SovereignsChoice Read online

  “But—”

  “Emma.” His voice is stern and low and it sends a strange tremble though my body. With a start, I realize he is using his Master voice on me. “Emma,” he repeats in that same tone. “Come out of the window. Right now, do you understand?”

  The many nights of erotic play rise up in my mind and I feel my body reacting, obeying, even though my brain wants to refuse. My head is dizzy and my hands are shaking as I climb out the window and stand swaying on the ledge, looking down at my Master standing so far below.

  “Master,” I whisper but somehow Aiden hears me.

  “Now jump,” he commands, holding out his arms. “Trust me, Emma, I’ll catch you. I’ll always catch you.”

  I don’t jump so much as fall. My fingers somehow peel themselves from the window pane and then, with a low cry, I’m flying free in the night with the ground rushing up to meet me. I close my eyes tight, not wanting to see, not wanting to know when I’m about to make impact…

  Then two strong arms catch me and pull me close.

  I put my arms around his neck and hold on tight. I’m crying and shaking and I feel him shaking too. Then suddenly he’s running. Running so fast the wind stings my eyes and I have to shelter my face in the crook of his neck. I have a confused impression of the raging fire receding in the distance and streets and houses streaming by at the speed of light. Then dark branches are whipping all around us. Up ahead, I see a house with glass walls, lit from within by a golden radiance. Unable to help myself, I think home.

  Aiden doesn’t stop until he has me in the living room of his house and is sitting on a couch, still holding me. Only then does he speak.

  “Darling.” He crushes me to him, burying his face in my hair. “Oh, Emma, I thought I’d lost you.”

  I’m tempted to melt at his words but then I remember he said the exact same thing after we healed the binding spell and I fainted in front of the Vampire Council. And then he left me and never called once. I struggle against him, trying to sit up.

  “Why are we here? Why did you bring me to your house?”

  “I…” Aiden looks stricken. “Instinct, I suppose,” he says at last. “You were in danger. My first impulse was to bring you where I knew I could keep you safe. To bring you home.”

  “Your home,” I whisper. “Not mine.”

  “No.” He clears his throat. “Of course not.” Abruptly, he puts me down on the couch and moves back, putting some room between us. “Forgive me,” he says formally. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

  “You didn’t. I-I just…” Miserably I twist my fingers into knots, trying to think of what to say. How many times have I imagined this moment in my mind, since the last time I saw him? How many things have I planned to ask, to beg, to demand, to plead? And yet now they’re all gone and my head is empty. “How…how did you know I was in danger?” I ask at last.

  Aiden looks at the carpet. “I felt it,” he says in a low voice. “I don’t have much of your blood left—I bled most of it out onto the Council Room floor. But there was just enough left to let me know you…you needed me.”

  “Thank you for coming,” I say softly. “It was Sanchez. I set fire to him because he…he was going to…” My throat locks up and I can’t get the words out, can’t stop seeing those slotted yellow eyes as the satyr hissed his final threat.

  “I know what he was going to do.” A muscle in the side of Aiden’s jaw clenches. “I should have killed him years ago.”

  “Well, he’s dead now,” I say with a shiver, remembering the screaming, clawing lump of burning flesh the satyr became when the witch-flames engulfed him.

  “I’m glad he won’t be bothering you anymore.” Aiden clears his throat. “As it happens, I won’t either.”

  “What? What do you mean?” My heart is suddenly thumping so loudly I’m afraid Aiden might hear it. “Where are you going?”

  “I’m going to ground again,” he says quietly, still looking away. “I’ve tried living in the human world and it doesn’t suit me. Not without…someone to share it with. And I’ve never liked the company of my own kind.” He clears his throat. “I was actually just about to enter my coffin for the final time tonight when I felt your distress. Now that I know you’re safe, I can go ahead with my plans.”

  I feel numb all over. “So…I guess this is goodbye.”

  “I guess so.” Aiden’s face is calm but his deep voice is hoarse. “I’m sorry for any pain I may have caused you, Emma,” he says formally. “I hope…hope in time you may find it in your heart to forgive me. If I ever come out into the light again, I promise to look after your descendants and make sure they’re happy and safe.”

  “My descendants,” I whisper and I know he’s talking about sons and daughters I’ll have with some other man. The children who have nothing to do with him—with a vampire who’s nothing more than a footnote in my past. A distant memory of a love that never was.

  Suddenly there’s a lump in my throat that I can’t swallow and my eyes are stinging. “Excuse me,” I whisper brokenly. “I…the restroom. I need to—”

  “Of course,” Aiden says. “Help yourself.”

  But I’m already rushing past him, the tears stinging my eyes and my heart caught in a vise. He’s going. He’s leaving me. Leaving forever and if it hadn’t been for Sanchez coming around to murder me in my bed tonight, he never would have even come to say goodbye. I’ve done the stupidest thing a girl can do—I’ve allowed myself to fall for a man who cares nothing for me. I’ve given my heart away and now I can’t get it back.

  I run blindly through the mirrored maze of the house. Somehow I find myself not in the bathroom but in the study, surrounded by the rows of leather-bound books and facing the huge mahogany desk that dominates half the room. I sink down and lean my cheek against its cool surface for a moment, my shoulders shaking with silent sobs. Whatever I do, I can’t let him hear me. I don’t want him to know that he’s hurt me this badly, don’t want him to guess how desperately I love him…

  If you love him, go and claim him.

  The witch-whisper in my head startles me so much I nearly scream. I jerk my head up off the desk and look from side to side, trying to see who’s talking to me. There’s no one there, though. Just the ancient copy of Farrow’s Handbook of Spells and Summonings,lying open on the desk blotter.

  “What?” I ask in a whisper. “Who said that?”

  I did. The book jiggles a little. I, your ancestress, Katherine. Speak to me in your witch-whisper. I will hear you.

  Katherine? I send back, my eyes wide with disbelief. Are you really still here?

  Only a small part—a piece of my spirit I left tied to my spell book, she assures me. I wanted to be able to watch over my beloved Aiden even after I was gone. I knew, you see, that I would precede him in death. Truthfully, it was what I wanted.

  Why are you talking to me now? I demand of her, still staring at the book. What do you want?

  For you to do what I never could, she whispers. I want you to make Aiden happy.

  Make him happy? I snort incredulously. How? He doesn’t care if I live or die—I don’t think it’s in my power to affect his happiness.

  That’s not true and you know it. Katherine sounds stern, maybe even a little angry. Would he have come to your aid tonight if he didn’t care for you?

  He was responding to the call of your blood, that’s all, I say dismissively. He never would have come otherwise.

  My blood is long since gone from him, Katherine says quietly. It was yourblood that called to him, Emma. You that he wanted to save. You that he loves.

  Yes, he saved me. Whoop-dee-do, I say angrily. And now he’s going to ground and he’ll never see me again. Is that the act of a man in love?

  It is the act of a man who feels he has lost your love, she whispers quietly in my ear. The act of a man desperate to remove himself from the pain of that loss. He thinks you don’t want him anymore, Emma. And if you don’t speak up and let him know