Читать книгу Jacob - Jacquelyn Frank - Страница 7

Jacob paced his parlor, tunneling the fingers of both hands through hair that already wore deep impressions from previous passes. Though he had not relished telling Myrrh-Ann that her husband was dead, Jacob had done his duty to completion. She had known the implications of Saul’s capture and Noah had tried to prepare her for the worst, but Myrrh-Ann had understandably reacted with a mixture of grief and fury. She had attacked Jacob with both her power and the more personal contact of her fists.

She’d had no time to cause him physical pain. Noah had reached out to touch her, draining the energy from her violent, flailing body. She had fainted into the hands of the Enforcer. Jacob had been unable to bear holding her. As her weight rested against him, he could feel the rustle of new life moving against him through her swollen belly. It had felt like a betrayal to know that sort of intimacy when the mother would never have allowed it had she been given a choice.

Myrrh-Ann did not need to know that a human had killed Saul. It was better that she cursed Jacob, hated the one justified by their laws to deliver such a sentence, rather than a vulnerable woman who barely knew what she’d done. Noah had sensed he was holding back information. The Enforcer was aware of his monarch’s perceptions, but he hadn’t seen fit to elaborate just yet. He needed time to think first. He needed to sort through the night’s implications before anyone else learned what had truly happened in that warehouse.

First and foremost was proof of the existence of a true necromancer, one born with power and skilled enough in black arts to Summon a Demon. This he had seen with his own eyes, though it shamed and infuriated him to admit it because then he also had to admit that he had allowed that stained being to escape unchecked into the world. The sudden appearance of a magic-user did not bode well for Jacob’s race. Indeed, it did not bode well for any of the Nightwalker clans. Where there was one, there was bound to be others, and Demons were not always their only victims.

And then there was…

He stopped in his tracks, looking up at the ceiling where Isabella now slept in a room above him. He had broken an herb capsule under her nose, the combination inducing sleep, allowing him to make off with her to his home in England unawares.

The woman had done the impossible. She had slain a Demon. Even more impossible, before the slaying had even taken place, she had sensed him, empathized with him, and tracked him. A human able to slay a Demon was unheard of. Not unless the human was a necromancer.

Isabella was not a magic-user. Jacob would have known instantly. There was an unnatural aura, a vile stench that clung to magic-users. The bastard who had captured Saul had reeked of it up in the loft. The putrescence still singed Jacob’s sensitive nostrils. Isabella’s scent was soft, clean, and delightfully pure. Even under all the filth of that warehouse, Jacob had still been able to smell the enticing wholesomeness of her scent. No perfumes or lotions, no dissolute habits, not even the territorial musk of a male marred her bouquet.

Nor was she any of the other immortals that walked the night. Nightwalkers who chose to walk amongst humans were nearly indistinguishable from them. However, breeds could identify each other’s “tells,” those little differences that gave them away. There was no doubt in Jacob’s mind that Isabella was human.

But a human who could kill a Demon? Even Demons had a hell of a time killing one another. That was why being the Enforcer was such a lethal job. Only the eldest of their kind were powerful enough to do mortal harm, and only Jacob was unreservedly sanctioned to do so. Capital punishment was terribly rare, and it was no easy task accomplishing such a sentence.

As was evidenced this evening.

Isabella had merely picked up a rod of iron and plunged it into Saul’s heart. Jacob couldn’t do this. No Demon could bear touching iron. Contact with it was like violent acid on the skin. If the wound was penetrating, it was excruciating agony. If it penetrated the heart or brain, it was death. Jacob looked down at his hands, his thumbs slightly burned from the rust that had mingled with Isabella’s tears. He’d not taken note of the contact until it began to act the irritant against his skin.

Regardless, the Demon skeleton was like steel, nearly impervious. How had a little thing like her pushed that rod through ribs and breastbone on the way to the heart? Besides, unlike the Lycanthrope’s vulnerability to silver, which was widely known in fiction, a Demon’s weakness to iron was not at the forefront of human knowledge. Had she somehow known this obscure detail? To assume that would be to assume she had known what Saul was, although, after transformation, Saul had appeared the epitome of a human’s ideal demon. Or had it been exactly as it seemed, a fortunate happenstance?

Jacob remembered coming to, finding himself on the warehouse floor, and shaking his hair and blood out of his eyes. This just in time to see the monstrous Saul bearing down on the small woman and to realize he could never reach her in time. His head had been ringing so badly that he couldn’t even concentrate to use his power. He’d never known such a feeling of frustration and helplessness before. He’d made unforgivable mistakes in the encounter and it had almost cost them their lives. Providence should never have needed to enter the situation. A hundred years between encounters or not, he should have remembered what dealing with the Transformed would be like.

