Synjon kept his body ice-still. These shifters were in for a rude awakening if they believed a veana could hold a paven like him hostage.

“What’s your plan?” Petra asked, her voice heavy with intensity, need, hunger.

“We’re going to lock you both in the cabin,” Dani said.

“Oh, gods,” Petra uttered. “This is insane.”

Synjon’s mouth twitched. He agreed with that assessment. Locked in. Did they not know what world he came from? What profession? The disaster he could create with just a twig and a firecracker? Petra’s brothers had gotten lucky back at his flat in Manhattan. That wouldn’t happen again.

“But if you need us, if you need anything,” Dani continued, “there’s a two-way radio in the bathroom. We’ll be here in seconds.”

“Except for this room,” Sasha added, “there’s sunlight all over the cabin. After you take what you need, leave him in here. He can’t follow you. We’ll be back to get you before the sun sets.”

“Get me?” Petra repeated, slightly panicked. “What do you mean?”

“You’re not staying here with him at night,” Sasha said tightly. “Soon as the sun goes down, he’ll try to escape. Val and I will be here to make sure he doesn’t. Although with what you’ve become, I’m pretty sure you could tame his vampire ass.”

Synjon heard retreating footsteps, then Petra’s voice outside the door. “This is crazy. We can’t just take a member of the Eternal Breed.”

“We already did, Pets.”

Synjon fought the instinct to crack a lid and see where he was and if anyone remained in the room. And he was glad he did. He heard a door close several feet away, then locks bolted into place, then after a few long moments, movement near the bed.

His entire body flared with warning.

The mattress dipped on his left side and the scent of something floral mixed with female sweat entered his nostrils. His cock stirred. He, however, did not. He felt a breeze move over his face, then warm breath and the tip of a nose against his neck.

“Should I tame your vampire ass, Synjon Wise?” she whispered. “Or just go straight for the jugular?”

He moved with the speed and grace of a trained killer. He had her pinned beneath him in under five seconds. “You won’t touch me, love. Unless I wish it.”

Black hair spread out wild against the pillow, nostrils flared with contempt, arms trapped above her head and belly exposed, she stared murderously up at him. He’d seen her only a week ago, in the dungeon of the mutore Erion. She’d come to rescue her father, Cruen, soon to be caged and tortured, and had ended up hearing the terrible and undeniable truth about him. And she’d felt Synjon’s hatred, rage, contempt, and lust for vengeance. Then she’d witnessed the Romans holding him down while her father took his emotions.

Syn’s gaze moved over her. Taking in each feature, each change. She was physically extraordinary-looking. Far more beautiful, far more desirable than any of the other females he came in contact with. And the fact that she was in swell made her even more attractive. He wasn’t sure why. He wasn’t sure why his dick was so smitten, filling with blood, pressing against his zipper, trying to get at her.

Maybe his body was remembering their night together. Her mouth on his. His fangs inside her vein. Her skin smooth and hot under his palm. Her tight pussy squeezing his cock until his body refused the comfortable existence of control.

It was a memory he normally chose to ignore. But with her beneath him, with her scent wafting into his lungs, it couldn’t be helped. Or stopped.

“I was told you wouldn’t come here even when you knew how bad off I was,” she whispered, her eyes narrowed, her body shaking beneath his.

Syn’s gaze rested on her upper lip and the tips of her fangs. “True.”

“Or how the life of this balas was in danger.”

His gaze traveled down her neck and breasts to the rise of her belly.

“Your balas,” she added with a hiss.

That thing, that something strange he’d felt before at the mention of the balas, moved through him once again. The physical sensation was almost like desire, but stronger. Without his consent, his hand reached for the base of her abdomen and remained there.

“What are you doing?” she said, a low growl ending the query as she shifted beneath him, trying to get free.

He didn’t answer her because at that very moment, he felt something press against the center of his palm, then retreat. His brows drew together. What the bloody hell was that? He waited a few seconds for it to return, but when it didn’t he moved his hand just a little to the right. His breath hitched, held in his lungs. He wanted it again. Whatever it was.

“Get off me!”

Sudden, shocking pain accompanied her cry, and Synjon gasped, falling to the right, falling off her. For the second time in twenty-four hours, he saw stars. Foolish prat, he scolded himself, his cock screaming, heat shuddering in his groin. Paying more attention to the swell of this veana’s belly than to planning your escape.

