Warrior Enchanted: The Sons of the Zodiac Read online

  He craved her. He was utterly bewitched by her. And he knew he’d no more be able to hold her than he could hold water through his fingers.

  Waves of pleasure assailed his body, the epicenter at the base of his spine.

  He needed her.

  Now.

  “Emerson.” With a ragged breath, he pulled at her slight frame, dragging her up his body until her core was again positioned over him. In one flash of movement, she impaled herself on him, the tight warmth of her body consuming him.

  Wrapping her in his arms, he shifted, rolling her to her back as he held his weight above her. With rough hands, he dragged her legs up until she wrapped them around his hips and mindlessly drove into her, satisfaction whipping through him as her movements matched his.

  Dark cries echoed around the room as they drove each other toward a shared goal. Sweat slicked their bodies as they surrendered to a passion that refused to be sated.

  A passion she refused to bring into the light.

  Drake felt her body tighten around his, felt the telltale tightness as the walls around his cock closed in. On a triumphant cry, he shouted her name again and buried himself to the hilt, desperate to drag a response from her.

  As the pleasure crashed—over him, around him, within him—he heard it. Whisper soft and the antithesis of the vibrant, effervescent woman in his arms.

  From the eye of the raging storm she whispered one word.

  “Drake.”

  Drake wrapped his arms around her from behind, the curve of her ass pressed against his all-too-eager cock. They’d barely settled from the firestorm and again he was ready for her.

  Who the hell was he fooling?

  He was always ready for her.

  He slammed a leg over both of hers, anxious to keep her there, even as he knew it was a futile exercise.

  Emerson Carano danced to no one’s tune, least of all his. As she’d proven all too often over the past year, she’d come and go as she pleased.

  And the going always came far too soon for his tastes.

  With a swift slap against his thigh, she struggled against his hold, scrambling toward the edge of the bed. “All right, Sweet Cheeks, enough cuddling.”

  He let her go, fisting his hands to keep from reaching for her. “We’re back to Sweet Cheeks?”

  She shifted and shot him a sideways glance out of stormy gray eyes. “You preferred last week’s nickname?”

  “Hell no.” He shuddered at the thought. Although he might like what it suggested, Lord Pantymelter was too twisted, even for her and her endless series of nicknames.

  On a devilish grin, she leaned in. “You’re right. Sweet Cheeks is so uninspired. I think I’ll switch back to Wonder Stud.”

  “Emerson.”

  When she looked at him with a wide-eyed, mischievous gaze, he couldn’t stop the words. “How about my name? Just my name.”

  “I use your name.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “I use it when I come.”

  Why the hell was this so important to him? He was getting no-strings-attached sex. So why did that simple fact chafe so badly? “That’s the only time you use it.”

  “That’s enough.”

  “No, it’s not enough.”

  She thrust a leg into a pair of jeans, the storm clouds immediately evident in her gray gaze. “You know the rules, Ace. This has to be enough.”

  “Well, it’s not, damn it.”

  “Too bad. My body, my rules. Take it or leave it.”

  She dragged a navy blue tank top over her head, the tight points of her nipples visible through the cotton, and damn it if his gaze didn’t laser in on that fact. Anger balled in his stomach at his helpless reaction to her.

  He had control.

  A great deal of it, truth be told.

  So what was it about this one pixie-sized woman that made him lose every last bit of it?

  Dragging his gaze away from her chest, he focused on her face and the wry quirk of her lips. “I know it may come as a surprise to you, but I actually enjoy your company.”

  The slight smile fell as she gave him a nearly imperceptible shrug, the tight set of her slim shoulders a direct opposite to the casual gesture. “Every man enjoys getting laid.”

  “Fuck, Emerson. Don’t insult me or yourself. I like you. The person you are. And I like spending time with you.”

