But right now, he had an opportunity to do some serious damage to Margetta’s entire operation. “Just give me a sec.”
He thought about the camp and how long it had no doubt been there, causing so much terror and unhappiness in his realm. He didn’t want to use Olivia in this way because he’d be putting her in danger.
On the other hand, he knew Olivia would be game.
What rose within him, however, was a renewed commitment to do whatever it took to burn the camp to the fucking ground.
He asked Olivia what she thought and he was right. Her green eyes glinted with excitement. “Let’s do it.”
He lifted his phone back up to his ear. “Sawyer, your plan is dead on. Contact the colony and have them send their most-trusted wraiths to Helms Watch since it’s the farthest distance from Margetta’s camp. Then Olivia and I will start leading the Ancient Fae in your direction.” He then took a moment to share Luther’s involvement.
Chase murmured a very soft, “Holy fucking shit.”
“What?” Zane asked. “Why did you say that?”
“Because these are extraordinary times.”
His ability to sift through Olivia’s memories at will, made him respond, “Yes, they really are.”
He gave himself a mental shake, then added, “All right. Chase, I want you putting the entire Vampire Guard on alert. I’ll want two-thirds of our force for the attack on the camp. Have the Guard congregating in the forest on the west side of the Arundel Mountains at 11:30. You’ll have twenty minutes of quick flight to the Dead Zone. And remember, everyone in the camp can see what’s happening outside the spell boundaries, so you’ll need to stage your troops at least two miles from the camp boundary. And I’ll be providing specific coordinates. Are we set?”
Both men responded in the affirmative.
Zane loved his men. “Sawyer, go get me some wraiths.”
When he hung up, he contacted Ryder, the leader of the Troll Brigade, filling him in on the details and routing him to coordinate with Luther. The Troll Brigade would require different travel arrangements, trolls not being flyers, but they did love their cars. Ryder would have his men in place, positioned within a few miles west of the camp and ready to move in at Luther’s command.
When Zane finally signed off, he presented this portion of the plan to Olivia and Regan. He hadn’t expected an argument from Olivia, but when her green eyes lit up, he had to laugh.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
“The way you look. You’re very enthusiastic and part of me expected resistance.”
Instead of being offended, she chuckled. “Of everything you’ve seen me do over the past two nights, what would lead you to think for a moment I wouldn’t want to take part in this mission?”
“You’re right. I’m just not used to being around a woman like you.” His words opened the air between them, spinning time out. He held her gaze, and she matched him, not wavering as she stared back. He felt as though he had a dozen things he wanted to say to her, but what these might be he had no idea.
A voice came over Regan’s home security system. “Mistress, you have a visitor at your front door.”
Regan turned toward a monitor set into the bookcase to her left. “Show me, please?”
The monitor came on and Zane recognized the vampire at once. “Ian’s here. Good.”
Zane turned toward Regan, but she wore an odd expression, her lips parted. “What is it?” he asked.
Regan pulled her shoulders back. “Nothing.” She closed her eyes, appearing confused. Then a sudden blush climbed her cheeks. When her eyes popped open, she said, “Sorry. I used to know Mastyr Ian very well. We were… involved, but that was a long time ago. And for a moment, I was back there.”
And Ian had said he’d been to the guild several centuries ago. Funny how some memories never seemed to age.
Still, Zane had never been more surprised. The Ruby Fae rarely lost her footing, but she’d done so just now. And she’d essentially confessed to having had an affair with one of the roughest mastyrs in all the Nine Realms. Ian made Zane look like a mild fae scholar.
Ian was a man of few words, who seemed to scowl his way through life, and whose presence intimidated the hell out of everyone. Zane had a hard time reconciling the woman and her formal home with the vampire who never wore the traditional Guardsman woven shirt. Instead, he left his chest bare, exposing a massive tattoo encompassing his pecs. He wore heavy rings on each of his fingers, even his thumbs. His black brows were thick and sat low on his forehead. Rumors were he kept two women captive in a cave somewhere in the mountains of his realm and used them for his pleasure, but Zane didn’t believe it.
“I don’t want to see him,” Regan said.
“No problem. I’ll take care of this. And don’t worry, Ian won’t be at Angler’s Cliff either. He’ll be in charge of the Guard in the rest of the realm, while I get my troops deployed out at the camp.”
Regan nodded. He glanced at Olivia and lowered his chin. His voice came out like he was speaking with a rumbling engine against his throat. “And I don’t want you anywhere near Mastyr Ian.”
If he thought to offend her, she caught his arm and a sudden wave of her cinnamon scent flowed over him. She held his gaze in a firm grip. “You’re the one,” she said quietly. “No one but you.”
Her words about knocked Zane flat and his mating frequency began to flow inside his chest, moving around so he could hardly breathe.
He slid his arm around her waist and held her fast. He continued to stare into her eyes. The room seemed to disappear and a flash of movement told him Regan had discreetly left them alone.
The moment she was gone, he pulled Olivia hard against him and kissed her. This time, he could feel her mating frequency as well, much stronger now, and he let his go, driving through her chest to swirl over hers. The sensation was so erotic, he grew hard as a rock in a handful of seconds, ready to give her what she needed.