The breath completely yanked from his body, his balls on fire, Synjon coiled into himself and cursed. The pussy brothers and the hawk shifter were right; Petra had some serious strength. Far greater than any veana he’d ever heard of or encountered. Was such a thing normal in swell? Or was she somehow different?

“I would say sorry.” She scooted off the bed. “But I’m not a very good liar.”

“Fuck,” he breathed, shaking off his pain, wondering if his dick was permanently scarred.

“Don’t want you making any more babies, do we?”

From his fetal position on the mattress, his gaze flipped up to find her. She stood just outside the door. In the hallway, where shafts of sunlight hit her neck and hair.

“I won’t be held here,” he told her through gritted teeth. “By you, your family. Even that hawk shifter who was only a few hours ago working her way into my bed.”

Shock registered on her face. She paled. “What?”

“She didn’t tell you?” he said evenly. Though he felt no emotion, he knew exactly how to extract it from others. Years of psych training in the military hadn’t been bled out of him. “Your small blond viper of a best mate, Dani?”

Petra shook her head. “She was there helping my brothers. Helping me.”

“Your brothers came later, love.” Recovered from the knee to the nuts now, Synjon pushed off the bed. He stood in the darkness, his eyes narrowed on the female who’d nearly turned him into a eunuch. This was going to be far trickier than he had thought. Her strength was amazing, strange, and couldn’t be matched. He would have to outwit her instead. An option that would take far more time and planning.

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Whatever happened with Dani was just an act to get you off your guard, and you know it.”

“Well, she certainly fooled me. And I’m not easily fooled.” Synjon smiled coldly. “Must’ve been that black minidress, those come-shag-me heels, and the phrase ‘Where would you like me?’” His gaze moved over Petra again. “No paven alive can refuse that.”

Petra’s mouth thinned and she shook her head. “You really have no shame, no care, no feelings for anything, do you?”

No. He did not.

“’Tis compliments of your father, love,” he said tightly. “Now, step aside.”

Her expression changed to near amusement. “Where do you think you’re going? The sun’s shining. It’s day.”

“It’s still night in New York. I may get a bit singed on the departure, but nothing a few veanas can’t take care of.”

Her mouth dropped open and she just stared at him.

“I’m asking you to step aside.” His eyes locked with hers. “I will only ask once.”

She lifted her chin. “And if I refuse?”

“I shall make you,” he said simply.

Petra took a breath, then released it as she moved into the very center of the doorway. “Make me, Syn.”

His brow furrowed. It was a response he hadn’t expected. It was illogical.

She continued, her tone filled with an almost feverish excitement. “Make me get out of your way. I’ve dreamed of it—this clash—and everything inside me is begging for it. I’ve wanted to deny this new strength I possess. Or just not deal with it because I didn’t understand its purpose, and shit, maybe it even frightened me a little. But I think it’s the perfect time to see just how powerful I am.”

“The balas . . . ,” he began slowly.

“You won’t touch the balas.” She grinned, her eyes flashing with heat. “I won’t allow it. Ever.”

Again the strange sensation scratched at his insides, and again he forced it back. “I will show no pity, love. As you know, it doesn’t exist in me anymore.”

She sniffed, dropped into a fighting stance. “Trust me, Syn. It never did.”

He moved first. But Petra was only a second behind him. Fangs bared, blood surging in their veins, they collided in the center of the room: cold and lethal versus savage and ravenous.

4

Cruen stood where so many lesser beings had stood before him. Where he had called to them, pulled them into his reality, rejected them.

The Hollow of Shadows.

Under the spotlight of a full moon, Cruen wanted to sneer at his predicament. But the action and the emotion behind it would steal the minimal energy that remained inside him. And though he grew worse with each moment he breathed, he had to appear capable and highly functioning before Feeyan and the others. For now, for today, he would tell them his only issue was a glitch in his ability to flash, the reason most frustratingly undetermined. He remembered something similar happening to another member of the Order many years ago. He hoped at least seven of the ten members would recall it now.

The temperature around him dropped another five degrees, the cold gripping his bones, weakening them further. It was truly disgraceful. The once all-powerful, feared, and respected vampire reduced to this. Begging for entrance to the plane he had created. Begging for an audience before the table he used to rule.