Page 205 of Jagged Souls

And thatinfuriatesme.

Pulling out the needle I picked up from Terra on the way over, I hold it up. “I was around for the war between Terra Harrison and Cara Jervis. The humans called it the Spanish flu.” His eyes dart to the needle, then back to me. There is a flicker of fear there, a knowledge that he can train as much as he wants, but he can’t learn to fight a fucking disease.

“A fifth of the world’s population killed off because of a lover’s tat. In just four months, the disease they made took the lives of twenty-one million people. Not the young or the old either but the healthy.” I shake my head. Then smile. “Howcrazydo we get over the people we love, huh? All the terrible things in the world because of it.” I pop the lid off the needle. Take a step forward.

He laughs, and there isn’t a single trace of fear in his eyes. “Even if you kill me, you won’t have her in this life.” Just utter fucking conviction.

I grab the arm he yanked free earlier, pressing my fingers over the piece of metal nailed through his wrist. He grits his teeth, his jaw tight, his nostrils flaring. Sweat beads across his brow as he struggles to stay conscious despite the pain. Jabbing the needle into the swollen, tender area around the nail, I look him in the eyes and say, “I already have her.”

I push the disease into him, and I take delight in the light tremors running down his arm. The fear he’s trying to hide.

“This won’t kill you,” I assure him. “You don’t deserve to go that quick, but you’ll run a fever, and you’ll shit yourself in this bed. Every part of you will ache, from your toes to your wayward thoughts, and the entire time you will know thatyour wifeis riding my cock and shouting my name.”

He smiles wolfishly. Leans forward. “But she will still bemywife.”

My jaw tics.

I break the needle in his arm.

He laughs even as he falls back, sweat already starting to break out across his skin. Terra’s disease is working quickly. “Go ahead and torture me. Whatever you do to me, she’ll be able to feel through the blood bond. And my brothers won’t even have to save her then. You’ll lose her all on your own.” He chuckles. “Just like you did Siome.”

My hand shifts into that of my wolf, and I lift my arm to rake my claws across his chest. But I stop myself before I cut him open and rip out his fucking heart. Death will not be that easy for him.

My jaw clenched, I drop my hand and storm from the room. He might’ve won this round, but I’ll figure out a way to make her hate him. A hatred so deep that it sears itself into her very soul so she loathes him across all the lifetimes they might have together.

I will not get her in the next life but neither will fucking he.

Sixty-One

Antonio

I had to wait three fucking weeks for Eduardo to feel well enough to do a transplant. I wanted to push him to do it earlier, but the operation is too risky at the best of times. If he’s struggling with his own illness, he could accidentally kill her.

But today is the day I give my mate back her eyes. It won’t change what I did to her, but it’s a start to fixing my sins.

And it’ll bring her closer to me while pushing Varius out of her orbit. Although she hasn’t wanted to see him at all, she keeps asking about my plans to bring back Rafiki.Theirchild.

And she’s pregnant with another one of his fucking kids. I wanted it aborted, but Eduardo warned me that if he did, her next pregnancy would be extremely risky. Magic got into her womb somehow, making it practically radioactive. He tells me he can’t heal her. He doesn’t know if it’s from the V –there haven’t been enough studies– but Siome had a hard time getting pregnant too after she became an addict. Ironic if it’s the cause, though, considering they have a line for increasing pregnancy. Either way, I’m fucking pissed. I can smell it in her womb every time I hold her.

Growing like a demon.

Claiming her like her fucker of a husband has, refusing to let go.

He’s still holding out despite his daily torture. I asked her if she could feel what I did to him, and she said no, so all the gloves came off. I haven’t told her she’s pregnant though; I know she isn’t ready to hear that news, and so I’ve been taking it all out on him. Skinning him. Hammering more nails into his skin. Making him eat bits of himself – muscle cut from his thigh, his left testicle, his right eye.

But physical pain isn’t breaking him. He’s still laughing, knowing that the more I do, the more I worry that Micha will go back to him.

She’s in my bed every night, but we haven’t made love yet. Haven’t even kissed. She still seems too fragile despite getting stronger and more confident every day. She asked me this morning if she could help me kill Sau when the time came, and that’s made me hopeful that she is looking to our future.

But every time I mention Varius, a bit too much rage flits across her face. He still has too much hold on her. Too much control over a woman who should be all mine. And I don’t want there to be any trace of that inside her when we make love for the first time. I want her solely focused onme, the man she loves. The one who loves her, who hasn’t stopped loving her for nearly two hundreds years.

So tonight I’ll be setting up a video camera in Rudy’s room and letting Varius watch what I do to him. He hasn’t once asked about his brother, so perhaps he will not care, but I want to torture Rudy anyway. Cut off another piece of him –his tongue this time rather than his ear– and send it to his mother.

Just like Aleric used to do all those years ago. Except I don’t want to kill him and ship him all at once. I want to drag it out and make ithurt.

He is a Shadow, and all Shadows deserve to be wiped out after Sau killed off all of Siome’s line. It matters not that she is reincarnated; she lost her entire family because of that head bitch. And I lost all of mine.

But for now, I just need to grab Jenny Ann – one of the three breeding women still on the boat. Her eyes are red. The other two women’s aren’t. So when she opens her door, I punch her in the face. Move in to choke her out quickly, then carry her to Eduardo’s lab over my shoulder.