He kissed her wildly and savored the feel of her hands kneading the muscles of his arms. She moaned softly.
He connected his hips to hers, letting her feel how much she’d heated him up.
Her hands drifted to his ass. She grabbed him in a not-so-gentle grasp, forcing him closer. She then arched her hips and rubbed back and forth.
Goddess help him, he loved how she engaged with him so easily.
He was pretty sure only a minute had passed, but he swore if he could get inside her, he’d thrust three times and come.
Needing desperately to draw back, however, because Ian was at the front door, he created a slight physical distance between his hips and hers.
Sorry, he pathed. Ian.
I know. She was breathing hard, her fingers gripping his shoulders, squeezing. “What a beautiful kind of madness this is,” she said, chuckling softly.
“Yes, it is.” He realized he was smiling. Again.
But he had to work at calming down, so he thought about anything other than the woman in his arms. He formed a vision of the moon rising over Maris Luna, the shape of the Arundel Mountains which split his realm east and west, the way the forest moved as a storm rolled through.
When he could walk without either hurting or embarrassing himself, he left Olivia in the library and headed swiftly to the front door.
Opening it, he realized he hadn’t seen Ian in months. He’d missed the warrior. “Ian.”
The mastyr wore sunglasses most of the time, despite the complete lack of sunlight. He said they calmed him and if anyone needed calming, it was Ian. He had a battle fervor like nothing Zane had ever seen.
The brother took off his shades. The mastyrs with access points to the U.S East Coast had a wild reputation, a lot of it due to Ian who fought like a whirlwind when he faced the Invictus.
He had cause.
He’d lost more than one entire village to Invictus depredations over the centuries, which had hardened the warrior.
Ian narrowed his gaze and rubbed a hand over his c
hin. “You look … fit, Zane.”
He wasn’t given much to conversing.
Zane nodded. “And you look like hell.”
“That’s the plan. Might as well have the exterior match the shit inside.” He glanced at the house. “Regan doesn’t want to see me, does she?”
“No. Not even a little.”
Ian turned up the walk, moving away from the house a few feet. “Fine by me. We didn’t leave things on pleasant terms. And there are some things you never forget.” He looked off to the side, his lips compressed. “I wasn’t very kind to her.”
“As I recall, you’d gone through a bad stretch.”
“And you’ve just made one hell of an understatement. We’d lost Raven’s Overlook. But nothing about the situation could justify the way I behaved.” He huffed a sigh. “Well, fuck those memories and tell me what you need.”
He gave Ian a more thorough rundown of what had happened since Margetta had abducted him. He added details about the Dead Zone camp and of course, Olivia.
Ian listened intently, asking penetrating questions now and then. Zane hadn’t wanted to make a big deal about Olivia being a blood rose, but Ian let the questions fly until Zane was telling him just about everything, short of describing the sex.
Ian just shook his head. “Including you, I’m counting seven of the ruling mastyrs in all.”
“Looks like it.”
“Sweet Goddess. And there really is no more pain?”
Still in a state of disbelief himself, Zane took a moment to search his abdomen, wondering if a residual amount remained. But he couldn’t feel even the mildest twisting in his gut. “It’s gone. Centuries of pain, just gone.”
Ian grunted and scowled. “But in order to keep her, you’ll have to bond, which I understand is a permanent situation.”
“It is, which is why we haven’t bonded yet, or if we even will. But let me tell you, the drive toward a blood rose is beyond comprehension.” He told him about Ely at the Elf Lords Hideaway and how only Olivia’s intervention had prevented him from killing a fellow mastyr vampire.
“Then you’d best keep me away from your woman.”
“You’d better believe I will.”
Once Ian had run out of questions, Zane contacted Sawyer, letting him know Ian was now in Swanicott and the powerful mastyr would be heading to Helms Watch.
Zane gripped Ian’s shoulder and squeezed. “You ready for this?”
A slow smile overspread Ian’s lips. “Hell, yeah. Any chance to kill some Invictus.”
Zane grinned as well. “You got that right.”
When Zane released Ian’s shoulder, Ian nodded a couple of times, then put his sunglasses back on. A moment later, he took to the air.
Watching him fly, eased Zane. Part of him even started to relax a little, knowing another mastyr had his back.
When he reentered the house, he found Olivia in the hallway, leaning against the wall across from Emily’s paintings, her gaze fixed to the middle one.
He frowned, remembering how jarring the initial sight of the paintings had been. The one Olivia was looking at featured a familiar stretch of grassy highland, a hundred yards above the beach and leading to a forest wind-break, similar to the place he’d left his Valkyrie. Some of the vampire schools used the area for flight training youngsters. The wind off the ocean created a tough environment for practicing levitation skills and life-saving flying techniques.
Closing the door behind him, he moved into the hall. “Everything okay?”
His woman looked upset.
~
Olivia didn’t know what had prompted her to tell Zane he was the one. But at the moment, she’d known exactly where he was coming from. Ian, as a mastyr vampire, would want to stake his claim on Olivia just as Mastyr Ely had attempted at the Elf Lords Hideaway.
