Tegan's Power (The Ultimate Power Series #4) Read online

  Checking the dash, I see that the tank is three-quarters full. Handy. I slide in and turn the key in the ignition, the engine roaring to life. Sticking my head out the window, I call, “Hop in boys and girls, we’re off for a picnic.”

  Delilah gives me an irritable look. “You always have to be such a fucking piss taker,” she mutters, slipping into one of the back seats with Ira.

  “Yeah well, I’m not gonna let your brother take the shine outta my sun.”

  She huffs, narrows her green eyes to slits and turns her head away, ignoring me.

  “All aboard?” I shout jovially, letting my arm hang out of the open window and banging hard against the metal door. Nobody answers. I pull away from the side of the road.

  We’re only driving for about five minutes when all of a sudden, and I shit you not, a white stretch limousine with tendrils of pearly, effervescent light shining from the windows like beams of heavenly rays speeds out of nowhere and overtakes the minivan. With my driver’s side window open, I hear a sharp female cry for help erupt from inside the limo.

  What the fuck?

  I increase my speed, following it, when all of a sudden one of the doors flies open and a woman dressed in a shimmery white evening gown jumps from the vehicle. She rolls along the road, huddles in a crouch for a moment and then gets to her feet. She begins running like her life depends on it.

  She’s about to come face to bumper with the minivan so I pull on the breaks and come to a screeching halt seconds before I would have hit her.

  “What’s going on?” Gabriel asks urgently, squinting his eyes out the window at the dark road ahead.

  Before I get the chance to answer, I see a really tall guy emerge from the limo. He comes marching determinedly after the woman. I look back to the woman who is now staring right into the window of the minivan, shaking like a leaf. She’s got long, curly blonde hair and crazy golden eyes.

  I hop out of the minivan and hurry to her.

  “Are you okay?” I ask her as her eyes flicker over me in an unfocused manner.

  “Stay away,” she croaks, holding out her shaking hand at the same time the guy from the limo calls, “Touch her and die, Slayer.”

  I look to the tall guy, now recognising him as Michael Ridley, one of Theodore’s warlock arseholes.

  The others have emerged from the van, coming to stand beside me.

  “Just try it, Warlock,” I sneer back at him.

  “Allora, come back here now. You are being completely unreasonable.”

  The woman, Allora, flinches at the sound of Ridley’s voice and takes a step toward me.

  “Please, don’t let him take me. It hurts…he hurts me too much.”

  At this statement my protective instincts kick into high gear and I pull her to stand behind me.

  “You hurt women, huh?” I ask levelling my eyes on Ridley. “Why don’t you try hurting me instead, see how well you fare?”

  Ridley huffs out an angry breath and raises his hand into the air, on the verge of casting a spell. Thankfully, Ira leaps at him with a snarl and clamps his big teeth down on Ridley’s hand before he gets the chance to finish. I wince when he doesn’t just bite him, but jerks his head and tears the hand clean off.

  Well, Ira does have some, uh, issues with magic, so I can’t really blame him for his slight overreaction.

  An almighty wail erupts from Ridley. He stares down at his now handless arm in horror as blood gushes out. Ira allows the hand to fall to the ground with a wet thump and then walks away with doggy style disinterest. Yep, I just said doggy style. It’s been way too long since I last had a woman beneath me.

  “I’m going to kill that fucking dog,” Ridley screams.

  “You’ll be killing no one unless you get yourself to a hospital real soon, my friend,” I tell him, wincing at the sight of his severed hand.

  He swears profusely, picks up his…hand, and then hurries back to his limo. The door slams shut and the vehicle tears down the road. I turn to see Allora running away from us now, in the opposite direction of the limo. Gabriel, Alvie and Delilah stare at her, dumbfounded. Ira sits by the side of the van, licking the blood off his paws.

  I decide it’s going to have to be my job to go after her. I run down the road but she seems to hear me coming because she quickens her pace. It must be awfully painful running in those bare feet on the gravel. A second later I catch up to her, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her to a stop. She wriggles in my hold, struggling to break free.

