Book One: The Girl (The Sanctum) Page 3

  “How did you find us?” she asked, ignoring his question.

  “We’ve spent years hunting your parents, those blasted wizards my family held so dearly, so convinced were they that their precious Maya and Philip would never turn on The Sanctum. Ha!” Max laughed and spat blood, “bloody fools.

  “Once Ava and Carter stopped mucking about, it was simply a matter of putting the best wizards on your trail and waiting, for we knew at some point you people would either mess up or get lazy. No one is that good, I don’t care how powerful you are; eventually we all get tired or comfortable. Apparently, they did just that and now, here we are, love. You and me.

  “So I answered your question, now you answer mine, tit for tat,” Max insisted obnoxiously.

  Dev looked down at him for a moment, the smug set of his mouth rubbing her the wrong way, annoying her. Before she knew it, her boot was in his face, Max’s nose was broken and he was screaming in pain. Somewhat satisfied, she felt ready to talk.

  “I’ve known your name since I was a little girl.”

  At this, Max laughed incredulously.

  “You are anything but a girl. You are an abomination. Angel and Demon, the spawn of two creatures never meant to come into contact with one another. You are disgusting,” Max spat.

  Dev studied Max for a long minute, wondering what made someone like him tick. He was young and already so full of hatred for her. And why? She had done nothing to anyone. Her only crime was existing at all.

  “And you are nothing but a tool of your father.”

  Catching the expression on Max’s face, she laughed as she took a seat on a chair close by.

  “What? Did you honestly think my parents haven’t told me what I am? How I was made? The extent of my powers?

  “Max, Max, Max,” Dev shook her head at him as if he was a misbehaving child, “I didn’t grow up in The Sanctum, in a world full of dark secrets and unfounded hatreds. I grew up with two parents who loved me desperately and equipped me with all the tools I would need should the day ever arrive that you fools with your petty grievances came calling.

  “Despite what you have been taught, I am one thousand percent a girl. A most powerful, awesome, brilliant girl who can destroy you with a thought. I can creep into your mind and persuade you to kill yourself. I am immune to your silly, little Raven blades and Shields of the Gods. I am smarter than your most intelligent officers.

  “I am half angel, half demon and all power. You have never seen anything like me, nor will you ever again. I am unique and wonderful,” Dev smiled, giving Max a glimpse of her extraordinary beauty, “and I am going to kill you."

  With that statement, Dev jumped from her seat, rejuvenated, grabbed Max by the feet and yanked him towards her. The sudden, surprise movement caught the boy off-guard and his head met the floor with a loud, painful thunk. As he tried to gain some leverage, thrashing this side and that, Dev continued dragging him across the floor, ignoring his cries of pain, determined to get him as far away as possible from her loved ones before ending his life. Max Breslin was not worthy of dying in the company of such people. He was going to die alone, with her blade at his throat, begging for his life, his cries falling on her deaf ears.

  Dev was so deep in her own thoughts, she paid little attention to where she was going. She never saw the shimmer. One second she was headed across the living room, the next she was sucked into nothingness, Max was stripped from her arms and everything went black.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  A couple of hours later, the trio exited the bar into a perfectly balmy, New York City summer evening. The setting sun reflecting off the buildings gave everything, including the pavement, a warm, pinkish tint. It hinted at the terribly hot and humid weather that inevitably engulfed the city every summer, but tonight it was like a small slice of heaven.

  Jools tilted her face up to catch the last rays of sun and the scent of the city before nightfall. The play of light and shadow on her face was stunning, especially to Darby, the slight girl standing down the block, hidden in the darkened alley of the parking garage. Darby was a lover of all things beautiful and Jools never failed to take her breath away. Jools’ dark beauty coupled with her deadly grace and utter confidence made her even more captivating than her male companions, and few were prettier than Wyatt and Ryker.