Her intention had been to reassure Zane she had no interest in other vampires. But when the words had left her mouth, somehow a second meaning had intruded, adding another layer to their already complicated relationship.
“Everything’s fine here,” she said, gesturing with a sweep of her arm to encompass Regan’s home. “But I think we should talk.” She explained about the slip, then added, “I just don’t want you to feel pressured because I didn’t exactly mean it the way it came out.”
He chuckled as he drew close. “As I recall, those words worked me up in the nicest way so I’m not going to regret you said them.”
He slid his arm around her shoulders and she looked up at him, wondering all over again how this was going to end. She settled her hand on his chest, sighing deeply.
He appeared serious for a moment, his brow furrowed. “Try not to worry about this right now. We have plenty of time to figure things out, what we should do or not do. And please don’t think twice about what you said; I knew where you were coming from. The truth is, if Ian had gotten within ten feet of you, I’d probably have killed him.”
At that, she chuckled. “This is so bizarre.”
“It is.”
He glanced at the painting of the grassy slope. “We train vampire and fae children out there, teaching flight skills.”
Olivia shifted her gaze to the landscape. “Your wife has a beautiful style. I swear I can feel the wind.” She turned toward him slightly, grabbing the hand that dangled from her shoulder, and asked, “Do you think we should complete the bond?”
He shook his head. “Hell if I know. It’s an enormous commitment, one of the reasons this situation chaps my hide. We’re being forced into something for which neither of us is the least prepared.”
She drew back just enough to meet his gaze. “You couldn’t be more right. I think it’s very annoying.”
He smiled and chuckled. “Yes, aggravating beyond words.”
He looked so young, his crystal blue eyes sparkling. He slid his free hand over her neck and leaned in.
She closed her eyes, receiving the kiss with a swell of her heart. She liked this man so much, more than she should given his history as a player.
She hated to admit it, but he was just the sort of man she would choose in any other situation. He was strong, powerful in a multitude of realm vibrations, spoke his mind, and was very physical. The shifter in her loved the feel of his fleshy hand stroking her throat, teasing her vein, reminding her of all the things he could do to her with various parts of his body.
When she parted her lips and he drove his tongue inside, she slung her arm around his neck.
The next moment, he turned her swiftly and she was plastered up against the wall, across from the paintings. She felt the strength of his muscled body pressing against her thighs, her abdomen, her breasts. And especially of course, she felt his stalk rubbing her sex.
As had happened many times before, he worked her up so quickly she was already panting.
But he drew back, thumbing her cheek. “Didn’t we just do this? Make love I mean?”
“Well, that was hours ago. Well, maybe only a couple. But ages, really, if you consider my new blood rose condition.”
His smile became a grin and she knew she eased him and which made her happy.
While he once more took some time to recover, she used her thumb and forefinger to stroke the diamond stud on his left earlobe. She shivered, wanting the gem in her mouth.
“Cold?” He drew his brows together in concern.
She shook her head. “No, I just really like being with you, being this close.”
“Me, too.” He nibbled on her neck.
But as her gaze shifted slightly, she caught sight of Emily’s painting. “Zane, there’s something I need to tell you. And it’s important.”
He pulled away. “Hold on, sweetheart. I’ve got a call.”
Olivia drew in a sharp breath.
Sweetheart.
The expression was so tender that for a moment she couldn’t even take a breath. She finally admitted to herself, blood rose or not, she had it bad.
She heard him talking to the Communicati
on Center, and his eyes narrowed.
When he hung up, she felt him vibrating with excitement. “They’ve already got the wraiths heading to Helms Watch in the south. It’s time for us to start setting out the bait.” He frowned suddenly. “But you wanted to tell me something?”
“It can wait.”
Oh, God, could it wait. She couldn’t imagine what Zane would feel or do once he learned Emily was still alive.
After saying good-bye to Regan, Olivia went outside with Zane and hopped up on his booted foot. Just for fun, she reached down and rubbed the nearest medallion.
“For luck,” she said.
He smiled again, then took to the skies, heading toward Angler’s Cliff and Margetta’s Camp.
She fell silent as she watched the landscape roll by. They were high in the air, the star-laden dark night sky above and the woodlands below. She wished she could see what her shifter would see in her wolf form since the fall trees were aflame with color.
The mountains gave way to a western plain. The winds blew heavily on both sides of the Arundels, so that the land had long since been broken up with wind-breaks in the forms of miles of trees. Many had been planted centuries ago to help create decent farmland out of the rocky, windswept realm. Without these wind-breaks, Swanicott would be a desolate place.
As Zane’s flying ate up the miles, she kept her gaze fixed to the horizon. He wouldn’t be able to see the camp at all or the spell, which kept it invisible.
Any sign of the camp? Zane pathed. My vampire honing knows exactly where it is and we’re only two miles out now. Just give me a heads up when you see anything.
I will.
A few seconds later she saw a golden glow and breathed a sigh of relief. She knew the glow meant Margetta was in the camp.
Put on the brakes, she pathed. I can see the Ancient Fae’s glow as well as the red flowing lines of the spell. We’ve got maybe three-hundred yards to go. I’m going to cloak us now.
Perfect.