Jacob had known what Saul’s demented brain and body were focused on when advancing on the striking little female. A Demon as far gone as Saul was in that moment had only two basic, urgent demands. The first was self-preservation. This was why it was a formidable advantage to have a Demon enslaved. Once its civilization was stripped away by the acidic spells that bound it, the captured creature would do anything for its master if it were promised life or eventual freedom, including using its elemental powers in service.

After self-preservation was satisfied, the Transformed Demon’s next thought was, of course, satisfying its rampant lust, a state especially magnified during this full moon of Samhain. It was a similar form of what Jacob enforced and punished his brethren for. It was what the red-haired woman would have experienced if he hadn’t kept Kane in check. But Kane’s treatment of that woman would have very much paled in comparison to the way Saul, Transformed and perverted as he was, would have violated Isabella. The thought of it sent revulsion crawling down his neck, stuttering his heart into a painful, rapid beat. Jacob had seen Saul’s distended phallus as he climbed on top of Isabella. Now he closed his eyes against the vile pictures stirring in his imagination, curling his hands into fierce fists as he shook the images away.

It was forbidden for a Demon to harm an innocent human being in any way. It was their golden rule, and it was the law Jacob was sworn to uphold above all else. Above even Noah’s desires, should they run contrary to it. It was especially taboo to attempt to mate with a human. They would be far too frail for such a volatile ordeal. Jacob once more thought of Isabella, so delicate and so much smaller than their species. Lovemaking between Demons was laced with an elemental ferocity that often surpassed excessive aggression. Isabella would snap like fragile little twigs under the onslaught of such passion.

This did not mean that Kane or Gideon or the many others whom Jacob had been forced to enforce over the centuries were deviants of the worst kind. They were merely victims of the curse of their race. Demons spent the entire waxing and waning of the Hallowed Samhain and Beltane moons struggling for control. Every minute of those two potent holidays was an exercise in torment as their bodies and spirits cried to the maddening moon. Somewhere in their genetic codes it was written that during these phases, the urge to mate would supersede all else. Like an animal going into heat, they suffered an all-consuming urge that even the most polished and civilized of their kind had to struggle to control. Usually, Demons would satisfy themselves with each other, but living in tandem with humans as they did, it was far too easy for the mating instinct to be misdirected.

Every year he found himself hunting down the most respected of Elders who were falling prey to this condition. It pained him terribly to see madness on those faces he held esteem for. Or, as in Kane’s case, held love for.

Jacob had never fallen victim to madness himself. Even as a fledgling he’d never weakened to the point of craving a human female. But he had been fledged hundreds of years ago, and there had not been more than six billion humans crowded onto the planet then. Even so, he’d always had a hard time figuring out what the attraction was. Though they looked alike, Demon and humankind were very different on chemical, mental, and intellectual levels. Still, asking a Demon to reason out why he’d be attracted to a weaker being while he or she was in the throes of the impulse was futile. And if he were going to be completely honest with himself, there had been a moment earlier when even he had felt the powerful draw of a soft, warm body and big, beautiful moon-lavender eyes.

Jacob swore softly, running his hand through his hair again as he moved to pour himself a drink. It wasn’t mortal alcohol he reached for, however, it was animal milk—at body warmth, preferably, but room temperature sufficed. Goat’s milk, sheep’s milk, and even other more exotic kinds of milk produced for the young of more unusual animals were intoxicating to Demons somewhat like alcohol was to mortals; the average pasteurized homogenized milk in stores was about as potent as a cup of grape juice, where something like giraffe’s milk would be the equivalent of a strong, exotic brandy. The rest were stronger and weaker depending on the animal and where it was raised, much as a particular winemaker or grape grower could produce something indigenous only to its breed of grapes and its region of growth.

Jacob poured himself a glass of Himalayan goat’s milk and sank down into the depths of an easy chair. He rolled his head around, trying to ease some of the kinks in his neck, mulling over all the same thoughts again, knowing that soon, whether he made sense of things or not, he was going to have to talk to Noah.

“Hello?”

Jacob started at the soft, unsure greeting, lurching to his feet and turning sharply to see Isabella rubbing sleep out of her eyes as she walked heavily down from one step to the next.

Impossible!