  Darby smiled to herself as she watched the boys, opposites in every sense of the word and yet so similar to one another, it was eerie. She closed her eyes and could see them in her mind’s eye, fighting as one, a deadly beautiful killing machine. Flashes of dark skin, corded muscles, playful eyes. Ryker. Furrowed brow, sharp angles, sensuous mouth. Wyatt. One completely aware of his physicality and how to use it to his advantage; the other, totally oblivious of the effect his beauty had on those around him. She feared she would forever desire to ravage one and protect the other. And knew she would do neither.

  Wyatt stretched his arms high over his head, wove his fingers together, cracked his knuckles and then slowly brought his arms back down to his sides, resting one hand on the hilt of the knife in his waistband. He felt calm, almost quiet inside as his eyes swept up and down the block. He cocked his head slightly to the side, feeling Darby watching him. He sensed her as soon as he walked out of the bar and her presence brought a slight smile to his lips. This was not the first time Wyatt had caught her watching them, but it mattered little since he never minded her voyeurism.

  “Darby,” Wyatt quietly called into the evening air, his low voice reaching out to her, but not loud enough for the others to hear.

  She allowed Wyatt’s voice to roll over and through her. Sometimes Darby wondered which she found more appealing, his physical appearance or the sound of his voice calling her name. Most of the time she wished he had never crossed her path. He was irresistible and unattainable. He was not hers.

  Quietly she stepped from the shadows and onto the street, completely glamoured and hidden to most. Ryker and Jools were deep in conversation as she came up behind Wyatt and wrapped her painfully thin, deathly pale arms around him. He turned and smiled down at her, pulling her into his arms while he kissed her hair. She was tiny, barely five feet tall, with fine bone structure, porcelain skin, shocking blue eyes and a pouty, kissable mouth. Her long, thick, blonde hair fell in perfect ringlets down her back and she was always dressed in Chanel.

  “The one and only Darby Winthrop.” Wyatt smiled into Darby’s hair, feeling her cold arms hold him tighter.

  “How come she gets to wrap herself around you but I can barely touch you without losing my hand in the process?” Jools did little to hide her disdain for Darby.

  “Let it go, little girl,” Ryker wrapped his arms around Jools, as if to protect Wyatt from his angry, little sister, laughing all the while, amused by the whole scene.

  Wyatt released Darby and turned back to his sister, carefully weighing his next words.

  “This little one,” Wyatt explained, hoping to stave off one of Jools’ infamous temper tantrums, “can drain all my blood in a matter of seconds. You cannot. Simple as that.”

  Jools knew Wyatt was trying to lighten her mood but she wasn’t taking the bait. She was hurt and as much as she hated to admit it, jealous. Of a vampire, no less.

  “Jooooools,” Darby drawled in her perfect Southern accent, “if it makes you feel any bettah, I’d drain you in a matter of seconds, too.”

  Ryker grinned as he watched Darby in action. He loved the vampire and sensing some of the tension drain from Jools, figured she might hold a little affection for Darby as well.

  “Ahhhhh,” Darby came to a stop in front of Jools and traced a slim, cold finger along Jools’ jawline, coming tantalizingly close to her lips, “that’s much better. There’s nothing quite like a Clayworth smirk. It’s rather divine.”

  For maybe five seconds, no one said a word, no one moved a muscle. Jools felt Darby’s eyes taking her clothes off right in front of the boys, with not a care in the world if they watched.

  “Stop that nonse
nse, Darby,” Jools blinked hard and stepped away from the vampire, grinning despite herself, “freaking wicked vamp.”

  That was Darby to a tee. A wicked vamp and she loved every minute of it. Born in 1847 to Southern abolitionists, she made it through The War between the States, as she insisted upon calling it, only to be turned in its closing days by the dark and beautiful Claude Grayson, someone she believed to be seeking the Underground Railroad, but was in fact simply seeking her long-term companionship. Never one to believe in eternal damnation and burning in hell—growing up surrounded by death, destruction and brutality, it was hard to believe in a benevolent and loving God--Darby had no issues with becoming a child of the night and reveled in her change.

  As vivid and enthralling as the decades were with Claude, nothing quite compared to the day she spied Wyatt and Ryker. She had been alone for so many, long years following Claude’s self-inflicted death, incapable of settling down in one place for too long since doing so inevitably resulted in a yearning for companionship and love, something Claude had provided without end while he was alive, and something all these years later, she had yet to replicate.