  “Let me go, please,” comes her throaty cry. It sounds like she’s on the verge of tears. “I need to get as far away from him as possible. I need to find my family.”

  “Hush,” I whisper soothingly. “You’re not going to get very far in your state. Let me help you.”

  She goes still when I speak and turns in my arms to look up at me. Her gold eyes continue to have that unfocused way about them, and I suddenly come to the realisation that she’s blind. I take the opportunity to study her more closely.

  Her eyes are amazing. I’ve never seen gold eyes on a human before, only on vampires. Her breasts are at least double D’s, her lips are plump cushions, can’t see her arse or her legs right now, her skin is lightly tanned and smooth, and her hair is a mass of silky curls. In other words, she’s beautiful – and still trembling in my arms.

  “I know your voice,” she whispers then, her forehead crinkling in thought.

  “I don’t think so, baby. We’ve never met before. I would definitely remember meeting you.”

  She shakes her head. “No, you don’t understand…”

  “Are you hurt?” I ask cutting her off. “What were you doing with that son of a bitch Ridley anyway?”

  Her soft breath hits the base of my throat as she breathes frantically. “He kidnapped me when I was on my way home from class two years ago. I haven’t seen the outside of his house until tonight.”

  “He kidnapped you?” I ask in disbelief. “Why? Is he some kind of sicko?”

  “Not in the way you’re thinking. He called you a slayer, does that mean you know about supernaturals?”

  “Yeah, that’s right.”

  She exhales in some kind of relief and then her small hands are cupping my face, moving over my features in concentration. “Can I trust you?” she asks as she tries to see me through touch. I stand stock still, utterly entranced.

  “Of course you can. I’m one of the good guys, Goldy.”

  She seems to blush at my words, but continues moving her hands over my face. Next they slide down my neck before resting on my shoulders. I swallow hard.

  “I’m half-elf,” she says, presumably coming to the conclusion that she can trust me. “I have the talent of seeing into the future. At first Ridley tried to drain my power to use it for himself, but he didn’t succeed. The spell went wrong and ended up blinding me. I only have about twenty percent vision now. He decided to keep me prisoner so that whenever he needed a prediction he could use me.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I mutter, staring at her with wide eyes. “I bet you’re glad my friend Ira bit off his hand, eh?”

  “Hearing his pain was a small revenge,” she says, nodding. “Where are we? Can you bring me back to the city? My parents live there.”

  “Uh, the city’s a no-go area at the moment. You probably don’t know this, but there was a reason why Ridley was leaving. The vampires have taken over. They’ve been slaughtering humans and there’s also been some magical business making the humans go crazy and kill each other. You don’t want to go there for a while.”

  Suddenly, tears spring to her eyes. “Are all of the humans dead? My parents…”

  “No, no, they’re not all dead, but it’s still not safe to go there yet. Not with the vampires all blood-lusty. Oh, and there’s a mad sorcerer on the loose.”

  She slumps in my arms, her small frame resting against me.

  “Come on, stay with me for a little while and then we’ll figure out how to return you to your family.”


  She nods, wiping at her eyes. “Yes, thank you.”

  Slipping my arm under her legs, I scoop her up and carry her back to the minivan.

  Chapter Two

  Happiness is Just a Cut Away

  Tegan

  “Let’s go outside,” I say, my naked body on top of Ethan’s, our limbs intertwined in rest.

  We spent half the morning having sex, but I don’t feel tired. No, I feel wired. His blood is better than shooting heroin…not that I know what shooting heroin feels like, but this has got to be better. I could run a marathon right now.

  Ethan chuckles deeply. “Okay. Where would you like to go?”

  “I don’t care. Anywhere. I just want to see you out in the sun.”

  I hop from the bed and begin jumping up and down, hyper as you please. It’s like I have all this energy inside of me that I need to burn off. I only get self-conscious when I remember that I’m naked and Ethan is watching my breasts as they shake.

