“Anything to get you to let me sleep.”
There was that slight quirk to her lips, forming a half smile. He didn’t even try to resist. He leaned down and brushed his lips lightly over hers before dissolving into tiny molecules and streaking away. His resting place would be beneath the tree house, deep in the ground.
Chapter
10
She was a prisoner after all. Sarika woke two hours before sunset. She wasn’t certain how she knew exactly what time it was, but she did know. She woke uneasy, with vague memories of nightmares, Tomas taking her blood, forcing her to drink his. Of a head rolling across the floor of an ancient temple to land at her feet, face up. It was the head of her mother. Or perhaps her. She couldn’t tell the difference, only that the eyes were wide open, watching as her head was taken from her body. A roar of approval swept through the temple, and she could only look down in utter horror at that severed head.
Sarika dragged herself off the hammock, getting up too fast, her heart beating far too hard. She had to leave this place now, while she still could. If Tomas came back, or Luiz, or any of them, she was lost. She jammed her belongings into her backpack and rushed for the strange door made of vines. Just before she reached the door, she hit something solid, like an invisible wall, and fell back.
She was definitely a prisoner. There was no need to run around like a maniac checking every square inch. The Carpathians would have been thorough. She had gotten out of Luiz’s safeguards because he’d made them one way only. This weave was far stronger and went bothways, inside and outside. She couldn’t see the invisible barrier, but she felt surrounded by it. She’d always been sensitive to any item with power. She could feel the strength, and this particular barrier was extremely strong.
She sat on the floor for a moment, breathing deep, pushing beyond panic to look at the situation from more than one point of view. There was a convincing argument that the Carpathians had woven the safeguards for her protection.
She wasn’t going to hide from the truth. She had been able to stall the male shifters, but she never could have defeated them in battle. She wouldn’t have been able to prevent Rud from taking Sandrine. She believed he would have killed the child simply because he was thwarted in getting what he wanted. She couldn’t have stopped him, not if Percy and Bacus entered the fray. She didn’t trust either of them.
She wasn’t certain how much help Jasmine would have been. She was ready to trade her life for that of her child. She was so terrified for Sandrine and so focused on keeping her alive, Sarika doubted if she would have gone against anything Rud said or did. She wanted to appease him and keep him in a good mood. Sarika couldn’t blame her, but it wouldn’t have been helpful.
So okay, Tomas was committed to her protection. If she looked at it like that and not that he’d made her a prisoner, she could have a conversation with him and point out what was wrong with his approach. He could have asked her to stay inside…
Sarika let out a groan and covered her face. Luiz had asked her to stay inside, but she hadn’t done that when she heard a child crying. She could understand why Tomas might think she would leave, even if she agreed to stay. She’d done exactly that. But if she hadn’t…what would have happened to Sandrine?
She forced herself to her feet, flung her pack behind one of the chairs and made her way to the bathroom. She was a little in love with the tub. She’d always wanted one that was deep and wide and where she could sink into the hot water, put her head back and just relax. Apart of her found it difficult to see Luiz having the tub or even the large beautiful bathroom. There was no woman in his life to decorate, and yet the house looked like something out of a magazine, specifically to her taste. She liked that she and her cousin shared the same taste.
The water filled the tub abnormally fast. She still hadn’t figured out how it did that or where the water came from, but she was grateful for it when she sank down into its depths. She loved that the faucet could be handheld, and she could wash her hair and rinse thoroughly after soaking.
Her body was still sore from travel, and weirdly, her neck throbbed and burned, making her aware of a spot right over her pulse. She found herself covering the spot over and over with her palm and then rubbing at it with her fingers. It was a strange sensation, but she found, after consideration, that she liked it.
She closed her eyes and tried to relax. That uneasy feeling hadn’t left her. Usually, the hot water would help ease all tension, but she found herself becoming almost agitated. The only thing that soothed her was the way she stroked her fingers over that burning spot on the side of her neck.