  His death left Darby hollow and bitter, closed off and deadly. She hunted with frenzy, careless with her victims, taunting The Sanctum with her thoughtlessness. Knowing her behavior would result in a death sentence, Darby invited it. She hoped The Sanctum would send someone after her to put an end to the misery that had become her unending life.

  Which was precisely what happened three years ago, when she followed a victim down a dark alley in Williamsburg, hell-bent on torturing the young man before bleeding him dry, only to come face-to-face with two Sanctum-sanctioned angels of death: Wyatt and Ryker.

  “Oh, honey,” Darby shot Jools a mischievous smile, “wicked doesn’t begin to describe it.”

  Jools rolled her eyes. The wide range of emotions Darby conjured in Jools never ceased to amaze and annoy her: intrigue, suspicion, fear and attraction. All balled up together.

  “You know what I’ve always wondered about you, Darby, and just never asked?”

  Darby casually leaned against a car parked in the street, making the simplest of poses seem incredibly sexy.

  “What is that, sweetheart?”

  Jools eyed her brother watching the vampire, wondering the hold the girl had on him. He would never admit it, but Jools suspected there was little Wyatt wouldn’t do for Darby. She wondered if he felt the same affection for her.

  “How is it that you managed to get my brother, the perfect Sanctum soldier, the Academy’s beautiful angel, the great Wyatt Clayworth, to go against a direct order to burn you to a crisp? What have you got flowing through those vamp veins of yours that makes my brother so crazy he would risk everything he has worked for to save your ass?”

  “Honey, you cannot be serious,” Darby laughed in disbelief, throwing her head back and shaking with mirth. “If you knew the first thing about your brother you wouldn’t even be asking me that question.”

  Sometimes humans, even the special ones, could be so damn amusing.

  “Wyatt didn’t save me, you silly, little girl. Ryker did.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  It took a few moments for the meaning of Darby’s statement to sink into Jools’ psyche, but when it finally did, she simply turned and stared at the boy next to her.

  “What?” Ryker asked innocently.

  Jools leaned against a car, studying Ryker and her brother. Best friends. On a certain level, soul mates. Which made it all the more difficult for Jools to swallow the fact that her brother consistently used his best friend to get ahead in The Sanctum. Darby was simply another example of Wyatt taking one of Ryker’s thoughtful decisions and making it his own. The plain truth of the matter was Wyatt would never consider sparing Darby because he would never consider doing anything except what The Sanctum demanded of him, be it right or wrong.

  Jools shot her brother a look of disgust. As desperately as she loved him, sometimes she really could not believe they were related.

  “Don’t do that, Jools.”

  “Don’t do what, Ryker?”

  She was used to this routine: the boys always defended one another. This time would be no different.

  “Don’t look at Wyatt like that.”

  “Shut up, Ryker,” Jools continued staring at her brother, “I can look at him however I want.”

  Darby sauntered over and leaned into Jools, trying to steer her attention away from Wyatt.

  “Oh Jools, do grow up, please,” Darby began sweetly enough, “this inability to leave your brother alone is starting to grate my last nerve. I’m sorry you’ve been thinkin’ Wyatt saved my life this whole time, but sweetheart, had you taken five seconds to flesh out that theory, you’da seen the foolhardiness of it a long time ago and we’da been spared all of your carrying on.

  “As much as I love watchin’ you get all hot and bothered every time Wyatt wraps those arms of his around me,” Darby shot Wyatt a mischievous grin, “even I’ve reached my limits with this nonsense. Now kindly get over yourself, go give your brother a kiss and let’s get the hell out of here.”

  Darby shooed Jools away from her.

  Jools pushed off the car and prepared to leave.

  “You are all making a big deal of nothing. I have nothing to say to Wyatt that I haven’t already said before. He is a spineless tool of The Sanctum, has been since he exited the womb and will always be, no matter what.

