Dark Promises 4: Flesh & Blood

  FLESH AND BLOOD

  An Ellora’s Cave Publication, February 2005

  Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.

  1337 Commerce Drive, #13

  Stow, OH 44224

  ISBN MS Reader (LIT) ISBN # 1-4199-0137-0

  Other available formats (no ISBNs are assigned):

  Adobe (PDF), Rocketbook (RB), Mobipocket (PRC) & HTML

  FLESH AND BLOOD © 2005 ELISA ADAMS

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without permission.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. They are productions of the authors’ imagination and used fictitiously.

  Edited by Martha Punches.

  Cover art by Syneca.

  Warning:

  The following material contains graphic sexual content meant for mature readers. Flesh and Blood has been rated E–rotic by a minimum of three independent reviewers.

  Ellora’s Cave Publishing offers three levels of Romantica™ reading entertainment: S (S-ensuous), E (E-rotic), and X (X-treme).

  S-ensuous love scenes are explicit and leave nothing to the imagination.

  E-rotic love scenes are explicit, leave nothing to the imagination, and are high in volume per the overall word count. In addition, some E-rated titles might contain fantasy material that some readers find objectionable, such as bondage, submission, same sex encounters, forced seductions, and so forth. E-rated titles are the most graphic titles we carry; it is common, for instance, for an author to use words such as “fucking”, “cock”, “pussy”, and such within their work of literature.

  X-treme titles differ from E-rated titles only in plot premise and storyline execution. Unlike E-rated titles, stories designated with the letter X tend to contain controversial subject matter not for the faint of heart.

  FLESH AND BLOOD

  Elisa Adams

  Prologue

  He stood deep in the shadows, hidden from the view of any who might walk into the room. The muted strains of classical music from the ballroom below reached him through the half-open door, mixing with the hollow ticking of the clock on the desk a few feet away. The den smelled of leather and books, with the remnants of burned wood from the fireplace hanging in the air. There wouldn’t have been a fire inside the brick enclosure in at least a few days, given the warm spell that had hit at the beginning of the week, but his senses—honed to perfection over more than a thousand years of existence—perceived the slightest disturbance in the atmosphere.

  He glanced at his watch, not needing light to see that both hands pointed to twelve. Midnight. The witching hour. He nearly laughed at the irony. The party would be breaking up soon. What would all the people in the grand ballroom, dressed in formalwear as stuffy and unimaginative as their personalities, think if they knew what kind of a creature walked among them tonight? More than half of them would run away in fear. They had no reason to fear him.

  Their host was his only target tonight.

  From the looming mansion on the waterfront to the hundred thousand dollar sports cars and custom-tailored suits, the man flaunted his money every chance he got. The bulk of it he’d obtained through illegal means.

  He bit back a rumble of bitter laughter. Illegal? Immoral might be a better description. Twisted. Depraved. Paul Richardson had to be stopped. He didn’t possess a thing not spoiled by his evil tendencies. Except…

  His gaze drifted to the window, through the darkness to the large garden two stories below. On a gray stone bench among myriad colorful flowers sat the one thing Richardson’s corruption hadn’t been able to touch.

  Faith.

  The woman who, in the months of his…business with her husband, had become his obsession.

  The breeze from the ocean blew her dark hair around her bare shoulders. The long, tight silk dress would have looked sexy had she chosen red or black, but the soft peach color draped her body in innocence. So far, nothing he’d seen of the woman belied that notion. He raised his hand to the glass. How did you end up married to that man?

  If she knew half of where her husband’s business interests lay, she wouldn’t stay. Unless Richardson had been threatening her. He wouldn’t put it past him. He’d like to say he’d kill the man if he dared lay a finger on Faith, but since his reason for lurking in the shadows revolved around doing just that, there didn’t seem to be any need to threaten.

  The Richardsons’ marriage wasn’t a happy one, at least not by conventional standards. Paul had his affairs on the side, and Faith…she seemed to merely tolerate the man she’d pledged her life to. She didn’t love him, yet she stayed with him. For what? Loyalty? Why, when Paul had no loyalty to anyone but himself and the demon he’d sold his soul to.

  In another time, another place, he might have been in a position to see to her happiness. But fate had a way of twisting things inside out. The woman who should be his belonged to another man—a man who, in just a few moments, would cease to exist. Would Faith mourn the death of her husband? Would she weep?

  Would she rejoice?

  He would never find out. He had a job to do, something far more important than his selfish wants and needs. Countless lives would be saved with a single action tonight. That was where his focus needed to be.

  He dropped his hand from the window. If he had a heart, it might have broken at the thought of never seeing her again. But he had no feelings. No emotions. Do the job. Get out. Walk away. Never look back.

  The door slid open, creaked on hinges bearing too much weight. His gaze snapped from the woman in the garden to the shadowed form filling the doorway. It’s about time. Paul Richardson stepped into the room. He ambled to the desk, his gait tipsy from one too many glasses of champagne, and picked up the phone. A complication. Complications were not to be tolerated. He had to make his move before Richardson dialed.

