Carpathian 21 - Dark Peril

been determined that he would purge every diluted strain of jaguar he could find. Only those who could shift were spared—male and female.

    There was no way to stop the evil inside of her father. The sickness had begun hundreds of years earlier, treating the women like slaves, like breeders, the men following the suit of the royal family. They had been self-indulgent, depraved, craving the power and building upon it, encouraging the worst traits of their species rather than attempting to become something different. Brodrick enjoyed killing. He surrounded himself with men just like him.

    The familiar rain felt like a seductive stranger, teasing her senses, running between the valley of her breasts and down her belly to the junction between her legs. Strangely aroused by the sensation, Solange lifted her face to the rain, capturing a few drops in her mouth, allowing it to run down her throat to ease the ache.
    There was no easing the ache between her legs.

    Colors as bright as the sun swirled in front of her eyes, nearly blinding her. Every emotion was magnified a thousand times. Humiliation. Embarrassment. Sorrow. Rage. A terrible sexual hunger, raw and volatile, a craving she’d never experienced. The rain dripped from the tips of her breasts, now tight, blossoming into twin hard peaks. She looked down at her body, and tears burned behind her eyes.

    This need, this craving, was stronger than any heat she’d ever experienced. It took her breath and stole her sanity. The passion didn’t just involve her body—every single part of her, heart and soul, seemed to have an overwhelming desire to be with him. Lifemates. She had seen the devotion her cousin Juliette’s lifemate had to her. He paid attention to the smallest thing, seemed completely focused on her every moment—and that kind of concentration would make Solange crazy. She’d been alone too long. She went weeks without seeing or talking to another person. How could she possibly be in a relationship? She didn’t know how. She didn’t know the first thing about sharing her life or—or anything.

    Panicked, she could barely breathe, her lungs burning for air. She could never go to him. Never. There was hardly a place on her body that wasn’t scarred. She had no smooth skin to offer, no soft side to the hard-edged woman who had become nothing more than a fighting machine. The dream woman had been an illusion. MaryAnn, Manolito’s lifemate, was as close to a friend as she had, and even MaryAnn had chided her for her wild hair and lack of femininity. She had pretended it didn’t matter that she wasn’t womanly, and it hadn’t then. But now—now that he was in her life, now that he had come, this man among men, this warrior who stood head and shoulders above the rest . . .

    She moaned and pressed her fists into her eyes. She wasn’t a woman to cry. Or to crave a man. Or to need him. Yet somehow, over the course of the last few months, that had all changed. She had changed—driven to the brink of destruction by the endless horror of her chosen life. There had been no respite—but him.
    The Carpathian. Her Carpathian.

    She inhaled sharply and silently admitted that she needed the Carpathian, even if it was just to share his last days. He would never flinch from what he perceived as his duty to his people any more than she would.
    This was a terrible mess and it came at the worst possible time. She had finally found Brodrick. She knew where he was, but she also knew he would never stay there long. And he usually traveled with his most violent soldiers.

    Around her the air stilled. All noise ceased in the forest. Her jaguar froze, shoved close to her skin as if to protect her. The hair on her arms stood up and a frisson of fear slid down her spine. Insects poured over the ground, ants and beetles swarming, covering everything in their path. She saw them flowing like a black river over the fallen trunks, moving toward her. Overhead, the sky filled with bats, moving fast through the canopy, an ominous black cloud, dark portents of things to come.

    The vampires had risen. She shifted quickly, letting the change take her. The undead would rise hungry and looking for prey. In her human form she would easily attract them. Her jaguar form could get into the canopy and wait until they passed.

    Bats. Her dream lover’s voice hissed the warning in her mind. The undead are rising.

    She was already back in the trees, the jaguar climbing into the crook of