Лори Девоти - Unbound

He escaped. Damn him — taking his power with him, measly though it was, it was her power now. She narrowed her eyes, her arms shooting out in front of her. She would stop him. Teach him not to take what was hers.

“Kara.” It was a yell now, and so loud, Kara jerked in response. “Look at me. Look at what is happening to you.”

Kara turned her head, scanning the lot, her gaze finally falling on the dog. He looked weaker now, his head hanging lower, his tail drooping between his legs.

“Kara, look at me.”

The dog. The voice was coming from the dog — no, her head. The voice was in her head, but the dog was responsible.

“Risk?” she murmured, her hands falling an inch.

“Kara.” He was tired. She could hear it. Feel it.

“What happened? What’s wrong?” she asked.

“The power. Let it go, Kara. You can’t handle it.”

She stood there, the power whipping around her, through her. Her hands trembling with her desire for more.

“It will destroy you. Make you want nothing but more.”

More. She did want more.

She stared down at her hands, turned her palms toward her, unintentionally breaking the connection.

A groan sounded from across the pavement. She looked up and saw Risk, naked, crumpled onto the snow.

Dear God. What had she done?

She ran to him, sliding and falling along the way, but picking herself up and continuing until she collapsed by his side.

She pressed her hands to his bare chest, felt the movement of breaths and the reassuring warmth of his body.

He sighed, his hand reaching out to cup her cheek, his thumb brushing along her cheek. “Blue. Your eyes are still blue.”

Then he took her hand in his, pressed his lips to her palm and everything around her began to shimmer and shift.

Kara’s living room flickered around her, as if she were caught inside a TV with choppy reception. Then with a low soothing hum, the world smoothed and she found herself on the singed rug in front of her fireplace and draped across Risk’s naked body.

She placed her palm over the hole where the ember had fallen just hours earlier. The wool pile was rough and crunchy, the fist-sized spot of wood floor exposed beneath it cool to her touch.

“Risk?” She blinked, her head fuzzy from the influx of power and her strange trip home.

He slid his hand up her arm. “You’re okay,” he murmured.

She nodded and sat up. “What happened? How’d we get here? The man, the dog, then you? I was pulling in power, and it felt good.” A shiver raced over her. “Too good.”

“Dangerous,” he said, his eyes tired.

“But…?” She didn’t know what to ask first…where to even begin.

“You first. Tell me why you were at the Guardian’s Keep, everything that happened there.”

“Are you okay?” she asked. He hadn’t moved more than his arm since they…she glanced around the room…arrived back at her house.

“Just a little drained.” A mocking smile tilted his lips. Then he brushed a lock of hair back from her face. “I’m fine. You talk.”

Kara hesitated, not convinced he was okay and unsure where to start with her own adventures.

He squeezed her hand and gave her a nod.

Still not convinced he was all right, she took a deep breath and began talking. “After you left, I went to the bar.” She edged a look at him. He had told her to wait.

He frowned.

“I talked to the bartender. He was…difficult. And weird, well, not him so much as what happened there.” She told Risk about following the bartender through the doorway and finding herself back where she’d started. “Then I tried again and this time I was outside the bar.”

Interest flashed through his eyes.

Kara rushed on, the reality of what she was describing unsettling her. “And then this nasty little man attacked me, snuck up on me somehow. He had a knife and this other thing. He called it a stunner. Then the dog came, and I was pulling the power, and then—” She stopped abruptly not sure what else to say.

Risk pushed himself onto one elbow. “What about the bartender, did he say anything?”

“To go home. Then some gobbledygook about telling my hellhound the guardian said to keep me away. Oh, and he said bull-headed little witches had a habit of disappearing around there.” Kara knew she was speaking too fast. She snapped her mouth shut, stared at Risk for a second, then continued more slowly. “That bar has something to do with Kelly and her friend, I know it.” Relieved she had gotten the story out, she folded her hands in her lap.

“He called himself the guardian?” Now sitting upright, knees bent, Risk leaned forward, his eyes intense.

“Yeah, Guardian’s Keep, the guardian. I guess that’s what he was talking about.” Her gaze wandered over Risk’s bare chest and arms. The late afternoon light leaking through the front window caught in the silver hairs on his forearms.

Lost in thought, he rested his arm on his knee.

He was so comfortable in his nudity, almost as if he noticed no difference from being fully clothed.

His thigh brushed against Kara’s arm. Her anxiety melted as heat pooled in her core.

“I need to go.” He stood.

“Wait.” Kara pressed her hand to his shoulder. He couldn’t leave yet.

He stared at her, waiting.

“Uh, what about the dog?” She threw out the first question she could latch on to. “Do you think that’s the hellhound the bartender mentioned? Have you ever heard of a hellhound?”

His eyes went from alert to guarded. “Hellhounds were used by the gods to hunt souls of the evil. Until the wild hunt was deserted, that is.”

“The evil? But I’m not evil.” The word hit her in the chest, memories of the power flooding into her and the thoughts of leaving her attacker to face the dog alone, of killing him and the dog. “Am I?” she added, her voice quiet.

“No.” He tilted her face to his, brushed hair away from her eyes. “You are not evil.”

“Then why—”

“Hounds used to run in the wild hunt, but that was a thousand years ago. Now they…they exist however they can.”

“So?” Kara was completely lost.

“So, you aren’t evil.” He wove his fingers into her hair, massaging her scalp.

Kara pressed her head against his hand and closed her eyes. His fingers kneaded their way down the back of her head, stopping at the nape of her neck. She tilted back her head, a soft moan leaving her lips.

“What else did the garm say?” he asked.

Her eyes fluttered open. “Garm. What’s a garm?”

A line cut between his brows. “The bartender.”

“He’s a garm?”

His hand still pressed to the back of her neck, he pulled her toward him until she fell, cradled in his arms. Brushing his lips over hers, he whispered, “Perhaps.”

Kara rested her palm on his firm chest. His heart beat a steady rhythm against her hand. Risk lowered his mouth, and captured her lips, his tongue slipping inside. He smelled vaguely of smoke and man, and Kara wanted nothing more than to curl up against him forever, forget everything to do with magic, hellhounds, and vile little men with magical stun guns.

“You’re beautiful and innocent. No amount of power could turn you into Lusse,” Risk murmured against her ear. Pulling her hair back, he trailed kisses down her neck.

Lusse, his boss. Kara frowned at the mention of another woman when they were in such an intimate position, his erection pressing against her side emphasizing just how intimate.

Holding her in his arms, he twisted to a kneel, then released her body, letting it slide slowly down the length of his. When she was kneeling in front of him, he ran his hand from her thigh, over her buttocks and up under her shirt. His hand burning into her bare skin, he lowered his mouth to hers again.