  Sneaking across the room, his feet a soundless whisper against the polished oak floors, he snaked his arm around Richardson’s neck. The man let out a surprised grunt and dropped the phone, struggled to turn around to get a look at his attacker. That wouldn’t happen. As much as he’d enjoy torturing the man, letting him see his killer just before he died, tonight’s schedule didn’t allow for games. With one twist of his arm, Richardson’s neck snapped. The crunch of bones didn’t satisfy him now, as it would have years ago. Weeks ago. Faith, I’m sorry.

  He released the body. The dead man slid to the floor, landing in an unmoving heap on the carpet. Scum of the earth. A man like Paul Richardson, with his connections in all the wrong places, didn’t deserve to live.

  He slipped into the small bathroom off the den, washed his hands and face. He needn’t worry about fingerprints, or DNA for that matter. The human-like body he inhabited didn’t come with any of the usual trappings. It was a shell, one of a few he could choose to become at will. Given his job, the body he wore now came in handy. He’d lived in the human world for so long that he’d come to prefer it to his true form. One which would give grown men nightmares. He glanced in the mirror and smiled. His human form—dark, scarred, brooding—didn’t inspire happy thoughts.

  He wiped his face with a towel and stepped out of the room into the darkened hallway, the events of moments ago already fading from his memory. Do the job. Get out. Walk away. Never look back. The words that had been taught to him, so many years ago, had become his mantra. He made his way back to the party, pasted a smile on his face as he slipped into the din in the ballroom. Seconds later he felt the scrape of sharp fingernails just above his shirt collar.

  “Where have you been, Sam?”

  Anita. The insipid bottle blonde he’d brought a
s his cover for the evening. She pouted her collagen-enhanced lips. “I’ve been waiting so long.”

  “I had to make a phone call.” He took her hand, pulled it away from his skin. “I told you I’d be right back.”

  Her gaze traveled up and down his body. “Are you finished with your business for the night, then?”

  “Yes. I’m all yours for the rest of the evening.”

  A sly grin tipped the corners of her lips. “Do you want to get something to drink?”

  His mind drifted to Faith, sitting alone in the darkened garden. He slammed the mental door on the unwanted images. The job is done. The Council had sent someone into Richardson’s lab earlier that day to destroy what would likely have caused the end of the world as the humans knew it. With Richardson out of the way and the formula destroyed, Faith would be safe from harm. She didn’t need him around to protect her. She’d need to get on with her life, and he with his. What he needed was to walk away and never look back.

  He shrugged off the emotions and forced a smile for his date. “Let’s get out of here and find something more interesting to do.”

  Chapter One

  Faith jumped out of her car, hurried toward the rundown little cabin. Finding no path from the gravel driveway to the front door, she wove through the trees, overstepped exposed roots, crunched through the scattered leaves and brush that made up the yard. With only the pale glow from the moon to light her path, she stumbled more than once. Fell, smacked her knee on a sharp rock jutting from the dirt. She swallowed the yelp, pushed aside the pain. Her heart beat hard against her rib cage, her stomach clenched. Had she eaten dinner, she would have lost it right then. Just a little further. You’re almost there. Almost to safety.

  She glanced over her shoulder, searched for them hiding amongst in the trees. Nothing. No signs of life, no movement save the branches swaying in the wind. A sigh escaped her lips. She sped up her pace. Death’s icy jaws snapped at her ankles, waiting for her to make one mistake. Paul had warned her from the start that this might happen. There were people, horrible people out there who wanted Paul’s miracle cure for themselves. They wanted to take credit and reap the rewards. They would stop at nothing to get it. Lives were not important to them. Not Paul’s.

  Not hers.

  He’d been gone a week now. For seven days, she’d been alone. Before he died, he’d talked with her about being careful, told her if anything happened to him, his rivals might come after her next. That had happened tonight.

  She’d been lucky enough to be awake when the men had broken into the house. If she hadn’t heard them coming up the stairs, she might not have made it out alive. Had they followed her here? No. No signs of anyone else in the woods. There was nothing. Her pulse raced, her legs numb from fright and adrenaline. She broke free of the trees and rushed up the stone steps to the cabin door. To safety.

  To Sam Kincaid.

  Could she trust him? Paul had. He’d trusted Sam enough to hire him as a bodyguard for the times he transported his formula back and forth from the lab. Trusted him enough to make sure Faith knew where to find Sam, should anything happen to Paul. Despite her husband’s assurances, standing at Sam’s doorway brought to mind standing at the entrance to a bear’s cave as it woke from hibernation.

  She raised her fist and knocked on the door, her hand shaking so hard it barely made a sound. She drew a deep breath and tried again. An owl hooted somewhere in the distance. Leaves rustled behind her. She spun, found glowing eyes—a wolf?—staring at her out of the darkness of the woods. The front yard. The place where she’d just been. A shiver ran through her. She pounded on the door. Please. Please be home. Please, Sam, open the door.

  The animal turned and fled. A shaky, hysterical laugh bubbled from her throat. His car sat in a small, cleared spot next to the house. Another laugh broke free. She might just make it after all. One more hurdle. Now she had to convince the man in the cabin to save her life. Sam Kincaid was a virtual stranger—a man she’d met the few times he’d been at her home. His intense, assessing gaze had followed her wherever she moved, chilling her blood yet heating her body at the same time. Hard. Shadowy. Dangerous. He dampened her panties like no man ever had. Haunted her dreams with visions of dark, forbidden sex.