He was not able to cast sleep inducements into a person’s mind like Kane could or force them into sleep by draining them of all their energy as Noah could, but he sure as hell knew how to blend potent enough herbs to do the trick. She should have been out for hours!

“Oh, hello,” she said, smiling at him sleepily when she spied him gaping at her from below. “Jacob, right?”

“Right,” he agreed, at a loss to do anything other than respond.

His eyes raked over her as he tried to puzzle a solution, but he only succeeded in reminding himself what a fabulously luscious figure she had. She’d soiled her clothes at the warehouse, so he had stripped her of her jeans, T-shirt, and socks and had clothed her in one of his own shirts. Somehow, seeing her in it, breathing, awake, and vital, made for an alluring visual stimulus. She carried herself in a kittenish sort of way, slow and vulnerable and irresistibly inviting. Her long, black boa of silken hair dipped both outside of and within the collar spread wide over her small shoulders. The deep vee of the shirt beneath her throat, caused by neglected buttons in his earlier haste, allowed space for one long lock of midnight to snake down her breastbone and into the enticing hollow between her breasts. Hers was a breathtaking shape, boasting ample curves for so slight a frame. Gorgeous, full breasts, a drawn-in waist, the curves at her sides set just deep enough to settle both hands within them, fingers spreading out over soft belly or tempting hips or…

Jacob felt his blood surging in hot response to his imagination, his body hardening so unexpectedly and so swiftly that it took his breath away. He turned his head away quickly, tearing his eyes off her and muttering a fiery expletive under his breath. His glass slammed down on the table in front of him and he pressed his hands atop the furniture, as if the feel of the wood could somehow ground him. His hearing, always sensitive, picked up the sound of her body and clothing as she completed her descent into the parlor. Even though she was half a room away, he could track her scent. That clean fragrance had altered, heated by sleep and perfumed by the freshly laundered sheets of his guest room. It reminded him of a sultry summer night, filled with flowers still warmed by daylight, clean damp grasses, and the sweet, delicate musk of a being clearly of the opposite sex.

Fresh, pure, warmly tempting.

And coming closer with every step.

“You should be sleeping,” he said abruptly, feeling her start when he broke the heavy silence of the room.

“I woke up.”

He heard her shrug. It made perfect sense to her and made none to him. She took another step, and another. Jacob was suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to call out to Noah. It was such an absurd impulse that he almost laughed at it. Such a summons was unprecedented, and it would very likely bring the King down on them with both proverbial barrels blazing since Jacob was not the type to ever need help, never mind call for it. But who, he wondered in a moment’s panic as her nearing heat began to assault him, who enforces the Enforcer?

No! Damn it! You are stronger than some slip of a human female! She is not even doing anything! Jacob would not let the madness of that accursed moon get the better of him. He had never lost control in his life, and he was not about to start now. He had set a staid example for over four hundred years and he wasn’t going to tarnish such a superlative reputation, not when Demons like Kane so desperately needed his guidance and censure.

With a grim set of his jaw, he turned to face her.

“What am I doing here?” she asked, her long fingers absently reaching to touch one of the many antique knickknacks on the table, softly shaping it, exploring its textures and craftsmanship until she smiled with a delight that lit her eyes an electric purple. She moved on to another, one of his personal favorites in his expansive, lifelong collection. Her eager fingers swept it with fascination and a specificity of touch that enthralled him. “I’m assuming this is your home?”

“Yes, it is.”

“I don’t even remember coming here. It’s quite lovely,” she complimented, her enormous eyes taking in the expansive room and all its rich appointments. “I see you have a thing for antiques.”

He nodded, knowing full well that what she called antiques had been brand new when he had purchased them so many years ago. Of course, there was no sense in telling her that, so he remained silent.

“You don’t talk much, do you?” she asked offhandedly as she reached for a tiny wooden figurine that she would never realize had been carved by a woman in a long-extinct African tribe hundreds of years ago, shined and mellowed with the woman’s spittle and painstaking rubbing. “Though after what happened earlier, I can understand not feeling chatty.”

Isabella put down the little wooden figure, moving her light, caressing touch to the next thing and then the next, her sensory curiosity devouring all the curves and textures of his belongings. Her gentle fingers skimmed the high tabletop, heading close to his left hand where it lay slightly curled atop it.

Jacob moved away awkwardly, all of his usual grace evaporating as he took a clumsy backward step to escape the nearness of her. Hell, he thought vehemently, the woman ought to have the sense not to get too close to a male she hardly even knows! Especially a human woman. She had no power, nothing innate to protect herself with, yet here she was, wandering trustingly into his reach.

