Garrett was texting with one hand while studying her face. “I think that’s off the table, kitten.”
Not if she chose otherwise. At the moment, she was at his mercy. At night, it seemed she was at Ulric’s. She could run from Garrett, and there had to be a way to prevent Ulric from invading her dreams.
Garrett’s upper lip twitched. “You’re not fleeing. Put that idea out of your gorgeous head right now.”
She crossed her arms over her still-sensitive breasts. “Tell me more about this Ulric and an Intended. Please.”
Garrett read the face of his phone. “Ulric is the leader of the Cyst. They’re the religious leaders and the key assassins for the Kurjan nation, who are our enemy by their choice. Kurjans are male only, just like vampires, so they need to mate enhanced females or females from other species.”
Her eyebrows rose on their own. “Vampires are male only?”
“Yeah, except for Hope. She’s the one and only female vampire.” Garrett didn’t sound happy about that fact. “More than a thousand years ago, Ulric underwent a ritual in which he killed one hundred enhanced females, took their blood, and made his body impenetrable. His entire body. He can’t be killed by any weapon.” Garrett glanced at his phone and looked back up at her.
“That monster on the beach can’t be killed?” Terror coated her throat and filled her abdomen with chills.
He exhaled as if trying to hold on to his temper. Even so, his cheeks were a dark red. “Not from the outside. So seven immortal hybrids, demon and vampire mixes, underwent a similar ritual without killing anybody, so only their torsos were fused. They altered physics and created three hell worlds dimensions away. Ulric is trapped in the center one. The other two have fallen.”
This was insane. Yet she’d been to that hell world somehow, and the description fit. “But you’re not a thousand years old,” she said, her voice barely quavering.
“No. Two of the Seven were killed, so Logan and I underwent the ritual and became part of the Seven to take their places. We have a way to kill Ulric once he gets home, and he will, because he’s getting stronger. It’s just a matter of time.” Garrett’s voice remained level, but his anger rolled through the room, making the air heavy.
“How will you kill him?” Was it by sacrificing an Intended or something equally horrible?
Garrett eyed the door. “Logan and Sam are coming this way, and we’re going to study your marking as well as the drawing being sent to me now.”
He shot one hand through his thick hair. “One of the enhanced women Ulric killed was a witch and a psychic. She had triplet girls, each marked with a key at birth. Somehow she infused a certain poison into all three of them, which has been passed down through the years in the blood of their descendants, along with the marking of a perfectly shaped key. We take the blood of the three Keys and somehow get it into Ulric, and supposedly he’ll die from it. If we don’t, he has some unknown plan to end the lives of all enhanced females on the planet. Don’t ask me why. He’s nuts.”
It was all unbelievable. Yet her birthmark did cover her entire nape. She’d caught glimpses of it in the mirror through the years, and it looked like a butterfly with mottled blotches on the wings. “Who are these three Keys?” At least he didn’t want her blood to kill the monster she’d met.
“We have two. One is Mercy, Logan’s mate. The second is a woman named Grace, who’s mated to one of the Seven. We’re on the hunt for the third now.”
Realization smacked her between the eyes. Now he was starting to make sense. “Oh. You think the final Key will be your mate.” There would be symmetry to that outcome, and she’d noticed that symmetry existed not only in Garrett’s immortal world but in the universe as a whole. She’d always been able to make such connections and figured it was an affinity for logical relationships, which she’d excelled at in school. His mate would be powerful and have a heavy destiny.
“No. You’re my mate.” His jaw firmed to the consistency of pure rock.
But Dessie wasn’t a Key. In fact, she was the potential mate of the enemy. “This is too much, Garrett.”
His eyes softened a bit. “I know.”
The door opened, and both Sam and Logan walked in, staring at their phones. They paused and looked at her.
She pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around them. “Hi. Guess I’m not just human.”
Logan almost smiled. “This is insane.”
“That’s what I said,” she blurted out.
Sam shut the door and swiped his screen. “The two markings aren’t exactly the same. I mean, Dessie’s mark and Yvonne’s marking have different symbols in the wings of the butterflies. That has to mean something, right?”
“No clue,” Garrett said, also looking at his phone.
Dessie cleared her throat. “Yvonne is the other Intended?”
“Yes,” Garrett said. “She’s lived with the Kurjans and worked with them for years, waiting for Ulric to be released. She’s an evil wench, based on our interactions and research.”
Wonderful. Dessie’s neck itched.
Garrett peered closer at his screen. “I see triangles, Celtic knots, and symbols for fate and destiny in both butterflies, but none are the same.” He looked up. “We’ll need code breakers and historians on this. I’ve already sent the picture of Dessie’s mark to the other members of the Seven, and we’ll need to vote on whether or not we bring in outsiders. I’d like to consult with the Realm.”
