giving explanations.” That wasn’t an acceptable answer, but from his expression he clearly believed it was.
“And you were using magic to draw me to your will,” I accused.
“I don’t draw people to my will, I bend them to my desire.”
Swallowing, I knew it was the truth. His way.
“You were agitated, and I was simply trying to calm you.”
Helena had warned me that Dominic was ruthless when necessary but calculating in his execution. A tactician, a stark contrast to his sister who was ruled by impulsivity and violence-lust.
“I’m telling you the truth. I don’t want to be locked in here any more than you do.”
He leaned in closer, pressing a light kiss against my lips, his tongue brushing lightly against mine and causing me to immediately forget I was in the middle of an interrogation. Dominic’s hand glided along the curve of my waist. The tentative kiss quickly became rough and hard. When he lifted me, my legs wrapped around his hips, pulling his impressive hardness against me.
He pulled away, his hands cupping my ass. “What am I missing about your family?” he requested, his lips resting against mine.
“What?” I exhaled in a rush of breath. How did we get back here?
“I don’t believe the Dark Caster chose you randomly. There’s a connection and I’m curious about it. Why choose you and not your brother, Forest?” A touch of humor was in his voice at the mention of my brother’s name. Luna and Forest. People always found some amusement in it.
“Your parents met at a bar in Colorado, married six months later, and two years later you were born. They relocated a year after you were born because of a new opportunity for your father. He works as a bank manager and your mother as a stylist. Absolutely no connection to the magical world. Your brother is the least traditional of you all. If there is a familial connection, why not him over you?”
That was a polite way of saying Forest was a transient—or, to use his preferred definition—a ‘discoverer of life’ where he periodically attended college, moving from one calling to another, including being a barista, self-proclaimed events planner, writer, and social media influencer with a following that would allow him to influence a small classroom. In the past two years, he had trained to be an electrician and was currently working as an apprentice. It seemed to be something he enjoyed, although he’d comment it was just another experience . An experience I hoped would lead to a career he liked.
Dominic went on to list the various jobs and professions my brother has had since he was sixteen. Some, I wasn’t even aware were part of his vitae.
“You seem to know everything. I’m not sure what more I can offer?”
The heat of his body was enveloping me everywhere his hands touched, his amber eyes as mesmeric as a dying flame.
“But there is more. He chose you and that wasn’t by coincidence. Think. No detail is too small.”
My life wasn’t exactly exciting, and nothing stood out that would remotely link me to the world of magic. My name inevitably led to people believing our parents were hippies. They couldn’t be further from the truth. Our parents were so rigid in their beliefs that bringing up even the possibility of a supernatural world would have been quickly dismissed. The connection wouldn’t have been through my family. So, I moved to my friends. Other than Reginald, the faux witch, I had no connections through my friends, past or present.
“I think it was coincidental,” I admitted, acutely aware of Dominic nestled between my legs. “Wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe Peter watched me because I seemed likely to do what he wanted. How many people would find a strange book, take it home, and read it? The ring would have appealed to only some people, and he put himself in a position to be able to watch his plan unfold.”
“Well this is an interesting interrogation technique. Will screwing her be part of the torture?” Helena said breezily, her blade-sharp glare traveling up my legs wrapped around Dominic’s waist to his hands under my shirt and tantalizingly close to my breasts.
“Helena,” Dominic ground out to his sister and her disapproving scowl.
“We’re locked in here and you’re busy playing with your human?”
“Anand and I are locked in here,” he pointed out, a cruel reminder that without her magic, Helena lost her ability to travel between the underworld and my world. The loss of magic hadn’t removed her depthless cold look that held its own diablerie.
“I don’t need a reminder of your overreaction. If you value your human, you may rethink your stance on that,” she said, approaching us slowly and extending her arms to expose the sigils on them that restricted her magic. Dominic released me and positioned himself between me and Helena.
“Should I remind you that I don’t need magic to get rid of your Luna,” she hissed.
Feeling belittled and also like a coward for letting Dominic be a bastion of safety, I thought about moving around him and presenting a brave front. And then what? Bravely get my ass kicked? Images of watching her destroy several supernaturals with minimal effort allowed me to reluctantly accept the protection.
“Oh Dominic. This is not a good look. You’ve allowed yourself to be brought low by a human. What is it about this creature?” Helena sneered.
Not a fan of that descriptor.
She gave me another appraisal. “I guess she is somewhat acceptable. Cute. Pint-size.”
Nice insult, you giant. I pressed my lips together to keep the response from flying out.
“You’ve had better. Prettier. And sexier. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were bespelled by this human.”
Whether their speed was linked to their magic, or their very being possessed its own, she’d suddenly moved around her brother and locked her hand around my neck. I gasped out the final breath she let me take while I clawed at her hand.
“Let her go, Helena,” Dominic said with the calmness of a person who was able to freaking breathe. “Now.”
Several ticks of time passed as she scrutinized me and her brother. Then she released me with a shove and I gasped for breath, putting distance between us.
“Fuck your creature then do what needs to be done.” She crossed her arms over her chest and stepped out of our pathway. What was she planning to do, watch? Dammit, I needed to get away from this weird family and their violent, voyeuristic nature.
“I need her. We need her. If we plan to ever get out of here.”
“Dominic.” The hostility had drained from her voice. “She is here and we are locked in. A temporalibus was done. She took Peter’s place, but she is also keeping the spell active. He sees a weakness in you and is exploiting it. You have two choices. Play into his hands and let her live—or do your damn job.” The latter was pushed through clenched teeth.
“That has always been the difference between us. You’re impulsive. There’s a reason behind him choosing her, and it is imperative that we find that reason. When we do, it will be used against him. I captured him once. You know it will happen again.”
“Can’t do it while imprisoned. Make no mistake, brother, we are as imprisoned as those in the dungeon. But ignore me if you must. It’s not just you and Anand unable to freely roam between the worlds. It’s Father, too. He will only tolerate captivity for so long. The problem will be fixed. Now you must determine on whose terms.”
The slight clench of his jaw was the only response he granted her. It was enough to lift her mood. A smile spread across her face before she left the room.
The Lord of the Underworld. He’d handle the situation. That wasn’t any comfort. Because I was the situation.