Then again, she’d just killed one of his kind only a few hours ago.

“I do not mean to come off unfriendly,” he managed with politesse in spite of his turmoil of thoughts. “I am not used to having the company of others is all.”

Well, at least that was the truth.

Isabella tilted her head, causing more of her raven black hair to skid forward, settling like black silk against her breast as she took his measure. The touch of her eyes was akin to physical contact. The exquisite glitter of violet curiosity began with a light dance across his face, a gentle glide over his shoulders, and then a slow drifting across the expanse of his chest. Everywhere that gaze fell, Jacob felt his skin begin to burn, the muscles beneath jumping tensely to attention, his clothing insignificant beneath her visual investigation. His abdomen flexed, the sinew of his thighs twitching unbearably as she inspected him relentlessly. She couldn’t possibly miss the raging hard-on he had.

The muscle in his jaw clenched as he felt her thorough examination like a brand. Did she realize what she looked like as she did this? Had no one ever warned her of how the half-mast sweep of the thick lashes framing her candid eyes was nothing short of natural sensuality at its most potent?

“A loner,” she said at last. It was a statement, and she nodded to herself in agreement. “I can tell you don’t have six kids running around. Not with all this priceless stuff within reach. By the way”—she met his eyes directly, and Jacob felt his breath stutter to a stop—“did you undress me?”

It was that moment that Jacob became convinced she could not be human. No mere human female could put so much influence into such a simple question. No sane mortal woman would have even dared ask such a thing while standing half naked inches away from an obviously aroused male stranger.

Isabella didn’t even see him move. One minute he was standing away from her, the next his hands were on her. His commanding grip encircled her upper arms and she was yanked up off her feet and against his chest. She let out a sound of surprise as her breath rushed out. Before she could inhale, his mouth was seizing hers with barely checked ferocity.

Her hands came up reflexively, clutching at the front of his shirt for balance and for a potential protest. That protest barely germinated as his hard, athletic physique burned its masculine strength into the curves of her softer, more pliant one. He was impossibly fit, every muscle blending perfectly into the next, and she could feel him positively vibrating with life. Male and potent, it was everywhere. His hands were arresting and sure as they moved to draw her more securely against the power of his body.

Jacob’s mouth scorched against hers with a cunning sensuality that was part art form and part natural talent. It was nothing like the awkward kisses she’d tried in the past, and there was nothing platonic or remotely giggle-worthy about the sensations he inspired, whether it had been invited initially or not. He kissed her aggressively, his hot mouth and the flick of his tongue touching her lips, both coaxing and demanding all at once, as if he knew something about her that she’d never discovered. There was dizziness and rushes of heat and the pounding pulses of her blood. She tingled across her breasts and lower until she blushed. She felt a surge of adrenaline, then the wash of a sensual desire she’d never conceived existed. She relaxed her lips against his, her heart fluttering like a wild bird caught in an unexpected snare.

Jacob felt the inherent invitation keenly. He’d been waiting for it. He accepted it with an invading sweep of his tongue, moving deeply beyond her lips and seeking the momentarily withheld mate she kept shyly hidden. It was the only thought in his head—making this contact, tasting her in a specific way, dragging her flavor into dimensions rich enough to drive a saint insane. All following thoughts were focused within the haven of a hot, sweet kiss. There was nothing else.

Isabella felt a wave of heat erupting up from deep within the core of her body, the splash of it oozing outward into every single vein and vessel. The feeling was extraordinary. Until she’d felt it for herself, she’d been honestly oblivious to her effect on him. Now, warmth slid like liquid fire along the underside of her skin, and she wondered if it felt the same for him. Her tongue touched his of its own volition. She grew braver and undeniably curious.

His mouth ravaged across hers with desperation and a primal need she had no hope of comprehending in her naïveté. It was as if she were the last woman on earth, the only woman worth kissing. She felt the misting heat of his breath as it rushed over her face and into her mouth. His fingers swept up the pronounced curve of her lower spine.

Jacob growled low in his chest as her mouth welcomed him further. She tasted sweet, unbelievably sweet, like the heavy delicacy of a forbidden candy. Her skin temperature was increasing exponentially, nothing like the cooler skin of a Demon female, and he could feel every degree like a taunting touch. Even his own naturally cool body was flung into extremes of heat not normal in his kind. A cacophony of urges washed through him, so many of them that his thoughts became a haze. Instinct took the reins as his hands skimmed over the curves of that unbelievably hot skin, from her shoulder to the bend of her waist and down low over the swell of her enticing backside. She was exceedingly soft, fitting his touch with exquisite perfection. His fingers flexed strongly on her bottom, pulling her farther up off her feet and deeper into the bend of his body.