  “And you’re right, Darby. Had I taken a few seconds to think about the fact that you’re still walking around instead of burnt to a crisp in some back alley in Brooklyn, I would have known Ryker was the reason. But I didn’t because this one time I just wanted to believe in my brother. I wanted to believe he wasn’t using his best friend as a stepping stone in the furtherance of his career.”

  Ryker stepped towards Jools, but she backed away, her eyes suggesting he shouldn’t come any closer.

  “Don’t. Just let me be. And certainly spare me whatever excuse you’re going to make for Wyatt this time,” Jools briefly glanced at her brother before turning on her heel, then stopped.

  “Don’t you ever get sick of it, Ryker? Always being the crazy one? I mean, everyone knows you’re as talented and smart as Wyatt, but you’re just a little off, no? Reckless and incapable of exercising control? Isn’t that the line you guys tow?”

  Jools shook her head sadly at Ryker. She hated admitting it but she loved him, had loved him since she first laid eyes on him, probably would be cursed to love him forever, but would never understand this aspect of his personality. How could he be so damn deferential to someone else? And not even a superior, but his equal. His best friend no less. It drove her to madness. She wished, just this one time, that Ryker had stepped up and claimed Darby as his own.

  "Jools, come on, do not look at me like that," Ryker pleaded, "you cannot begin to understand."

  "Then for once, explain it to me. Because standing here, right now, this entire scene just looks like more of the same crap. You make a good decision not to follow some set of ridiculous orders and Wyatt takes all the credit.

  “Wyatt’s the one who vouched for Darby to The Sanctum, telling them what? That he looked into Darby’s eyes and couldn’t do it, saw some spark of humanity and couldn’t kill her? Ha! You and I both know Wyatt would never do such a thing. Never."

  Ryker glanced at Wyatt, sitting on a car, cleaning his short blade. The hunch of his shoulders and the wrinkle between his eyes assured Ryker his friend wasn't paying the least bit of attention to Jools. In fact, Wyatt had completely tuned her out; these were the moments Wyatt found his sister insufferable and downright bratty. She could carry on as much as she liked but the simple fact remained that Jools would never understand the intricacies and intimacies of the boys’ relationship; she would never understand their complete faith and devotion to one another. And neither boy would ever try to enlighten her.

  “Of course,” Jools continued, too caught up in her soliloq
uy to note her brother’s preoccupation or Ryker’s irritation, “Wyatt will tell you he’s covering for you and he’s got your back and he’ll take the blame because no one would ever get mad at Wyatt Clayworth for not following a direct order of The Sanctum, whereas if you take credit for your decision, the same decision that is eventually going to be viewed as the better one to make, you’ll be excoriated and...”

  “JOOLS!”

  Ryker’s voice echoed off the buildings, startling Wyatt, Darby and Jools to attention. He never yelled. He hated yelling. Ryker rarely even raised his voice. And yes, it seemed so weak and beneath him to do so now, but he didn’t want to hear another word come out of Jools’ mouth. The ensuing silence suggested he achieved his goal.

  “Now look what you’ve gone and done, little girl,” Darby drawled, thoroughly disgusted with Jools, “shame on you, making Ryker raise his voice like that, nearly scaring the skin offa me.”

  Darby was all smiles and polite words but the boys picked up on her deadly tone right away, shifting their attention to the angry vampire immediately. Both Ryker and Wyatt knew what came next: Darby killing whatever it was that pissed her off. Before Wyatt could make a move, Ryker wrapped his arms around Darby, engulfing her tiny, cold body in his warm embrace. He whispered something in her ear, making her momentarily forget her murderous ire and throw her head back with laughter. Ryker grinned and kissed Darby’s cold neck and cheek, all the while never taking his eyes off Jools, hoping she realized how close she had just come to her own death.

  “Jools, you are a very, very lucky little girl,” Darby purred as she wiggled out of Ryker’s arms, “because let me tell you honey, without Ryker around, I woulda killed your ass and drained you dry a long time ago. You might be as pretty as your brother, but you don’t have an iota of charm in that gorgeous body of yours.

  “For the life of me, I will never understand why Ryker loves you like he does,” Darby mumbled to herself as she walked away from the trio.