  “Fine.” She ran a hand through the short spikes that covered her head in a soft cap of black. The tribal tattoo on her inner arm flashed, the dark ink exotic against her pale white skin. “You want to talk to me. Fine. Talk to me. Tell me about your day.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

  Moonlight reflected off of her form and he didn’t miss the sly grin that lit up her face. “Then what are you talking about?”

  “Shared conversation and interests. Time spent together. Intimacy.”

  “It takes an intimate relationship to have intimate conversation. We have sex, Ace. Don’t tell me you haven’t been paying attention.”

  Drake fought the urge to fist the sheet in his hands. He had been paying attention, damn it. With his dick most often, but more and more with his head.

  And the sex wasn’t enough.

  The sat phone on his night table lit up and he reached for it as the ringtone—“Under the Sea”—offered a dead giveaway as to who it was.

  “Ah, saved by the bell.” Emerson leaned in and pressed a loud, smacking kiss to his lips. “Or Walt Disney.”

  He didn’t disavow her of the notion, even as he cursed Brody and his damn idiot sense of humor with the ringtone.

  Although she knew what he and his brothers were, he refrained from discussing what he did for a living in too much depth.

  Or his immortality.

  She was prickly enough about a relationship; he didn’t need to complicate it with information that would send the average woman running for the hills.

  The ringtone continued to peal in the silence of the air between them and he fought the urge to turn it off.

  Why hadn’t he changed the damn song?

  The sugary-sweet notes of the music couldn’t diminish the power of the instructions that would be conveyed from the other end, but at least he wouldn’t have the immediate reminder of what he was.

  Of what he’d chosen.

  While he lived with his choice and was grateful for it more often than not, the all-consuming nature of his service to Themis came with a price.

  Drake picked up the phone and offered up a terse hello as he watched Emerson sashay out the door. Listening abstractly to his latest orders—something about overthrowing a warlord causing trouble off the coast somewhere in southeast Asia—Drake couldn’t help but wonder how he’d gotten himself into this position.

  Traipsing through third-world countries with nothing but a gun and a backpack for days on end, a slave to the constant demands of human depravity as he fought in service to Themis.

  No-strings-attached sex with the only woman he’d ever wanted to tie himself to.

  And then he remembered.

  Oh yeah, he’d agreed to all of it.

  Emerson snuck down the dark hallway, throwing a long shadow on the wall as she moved. The spikes of her hair waved back at her from her silhouette as she hotfooted it down the stairs, desperately hoping to avoid detection. Unfortunately, the small table lamp in the middle of the foyer threw a surprising amount of light.

  Just enough to ensure she’d be easier to see…

  “Emerson?”

  She had nearly made it to the front door—and freedom—when Callie’s voice stopped her.

  “Oh. Hey.”

  “Visiting again?”

  Emerson couldn’t resist giving the raised-eyebrow treatment as she sized Callie up. The woman knew why she was there. She’d probably also known the moment Emerson had walked in the house, had entered Drake’s room and had even had her first orgasm—the first of three, damn that asshole—that she’d had that evening. />
  “Just hanging out with Drake.” He showed me his tattoos. Every luscious inch of them.

  “Where is he?”

  Since “I left him behind” sounded bad even for her, she grasped at the straw offered by his late-night phone call. “I think he just got called on a mission.”

  “Which he’ll no doubt come home from bloody, bruised and mean as a wild rhino. Ah well, there’s nothing to be done for it.” Callie let out a soft sigh. “Do you want a glass of wine?”

  Emerson nearly said no. The reply was on the tip of her tongue, but something held her back.

  Maybe it was embarrassment at the way she snuck in and out of this house like a thief. Or maybe it was a sudden desperate need for the sisterhood the other woman offered.

  A sisterhood she missed desperately.

  She kept other women at a distance, the nature of who and what she was difficult to share. Add in the shoddy relationship with her own sister and there wasn’t really a female sounding board in her life save her grandmother.

  And, Emerson acknowledged, one didn’t exactly regale one’s grandmother with tales of the hot next-door neighbor who banged your brains out on a regular basis.