He released her mouth suddenly, his breath coming so hard that they swayed to the rhythm of it as they stood entangled together. His eyes searched her face restlessly, studying her as if she were some sort of complex puzzle. Isabella could do little more than cling to him, trapped as she was against his demanding, dominant body. She watched his nostrils flare as he took a deep, purposeful breath, as if he was drawing in a fragrance. But she wore no perfume. Then he leaned in and nuzzled her neck, inhaling deeply against her skin. It was an erotic sort of thing to do, and Isabella felt her belly constrict in response. His tongue touched her skin over her pulse, his teeth scraping over the sensitive area, and she shivered under the stimulation.

Jacob felt her body tremble. He made an appreciative sound low in his throat as he sought her mouth once more, branding her with his taste, bleeding his own scent onto her fragrant body. She made a soft, sexy little noise and it burned over his raw senses.

Their melded bodies jerked as his arm swung out, sweeping across the top of the table just behind Isabella, sending a cascade of priceless trinkets spilling to the floor. She was lifted up and her bottom contacted the wood tabletop under the guidance of his urgent hands, the sitting position naturally drawing up her thighs. Her knees bracketed his hips, her ankles hooking around his legs as if she’d done the action a hundred times before. She gave little thought to the fact that she hadn’t. She felt the thunderous beat of his heart against her breasts, the vibration throbbing right through her entire body. Jacob’s palms cradled her head, his urgent fingers grasping at the fine tendrils of her hair. It was supple, heavy silk, filled with the fragrance of a flowery shampoo. The heat of the skin it grew from was divine.

He was acting purely on impulse, every wild twist of his mouth against hers a reflection of that mindless need for gratification. Jacob’s hands dropped, his long, urgent fingers wrapping around her hips and dragging her forward to the very edge of the table, holding her steady as he pushed himself deeper toward the juncture of her thighs. She gasped at the strength he used to command her pliant body, and then moaned beneath his demanding lips when she realized she could feel his impressive arousal against the very center of herself. His body was hard, hot, and straining against barriers of fabric for the mate so close within reach. She made an abandoned sound of pleasure, wriggling up toward his aggressive frame instinctively. Her hands glided down his back, over his waist, and onto his taut buttocks, where she could feel every muscle straining toward her.

Jacob groaned with coarse satisfaction at her eager response. He made savage use of her mouth, kissing her until she was bruised, gasping for breath and practically chanting a sound of encouragement that scraped over his already raw senses. He was bombarded by her natural perfume, her aroused sex, and her blood as it pooled and heated in her erogenous zones. The mixture was heady, and he felt as if he were swimming in it.

Isabella was drowning in his fierce passion, hypnotized by the rock of his body as he used her mouth with wicked skill. He moved against her as if he needed urgently to caress all of her at once. Then she felt fingers thrusting hungrily under the shirt she wore, burning back up over her hips and belly until he’d caught her breasts in impatient palms. His touch was aching skill, an assured manipulation that molded her supple weight as he rubbed his palms against her. Then he drew an already peaked nipple between thumb and forefinger and rolled it into a deft pinch. Isabella gasped, her torso bucking forward into him. She moaned when he toyed with the opposite breast in a similar fashion, melting liquid down the center of her body until she was soaked with it.

She became aware of his personal scent, musky and darkly spiced, and ripped away from his mouth so she could burrow her face into his neck and drag him deep into her lungs, just as he had done to her. Her tongue licked along his carotid pulse and he whispered a fast, foreign phrase through clenched teeth as he shuddered in response.

“Tell me,” she demanded mindlessly. She let go of him suddenly, reaching for her shirtfront and ripping it open, not even pausing to think about what a wanton gesture it was. She looked down, stirred by the contrast of his dark skin against her pale breasts as he fondled her. She placed her palms on the backs of his hands, urging him on, tightening his touch. “Tell me,” she repeated in a low, coaxing voice.

Jacob’s senses roared, every nerve ending in his body broadcasting her heat, her sultry perspiration as it dampened their clothing and her deliciously lithe skin. His fingernails lengthened slightly, reflexively, and he felt the bristling of the fine hairs on the back of his neck. The animal within was so close to the surface now that he could hear it howling in the recesses of his mind. This woman, with this impossibly tempting body, was his.