  A hot, affectionate expression crosses his features and I get a little jolt of panic at the love in his eyes. I’ve never considered myself a commitment-phobe, but committing to the most powerful vampire in the city would give even the most relationship needy person anxiety. What makes me even more anxious is the love that I feel in return. It’s almost the same as how I felt for Matthew. Just more – so much more.

  Bringing my hands up to my eyes, I can see every tiny line on my skin, every pore. It’s like I have super-duper detailed vision now. Not only do I want to see Ethan in the sun, I also want to see other things with this new sight before it runs out.

  No high lasts forever.

  Ethan pounces on me, scoops me up into his arms and carries me to his bathroom where he turns on the shower. He settles me under the hot spray and begins lathering both of our bodies with soap and shampoo. His hands roam my skin, exploring every inch, before he turns off the water and wraps me in a towel.

  I don’t have any clothes here, but I find that he’s laundered the ones I had been wearing. They sit neatly folded on the arm of a chair and I have a strange vision in my head of Ethan doing laundry. So out of place.

  I slip on my jeans and T-shirt and lace up my boots. Once dressed I find Ethan standing in his front garden, his face held up to the sun. He’d been doing the exact same thing when he was sitting in his chair this morning. Something in my heart flutters at the knowledge that I gave this to him. I’ve given him my blood but he hasn’t turned into a monster. He’s just been made better. He is no longer imprisoned to live only in the dark.

  I step up beside him and lace my fingers through his. His eyes turn down to meet mine and he grins.

  “What’s been going on in the city while I was sleeping?” I ask warily as we walk away from his house and down the quiet street. I don’t really want to ruin my good mood with reality, but I’m worried about Finn and the others. In fact, I’m antsy as hell to know where they are.

  “My people cleared away the dead as I instructed them to. Much of the human population tried to flee, but they couldn’t.”

  I arch a brow at him. “What do you mean they couldn’t?”

  Ethan sighs as though he was hoping we could avoid the heavy subjects for a little while longer. “There is some sort of magical force field around the city. Nobody can get out. There is also a block on all forms of electronic communication. No calls, emails, messages of any sort can get to the outside world.”

  I gasp, my heartbeat speeding up. “What?! Did Theodore do this?”

  My skin crawls with claustrophobia. We’re all stuck in Tribane. Indefinitely.

  Ethan shrugs, and I find the gesture far too nonchalant for the topic we’re discussing. “He’s the most likely candidate.”

  “We have to find him, Ethan. I can’t abandon Rita, and if you leave Theodore to his own devices for too long he’ll come up with something…I don’t know, something bad. The fact he can imprison us all inside the city is scary enough. Aren’t you scared?”

  “I wonder if I could kill him,” Ethan ponders, ignoring my question. “Well, I’d have to find him first.” He shakes his head. “Normally though, the only person who can kill a sorcerer is another sorcerer. A pity I don’t have any of those in my address book,” he jokes and squeezes my hand, placing a kiss to my temple.

  I narrow my eyes at his louche attitude. Then my thoughts race at his statement. I may not have any sorcerers in my address book, but I do know of one out there. I glance up at Ethan. “Um, there’s something I need to tell you.”

  His silver and blue eyes flicker with interest. “Yes?”

  “You remember Emilia? My grandmother? The one who took Pamphrock’s daughter?”

  “I do.”

  “Well, before she went all Hand that Rocks the Cradle on us, she told me that my mother was the result of an affair she had with a sorcerer called Roman. My grandfather is a sorcerer! There must be some way that I can get in contact with him. I mean, maybe he won’t want to kill Theodore but he could be able to offer us advice.”

  “So that is why you have so much magic,” Ethan breathes, stopping to stand in front of me. He runs his hands from the ends of my short hair down to rest on my shoulders.

  “Yeah.”