  A hot, sexy next-door neighbor who increasingly twisted her thoughts in unexpected directions.

  Dragging herself from an endless loop of questions she never seemed to be able to answer, Emerson opted for one she could. “Sure. I’d like that.”

  Five minutes later, she was swirling a dark red Cabernet at the heavy butcher-block counter in Callie’s kitchen. She hadn’t spent that much time in here; she avoided the room most often reserved for family gatherings and dinners like the plague.

  Even if Drake had extended an invite.

  Repeatedly.

  “You’re up late.”

  Callie swirled her own glass. “I could say the same for you.”

  “I can’t sleep.”

  “I know your grandmother is far more expert than I am, but I could make you some teas. Something to help take the edge off.”

  On a shrug, Emerson took another sip of her wine. “Nothing helps.”

  “Not even Drake?”

  “No.”

  “He might be able to if you let him in.”

  She raised a practiced eyebrow. “I don’t need the lecture, Callie.”

  “You’ll get none of that from me. He’s a grown man. He can figure out his own mind. That one only looks dreamy on the surface. A hell of a lot more goes on underneath.”

  Emerson rubbed a spot above her heart. Didn’t she know it.

  Which was the entire problem.

  The all-fun, no-strings sex fest she’d looked forward to carrying on with her hot neighbor had turned too serious.

  Way too serious.

  She took a sip of her wine in an attempt to chase the suddenly raw taste of fear on her tongue. “Why does everyone want to make this more than it is?”

  Callie’s voice was quiet across the butcher-block counter. “Maybe because it is?”

  “It can’t be. I’m not wired that way.”

  “Is anyone?”

  Emerson laughed at that one. “Hell yeah, lots of people. They’re the ones that live those nice comfortable lives in the suburbs, with two-point-two kids and a minivan.” People like her sister, who believed if she simply ignored the gift she’d been given—ignored the gift that lived and pulsed and breathed under her skin—it simply didn’t exist.

  “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

  On a quiet nod, Emerson stared at Callie, unable to lie to her friend. “No. I don’t. Nor do I think anyone has a carefree life without pain or suffering or their own personal brand of misery.”

  “So why can’t you have it, too? Love is what makes all the pain and suffering and personal misery worth it.”

  “I’m just not cut out for it, Cal.”

  “He loves you, you know.”

  The words struck as hard as a blow to the chest before being replaced with something else.

  Delight.

  Yet even as the hot bloom of satisfaction suffused her veins, Emerson fought to cut it off. “Then that’s his problem.”

  “It’s your gift, Emerson. Yours and Drake’s.”

  “I can’t give him what he needs.” But the goddess help me if I can give him up.

  Drake clawed his way through the afternoon heat of the jungle. Themis’s intelligence had been spot-on, as always. The scumbag drug lord was exactly where she’d said he’d be. Other than the land mines the asshole had embedded all along a two-mile radius from his home base, the hunt had been quick, the kill justified.

  Themis loved her humans far too much to take such decisive action, and he’d been more than a little surprised at the order. The goddess of justice rarely, if ever, ordered killing as a means to solve a problem.

  After he’d seen the shallow graves full of the drug lord’s victims and the devastating pollution that filled the nearby river—a result of runoff by the man’s manufacturing operation—Drake understood Themis’s decision.

  All of her Warriors had a job to do—a contribution that made the whole of their unit greater than the sum of its parts—and he believed in his. His military training had set him up as the perfect person to handle ops like this. He knew how to execute military strategy and could be counted on to get in, do the job and get out.

  He stayed cautious, keeping an eye out for the hastily set land mines stationed every few feet. He’d already tripped one and narrowly missed having to regrow a few limbs thanks to a quick port back to where he’d started. He did sport a nasty burn on his foot that hurt like a bitch and his attitude—already prickly from Emerson’s standard exit strategy—had gotten worse with each heat-filled, passing step.