“Mine,” he growled, low and dangerously.

The urge to mate with her rode over him in torrid waves. He could slice the remainder of their clothes from their bodies with his bare nails. He could be buried deep inside her a second later.

“Yes,” she panted softly, as if reading his mind. Her hands swept through his hair, fingers curving until her nails were running over the sensitive back of his neck, erotically taunting those alert hairs and making him even harder than he already was. She scraped her nails through the fabric of the shirt covering his back, around and up to his chest, simultaneously drawing him deeper into the tender trap of her locked legs.

“Isabella.”

Her name rumbled out of him roughly, the aroused sound of his voice brutal in its honesty. His primitive need was to dominate her, to feel her writhe in pleasure, to make her his mate. He launched back and away from her for all of a second, grabbed her roughly by the shoulders, and in a rush of vertigo and harsh manhandling, she was thrown to the ground on her hands and knees. He was behind her immediately, his muscled arm like a band of steel as it crossed her lower abdomen from hip to hip, his other hand grasping through her hair until he had firm hold of the back of her neck. He jerked her back hard against himself, her bottom snuggling deep into the well of his hips as his thighs pushed hers apart.

Isabella cried out, a gasp of stuttered shock and carnal awareness. Something in her mind tried telling her she should be afraid, but she wasn’t. Quite the opposite. Her body was eager, damp and welcoming, and becoming more so with every erotic rub of his suggestive burrowing against her. She didn’t know that he could smell that heady increase in her aroused scent and that it was putting her in escalating danger. All she knew was that, for the first time, she wanted to know what it would be like to be taken by a man.

That was when the room exploded.

Isabella was crushed into the floor by the initial force of it. Violent winds suddenly ripped at her body, lifting her and throwing her through the air like a limp doll even as single-minded hands tried to hold on to her, the lingering grip bruising her flesh as she was torn from its hold. Isabella landed with a grunt on soft furniture. She sat up and shook away the whipping tendrils of her hair, the haze of passion, and her disorientation. Her vision cleared in time to see Jacob hurtling across the room, slamming forcefully into a wall, driven into the plaster by hurricane-force winds.

That was when she noticed there was another man in the room.

Perceiving the blond stranger instinctively as a threat and hearing Jacob roar in outrage, Isabella scrambled off the couch and hurled herself at the intruder. Unfortunately, he was built like a brick fort, and she felt rather like a dust mote bouncing ineffectually against him. He turned his head, a lazy, unconcerned movement, and cocked a gold brow at her in surprise and…amusement? He flicked a hand in her direction and once again she was swept into a maelstrom of wind that stole her breath away.

A second later she felt all of her weight suddenly disappear, her body becoming the consistency of dust, causing the confining wind to pass right through her. She watched in awe as debris caught in the slipstream rushed through her as well. She heard the newcomer swear bitingly, and Isabella instinctively knew the golden-haired visitor was going to do something to injure Jacob further as he focused all of his attention on him. She felt a force of power explode out from the giant and could see the eddy of air currents as they hit Jacob like a nuclear blast. About the time the side of the house blew out and sent Jacob flying outside, Isabella became solid again. Her touchdown onto her feet was abrupt and awkward.

By now, she was working purely on instinct. Jacob had saved her life and was in terrible danger, and she had to do something. Before another millisecond could pass, she was once more hurtling through the air. As if Bruce Lee had suddenly invaded her, Isabella found herself nearly kicking the man’s head off his body. She whirled and struck again, his surprised grunt giving her satisfaction as she swung her leg up and around high enough to force her heel into his Romanesque nose.

The intruder flew backward at the impact, landing hard on his back with a stunned cough. Before he had a chance to regroup, she was on him, straddling his massive chest and grabbing up the nearest thing she could find to threaten him with. It happened to be a heavy potted plant, the planter made of some kind of pewter. It wasn’t an iron bar, but she was sure it would hurt. She wielded it over his head with the confidence of that fact radiating out of her every pore.

“No, wait!” He threw up his hands in a protective gesture, and in spite of herself, Isabella hesitated. “I was protecting you!”

“Like hell!” she barked out, aiming the planter with intent.

“I swear! Listen to me, please. He would have hurt you! Don’t you understand that, you foolish woman?”

“Tsk…it’s not wise to insult a ‘foolish woman’ with the upper hand,” she threatened, jiggling the pot in her hands until the leaves of the plant within shook.