  For the two weeks before Paul’s death, Sam had been a constant presence in their house. For protection, Paul had told her. He hadn’t done a thing to make her feel safe. No. Just the opposite. Put her off balance. Made her wanton. Needy. Made her forget herself, and who she’d become. She had spent many nights hiding in her private bedroom, avoiding the man who twisted her insides into knots. Avoiding the mind games he played, the way he frightened her, made her want things she had long ago tried to forget.

  How ironic that now, after he hadn’t been able to stop Paul’s murder, she stood on his front doorstep ready to offer him anything in exchange for his protection. Anything. Even if it meant making a deal with the devil himself. Sam’s services would come with a price. How steep would that price be? If he wanted money, she had more than enough. If he wanted something else… She sighed. There didn’t seem to be much choice in the matter. What he wanted from her, beyond money, had been clear in his dark gaze every time he looked at her. If it came to using her body as a bargaining chip, so be it. Alone and desperate, she had nowhere else to turn.

  She raised her fist and pounded on the door again.

  Footsteps sounded on the other side of the door. It swung open as if in slow motion, groaning in protest, and then Sam loomed in front of her. Her heart thumped against the wall of her chest as his gaze locked with hers. His deep green eyes bore straight into her soul. Aggravation laced his expression, his mouth set in a hard, cold line. She shuddered, bit back a strangled whimper. Dark stubble covered his jaw, hiding most of the long scars that lined the right side of his face. He wore nothing but a pair of faded jeans, zipped but unbuttoned, exposing too much golden skin. She gulped.

  “Mrs. Richardson.” His voice, hypnotic in cadence, soft yet menacing, sent a shiver to the tips of her toes.

  “Faith.” She swallowed against the hot lump in her throat, ran a hand through the tangled strands of her hair.

  “Faith,” he repeated, his mouth caressing the single syllable. “I’m sorry about your husband.”

  “You’re lying.” The words left her mouth before she could stop them. She winced.

  He shrugged, a mocking smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. “Perhaps. Do you need something, or do you always call on near strangers in the middle of the night?”

  “Did you forget your manners?”

  He barked a rough laugh, crossed his arms over the broad expanse of his chest. “What do I need manners for?”

  I’ll give you manners, you big jerk. She shook off his callous words and drew a deep breath. Do it now. It isn’t going to get easier, and he’s certainly not going to try to pry it out of you.

  “I need help.”

  His eyes denied her request, though he had yet to open his mouth.

  No. Don’t send me away. Hear me out. My life is at stake. “Please let me in. I can explain everything. I don’t feel safe standing out here like this.”

  He said nothing, raised one thick, dark eyebrow and propped his hip on the doorframe. His heated gaze raked the length of her body with excruciating slowness, traveling from her eyes to the tips of her toes and back up again. He closed his eyes for a brief second, snapped them open and shook his head. Finally, he stepped back. “You can come in, but all the talking in the world isn’t going to convince me to help you.”

  His coldness washed over her, chilled her blood and froze her heart. Pride urged her to walk away, but her life had no place for pride. Not when she’d nearly been murdered in her bed. She followed him inside, pushing the door closed behind her. The hollow click of the latch sliding into place echoed through her mind. She clenched her hands into fists. “Please, Sam. I can pay you.”

  He snorted. “I don’t need your money.”

 
; “Everybody needs money.”

  “Not me.”

  She glanced around the small cabin, taking in the lack of décor and personal items. The single main room contained only a serviceable brown couch, a worn recliner, and a rickety-looking round table with two metal folding chairs around it. “Your home says otherwise.”

  “My home? Sweetheart, this is just a weekend place.” He lifted his hand to her face. “My home is so much nicer than this. I have all the money I could ever want. I don’t need yours.”

  Despite his protests, curiosity sparked in his eyes. This close to him, she could barely breathe. He cupped her chin in his palm, his thumb pressing against her cheek. His touch made her heart race with anxiety and fear, yet it dampened her sex at the same time. He could snap her neck with the flick of his wrist. A shudder coursed through her, weakened her knees. He wouldn’t do it. Certainty flowed through her like a warm caress. He would not kill her.

  Whether or not he would hurt her remained to be seen.

  There was no light in this man. None at all. A tortured soul wandering the world alone. Something deep inside her called to him, and something within him echoed her call. He could help her. He had the power to keep her safe, make her world right again. But would he? Or would he tear her down, break her defenses and shatter her soul? She might make it out of this alive—but not unscathed.

  He leaned in, his face inches from hers, the minty scent of his breath and the musky, darker scent that was the man himself filled her lungs. Wrapping around her. Making her need. Pure sex and sin. A sudden burst of longing filled her, nearly drowning her in its intensity. She and Paul hadn’t shared a physical relationship. It hadn’t been part of the deal. It had been so long since she’d felt a man’s skin against hers. She ached for it—the heat, the hardness against her softness, the sweat and slick friction. His touch seared her skin.