  Why did he let her affect him like this?

  Kneeling down, he settled his backpack next to the river and rubbed a hand over his chest. The once-clean river showed the ravages of the drug lord’s greed as several dead fish bobbed along the fast-moving current. It was moments like this—those quiet moments he spent all alone—when he wondered if he’d have been better off taking his chances, living the life he’d been given and dying like a normal man.

  At least then he’d have had only one lifetime of seeing how humans fucked one another instead of a never-ending parade of lifetimes to experience it again and again.

  Stripping off his clothes, he stepped into the river. The cold shock of water rushed over his burned foot and he winced before ignoring the pain to step deeper, the mud and silt of the riverbed soft under his toes. As he continued stepping farther and farther into the raging current, the water sluicing around him, he opened up his senses.

  The pollution of the drugs assailed his skin in harsh rivets, like a thousand daggers along his nerve endings. Through it, he felt more than heard the screams and suffering the poison had wrought, from the thousands upon thousands of souls it had touched.

  Addiction.

  Violence.

  Death.

  And through it all, like a thread that grew stronger and stronger, was anguish. Soul-deep anguish borne by humanity for centuries.

  The fish on his back, tethered together by an unbreakable string, came to life in his aura. He heard the splash as both dropped into the water to swim in circles around his body, driving against the current. The animals pushed Themis’s power into the water to begin the process of eradicating the damage done by the drug lord.

  Drake closed his eyes and allowed the gifts of his immortality to do their job.

  Although he couldn’t save all the life in the river, he could begin the process of healing it. Biting down on his back teeth, he fought the rising pain as it assaulted his senses—fought the drug-ravaged water as it branded his skin with poison—and held firm against the raging water.

  He allowed minute to follow minute and hour to follow hour as he stood in the water, patiently waiting for his aura to repair the damaged river. His body weakened against the assault, yet he fought on. Fought wi
th the stoic determination he’d spent his life with.

  Only as the sun was setting in the sky did he finally give in to the pain. Crawling out of the river, he fell onto the banks facedown in the scrub that lined the soggy ground. He’d done all he could do.

  Had taken all he could take.

  He could only hope it was enough.

  The sounds of the rushing river faded as sleep took him, and just before he fell fully under, Drake whispered one word.

  The same word he’d whispered each and every night for the last year.

  It was his prayer. His benediction. His comfort.

  “Emerson.”

  Chapter Two

  The cool, slightly dank smell of her family’s brownstone basement surrounded her as Emerson ground herbs with a mortar and pestle. The satisfying crunch of stone on stone and the soft, airy scent of rosemary offered a soothing balm to the raging thoughts she couldn’t get under control.

  Drake loved her.

  She’d known it, of course, but the evidence—the acknowledgment from another person—was a swift kick to the head.

  And to the heart she’d tried so very hard to keep distant from him.

  She’d allowed her hormones and her brain to think they knew better—to think they could keep him at arm’s length—and she was paying for it.

  Who was she kidding? She ground the pestle harder as the contents of the mortar grew to the consistency of the finest dust. She’d loved him since she was a young girl.

  She could even name the very first night she’d seen him, during that full moon the August she was fourteen. Emerson remembered it like it was yesterday. The moon had been high in the sky, the oppressive heat of the city in late summer breaking slightly overnight.

  She and her mother and grandmother had prayed to the goddess that night, chanting their prayers skyward. Emerson had asked for extra help that evening, trying to find a way to get through to her older sister, Veronica, who refused to celebrate the moon with them.

  Her throat was still tight from the horrible fight they’d had that reduced them both to tears.

  Sadly, she now knew, they’d have many more along the same lines.

  After their ritual prayers, her mother and grandmother had eventually gone inside, but Emerson had wanted to enjoy the night sky a little longer. Wanted the time to stay wrapped in her thoughts as she tried to puzzle through her sister’s unwillingness to accept who she was.