“What in hell is going on here?”

Isabella and the stranger looked at each other, both taking a moment to realize that neither of them had spoken, even though that had been the sentence on the tip of each of their tongues. They turned their heads in unison to see yet another stranger, this one with dark reddish black hair and an imperious aura that, in a way, reminded Isabella of Jacob. This new stranger stood reeking of power and authority on the threshold of Jacob’s home.

“Noah!” the one stranger said to the other, a mixture of relief and embarrassment in his voice. “Get this hellion off me.”

“Come one step closer and I’ll bash his tiny brain in,” Isabella warned.

Noah didn’t move, but he didn’t look very concerned either. Instead, he looked as though he were just this side of laughing his head off. Isabella was aware of his eyes traveling leisurely over her, and that was when she realized the torn shirt she wore was gaping wide, exposing a great deal of her breasts.

With a cry, Isabella dropped her burden and grabbed her shirt, clutching the material closed. Unfortunately, she forgot she’d been holding the pot over blondie’s head. With a yelp of shock, he jerked his head aside, avoiding the brunt of the would-be weapon’s strike but getting a face full of planting soil when the pot burst and spilled its guts all over him.

Isabella was aghast as the man spluttered and spat out words that sounded suspiciously like swearing in a foreign language. She scrambled off his chest, not wanting to be within reach when he regained his eyesight. The blond giant sat up and shook off mounds of soil with a couple of jerks of his head. Isabella was backing off from the two strangers, her wary eyes glued to them, her hands still grasping at her shirt.

Noah watched the ebony-haired female take in her surroundings with the sharp eye of a hunter. The King was full of questions, but he didn’t think he was going to get much satisfaction out of her. He turned instead to the other man in the room. “Elijah, would you care to tell me what is going on?”

The huge male surged to his feet, dusting dirt out of his hair with a disgruntled sound as he turned a grim expression to his King. “I was passing by and there was a massive change in the atmosphere. It was so strong it literally jerked me out of the sky. I investigated and it turned out it was a change in gravitational force. A side effect of…well…Jacob was out of control. He was…I found Jacob…um…” Elijah shifted his weight in discomfort. “He was consorting with this female…or about to. I stopped him just in time.”

“Jacob?” Noah gasped, his shock so resounding that Isabella felt instantly insulted.

“No one asked you to stop him,” she said sharply, her eyes shooting fiery daggers at the one called Elijah. “What the hell business is it of yours if Jacob…uh…consorts with me?”

“That would require a lengthy explanation,” Noah offered in answer.

“I have time,” she shot back.

Noah stepped forward, made eye contact with her, and raised his hand in a graceful sweep of his fingers. “You look tired,” he remarked.

Isabella blinked, was overcome by a wash of exhaustion, and yawned against her will. Her chin lifted stubbornly as she swayed on her feet.

Noah went very still and Elijah’s jaw fell open.

Noah manipulated her personal energy further, literally sucking the strength out of her with such force that Elijah could feel it tingling across his skin. Isabella stepped back hard as if hit physically. Helpless against Noah’s awesome power, she crumpled to the floor, curled up into a fetal position, and promptly fell into an exhausted sleep.

Jacob opened his eyes and instantly regretted it. His head was a gymnasium of jumping, dashing pain. With a groan, he forced himself into an upright position, trying to shake the fog out of his skull. He looked up, focusing on two blurs before him, one darklike shadow, the other decidedly more like gold.

Noah and…

“What in hell are you doing here?” he demanded upon recognizing Elijah, indulging in the knee-jerk reaction of hostility even though he wasn’t at all sure why he wanted to.

“Saving your ass,” Elijah quipped, smiling with a flash of teeth that was a combination of boyishness and outright feral pleasure.

“The hell you are!” Jacob barked, his pride bent at the very idea. He might be in a fog, but he knew he could take care of himself and needed no one to save him from anything.

“I am sorry to say it, my friend, but he is telling the truth.”

Jacob swung his gaze to the Demon King. Noah’s sea green and gray eyes were a serious match to the grim press of his mouth.

“Look, Jacob.” Noah indicated to something lying curled up on the couch next to his hip.

Isabella.

Beautiful Isabella. Curled up like a sweet kitten and breathing so deeply that she made a noise in the back of her throat with every exhale. Sound asleep, looking like an ethereal angel, and…

Bruised.