Tomas. She couldn’t get him out of her head. There was some part of her that kept wanting to reach out to him. To connect. To just touch him. They didn’t even have to talk. She wanted to know he was close. She made herself take a deep breath, realizing panic was beginning to set in. She forced herself to analyze the situation. That was one of her greatest strengths. She could step back and look at a problem from various angles. Needing to touch base with Tomas was definitely a problem as far as she was concerned.
She might have written him a hundred letters over the years, but it was difficult to equate the living, breathing, larger-than-life man with the faceless figure she’d had so many discussions with on paper. Across oceans. Far away. What were the odds that he would be trying to put a claim on her?
“Trying?” she murmured aloud. Tomas had done something tobind them together. She felt those ties. She felt them pulling at her now. The ritual words he’d spoken in his language and hers had bound them. She knew the power of words. She wore an ancient protection amulet and felt the weight of it each time she was in a dangerous situation. Words mattered.
There was no book to research the secretive Carpathian species. Nowhere to find information on them. They were an ancient race and yet had managed to hide themselves among civilizations for centuries. Not only had they managed to hide themselves, but they had hidden the fact that vampires weren’t simply a myth as well.
Carpathians hunted vampires. That much information she’d gotten from Luiz. They could read minds. They could take blood and prevent a human—or jaguar shifter—from knowing. Thoughtfully, she stroked the pads of her fingers over her pulse point. Why was it burning right in that particular spot? Why did it soothe her when she touched it? Why had her nightmare included Tomas taking her blood?
She hit the surface with the flat of her hand and sent the water flashing high across the tub to splash against the wall. “He took my blood after I specifically told him no. Just like Luiz did. One thing we’ve learned about Carpathian males is they refuse to give their women choices.” She hissed her conclusion aloud, certain she was right. Tomas had taken her blood despite her clear refusal. “Not a good start to this lifemate business.”
Where was he? The need to reach out to him hit her again, this time even stronger than before. Sorrow welled up. Inexplicable grief. She kept taking deep breaths to stay calm and center herself. Tomas had warned her. At least he’d done that.
What was she going to do about all of this? She admitted to herself she was confused and even afraid. It was the fear that made her angry. There was alotof fear. She was a woman who liked to make her own decisions. Maybe she didn’t always make the right decision, but who did? She learned from those mistakes and tried to do better.
She also had to admit to herself that she was, for the first time inher life, physically attracted to a man. She had no idea if it was because she had a past with him. All those letters. All those candid discussions. Even when she was a child, when she wrote to him with her ideas, he’d never made fun of her or acted as if her opinion didn’t matter. She didn’t always get that from her colleagues, even with her extensive education, internships and the fact that she had a brain. A good one.
She had experienced wanting sex because when a jaguar went into heat, it was equally uncomfortable for their shifter counterpart. When it had happened, there were no jaguar shifters to satisfy her female, and she didn’t want to randomly pick up a strange man, so she’d retreat into deep forest and ride it out. It hadn’t been easy, and she had spent a great deal of time apologizing to her jaguar for the lack of ability to see to all her needs, but she’d done her best under the circumstances.
But there was Tomas, and if she just let everything go while she was soaking in the bathtub and allowed herself a few private moments, she could definitely have some amazing fantasies with him as the star. The temptation was strong, especially since she was stuck in the tree house and couldn’t retreat. There was no running from the situation.
Information. Knowledge. That was the biggest source of power. The more she knew and understood, the more of an advantage she would have. She felt it was necessary to extricate herself from the situation. She wasn’t a woman to have her choices taken from her. She wasn’t a woman to be silenced. She needed to be in a partnership, one where she was respected.
It didn’t seem to matter what her wishes were when it came to the Carpathians. They took away choices and felt that somehow that was their right. As men? As ancient beings? It didn’t matter because that trait, clearly in every one of the five she’d met, was strong.
Sighing, she soaked her hair and began massaging the shampoo into her scalp. It hit her, as she used pressure to give herself a scalp massage, that the shampoo was her brand. She looked at the items on the sink. The conditioner waiting for her to use. She was careful withproducts. She had curly hair, and it could be wild and untamed, growing huge in any humidity. The shampoo and conditioner, along with several no-frizz products, were all her exact brands.