  His eyes get big and round as he stares at me, then a second later he begins walking again. I follow. “We would never find this Roman,” he says, dismissing the idea.

  “I could ask Emilia. That bitch owes me after all the trouble she caused, pretending I could trust her and then running off with Rebecca.”

  “Aha,” says Ethan, flashing me a hint of fang. “Shall we pay her a visit?”

  I sigh. “Not today.” Lowering my voice shyly, I continue, “I want just one day with you. One day that’s just…us.”

  He squeezes my hand and bends down to suck my earlobe into his mouth. “I like that idea.”

  We continue our walk. The city seems different. It has an air about it kind of like a housewife living in quiet desperation. Nobody understands what’s happening but they’re too afraid to kick up a fuss in case the vampires decide to go all killer on them again. There are people on the streets, but not the crowds there used to be. Lots of shop windows have been boarded up and others are simply locked tight, not open for business like they would normally be in the middle of the day.

  I try to ignore the fact that we’re all prisoners. As I said to Ethan, I need a day that’s free of worry. A day where I can just be a girl in love with a madly handsome man.

  I let go of Ethan’s hand and break into a run. His laugh drifts behind me as he watches me take off. I’ve never ran this fast before in my life. I chuckle to myself as I get these grandiose ideas of entering the Olympics. Ethan could just give me some blood before every race. To think that such a feeling can be gotten from a little gash across his skin, from me putting my lips to it and sucking.

  I hop up onto a ladder affixed along the side of a three story building and climb it effortlessly. I can tell Ethan’s somewhere behind me even though I can’t hear a single rustle of movement. I race over the rooftop and go flying into the air, sailing through the narrow four foot distance between this building and the next one. I feel like a little wingless bird. My heart beats wildly and I grin like a crazy person as my feet crash down onto the hard surface.

  Not a single stitch.

  This is amazing.

  I stand and get ready to continue my roof jumping antics when suddenly Ethan grabs me and flips me over his shoulder. I wiggle in his grip but obviously it’s a useless effort.

  “What’s gotten into you?” he growls before setting me down on the ground. We’re already off the roof and back on the street. Yeah, he moves that fast now.

  “Having fun, you should try it sometime,” I answer with a cheeky sideways smile.

  “You could have severely injured yourself. What you’re feeling isn’t real, Tegan. It’s a chemical high. You can’t actually fly, you know.”

  “That’s not what I thought,” I say, poutin
g, because that’s exactly what I thought.

  He pulls me to him, wrapping his arms around my waist. “It’s just the blood,” he whispers. “Your little human bones can still break if you fall.”

  “I know that,” I answer, feeling embarrassed now.

  All of a sudden, the sun is too bright. It dizzies me. I stare into the window of a women’s boutique across the road where there are all sorts of glittery dresses on display. Despite the distance, I can see the stitch in every sequin; I can see every thread weaved throughout the fabric. Jesus, the details are hurting my brain.

  Somewhere close by, a seagull lets out a loud caw and I hear too many notes in the one sound, too many levels of noise. I clamp my hands over my ears to block it out.

  “Tegan, are you alright?” Ethan asks with concern just before I pass out.

  When I wake up I’m lying on the couch in his living room and he’s holding a cool wet face cloth to my forehead. It feels soothing.

  “I think you might have drank too much from me,” he says when he sees my eyes flicker open.

  “Yeah. God, is that what it feels like to be you? I felt as though I was going to go crazy from sensory overload.”

  A small smile curves his lips. “I have the natural ability to turn it on and off at will. Since you are human, you don’t have that. I think my blood had fully hit your system when we were out on the street and that’s why you fainted.”

  “I feel better now. The high is wearing off.”

  I reach down and rub my shin where it aches, most likely from the jump I took across the roof. The blood didn’t protect me from being hurt, it just protected me from feeling pain in the moment. Huh. Not as fantastic as I originally imagined then. And now that the high is dwindling I can feel a sharpness in my veins crying out for more blood. So this is what it feels like to be addicted.