He stared in horror as he realized those were his fingerprints pressed deeply into her neck and throat, as well as the bare curve of her upper thigh. Everything came rushing back to him, the implications hitting him like a gut punch, stealing his breath away as his face burned in appalled shame.

“Oh, no,” he rasped, his dismay and devastation grinding into those two simple words.

“Easy, Jacob,” Noah said quickly. “Elijah arrived in time to keep you from harming her any further.”

Barely, Jacob recalled. He remembered the lust, the craving for Isabella that had so overwhelmed him. He remembered how close he had come to taking her, mating with her, damn the consequences. In fact, the consequences had never once entered his mind. Even now, though he was full of despair over his lack of control, he couldn’t shake the urge he had to get closer to her, to touch her, to drag that delicate body in a crush against him and taste her again. It rode him heavily, rooted in his gut and groin, and he was filled with the dreadful conviction that he would never be able to remove that need from his soul. Ever.

“I never meant to hurt her,” Jacob said quietly. The irony of speaking the exact words Kane had used gutted him with anger—anger at himself and frustrated outrage that those he highly respected had been witness to his humiliation.

“We know that,” Noah said evenly, hoping to be some kind of comfort to him. “What we do not know is how she came to be in your home.” Noah leaned forward. “What in the world would possess you to bring a temptation such as this onto your territory?” the Demon King demanded of his champion. “You are not infallible, Jacob, even if you are the Enforcer. You are Demon. You too can fall to the madness of the Hallowed moon.”

“I know that!”

“Then why,” Elijah asked, “did you bring her to your home?”

“Because she…because I needed to figure something out about her. She is not usual for a human female.”

“You’re telling me,” Elijah said wryly, gingerly touching his bruised nose.

“What made you think she was unusual?” Noah asked.

Jacob took a deep breath before dropping the bomb. “She killed Saul.”

The two Demons across from him sucked in air as if they were suddenly drowning for it. Jacob instinctively got to his feet and sat on the arm of the couch beside Isabella’s head, crossing an arm to the back of the sofa in a clearly protective gesture.

“That is impossible,” Noah said quietly.

“I saw it with my own eyes. Saul had completely Transformed. I miscalculated his power…his strength. It has been too long since I have fought an altered Demon. He severely injured me, but she stopped him.”

“This little human creature killed one of us? One of the Transformed?” Elijah snorted in disbelief. “He must have been unconscious. Incapacitated.”

“That same little creature broke your nose not twenty minutes ago, Elijah,” Noah reminded him dryly. “Were you unconscious or incapacitated?” The King was frowning, worry lines etching deeply across his broad forehead. “I have never heard of such a thing,” Noah informed them. “You were right to detain her, but it was wrong of you not to be forthcoming about it sooner. I do not understand why you put both of your lives in danger, Jacob. What would have kept her from possibly killing you? And then the way Elijah found you with her…”

“I cannot explain it. Any of it. I just…I just knew she was not a danger to me. Even in spite of knowing how she has affected me, I still do not look at her as a threat or at myself as a threat to her. I cannot explain it, Noah. I have been the Enforcer for four hundred years. Never in all that time have I strayed. Never once have I entertained the slightest craving to do so. And yet, with her, there is no conscience in me. No sense of my cultural mores. She…” Jacob paused to move a wisp of hair off her cheek. “It feels as though there is no wrong in what I did. Everything I have come to believe in my lifetime tells me that it is very wrong, but it does not feel like it.”

“That’s the madness talking,” Elijah scoffed with disgust. “You were like an animal when I arrived, Jacob. You would have torn her to pieces.”

“No!” Jacob’s fury was punctuated as he snarled at Elijah. “The urge to mate with her was not entirely that of a beast who would use any female without discrimination. It was different. I…” He was at a loss, looking away from the stunned expressions of the other two males. “It was primitive, yes, but not just lustful instinct. It was more…deeper…something I could not resist. No, not even I.”

Noah stood up then, suddenly feeling like it would be a good idea not to be sitting so close to this woman who had somehow managed to become the fixation of the unbendable, unshakable Jacob. Jacob’s moral code was what made him the best Enforcer they’d ever had. It was what protected him. If he had succumbed to madness, there had to be something more to it than met the eye.

Who was this woman who could kill a Demon, who had beat down Elijah, the Captain of Noah’s fighting forces? Enchanting Jacob, the implacable Enforcer? And what of the way she had resisted his drain on her energy? Yes, Noah thought heavily, there was definitely more to be discovered here.

He could only hope that it was not the bad tidings he thought it was.