Kissed by a Dark Prince (Eternal Mates Series Book 1) - Sample, Felicity Heaton [free ebook reader for ipad txt] 📗

restored my strength, you would have healed, and your life would have gone back to normal.”

“You keep saying normal.” She always had been perceptive and he might be talking in a very practiced calm and rational voice clearly designed to placate people and keep them calm and rational too, but she was so far beyond calm and rational that she couldn’t even see it in the rear view mirror. “If that’s the normal version of events... what crazy one really happened?”

His fingertips caressed her ear, distracting her.

Olivia knocked his hand away and glared at him. “Answer me.”

He lowered his hand and his shoulders slumped. “Very well. Your blood carries a specific gene that is rare amongst humans. It marks you as a potential mate for my species.”

“Vampires.” She threw it at him like a barb.

He neatly deflected it. “You know I am not a vampire... a forefather of that kind, yes, but not at one with the darkness as they are.”

He was right and it wasn’t only because he had told her before that he wasn’t a vampire that she knew. She knew better than most that he only bore a passing resemblance to a vampire because she’d had firsthand dealings with one, a memory she had buried deep and would rather not recall because it hurt worse than the memory of the bastard demon who had used her.

“Female?” His deep voice pulled her out of her dark thoughts and back to him, and she stared up at him, lost again but for a different reason this time. Her heart ached. She rubbed the spot on her chest and stifled the tears that threatened to come. “Are you unwell?”

Olivia shook her head, touched by his concern and the gentle way he brushed his knuckles across her cheek.

She sucked in a deep breath and squared her shoulders, shoving the pain away and locking it back within her heart.

“What kind are you then? Just what species are you a prince of?” Would he finally give her the answer to the question that had plagued her from the moment she had set eyes on him? He owed her a little honesty since he had pulled her into a messed up war.

“Elvenkind.”

Olivia’s eyebrows shot up. “Elves? The elven species are supposed to be extinct... little more than myths... and you expect me to believe you are an elf?”

He had pointed ears, sure, but he also had fangs and was darkness made flesh. She had always imagined elves would be fair-haired and nature friendly, not black-haired with a penchant for drinking people to death.

He was beautiful though, and tall. She was overly aware of his stature as he closed the gap between them again and she had to tip her head back to keep her eyes on his.

“We are not extinct. We merely left the mortal realm and for good reason. Mankind had become increasingly violent, waging war against demonkind and the fae.” His expression blackened, as if he were recalling the bloodshed he spoke of. “They hungered for violence, butchering our kind until many of the weaker harmless and defenceless species were extinct. We withdrew from the world, fearing the cruel acts would taint our souls.”

And turn them wicked no doubt. Had the vampires stemmed from the elves who had remained behind, their souls blackened by the violent nature of mankind?

“How long ago was that?” she said, her curiosity getting the better of her again.

“Close to fifty centuries have passed since I lost my father and withdrew my people from the mortal realm. I have not set foot in that world since forty-two centuries ago, when I went to war with Vail.”

Olivia couldn’t take that in. Almost five thousand years since he had moved his people and over four thousand two hundred years since he had been in her world. He was old. Very old. Damn ancient. Was Vail the name of his enemy?

“Why were you here this time?” she said with a frown.

“I did not consciously move from my realm to yours.” He averted his gaze and it picked up that conflicted edge it had whenever he was thinking about his enemy.

The man had injured him, rendered him unconscious, and then dropped him into her world.

Olivia paused. “Wait... what realm is this?”

“It is not your world.” His smile was wicked.

It did a funny thing to her insides that should have been illegal.

Olivia’s gaze slid off to her left, towards the tall arched doors and the flowing curtains. Not her world. Her eyes slowly widened.

The scientist in her found that fascinating.

Beyond the walls of this building, there was another world, one filled with creatures she might never have heard of before.

The woman in her was petrified.

“I want to go home now.”

“I cannot allow that.”

Olivia snapped her attention back to him and fixed him with a scowl. “Why not?”

“Because you are bound to me... my mate.”

He didn’t have to say it like that, in a deep husky voice that sent another unwanted hot shiver dancing over her skin, making it ache for his touch. It didn’t matter what had happened. She was not staying here and she was not being his mate.

“Why did he do this?” There had to be a reason. The prince had said his enemy had done it to make him suffer.

“Vail sought to bond us to weaken me and make me vulnerable, and therefore grant him a shot at killing me.”

That wasn’t right. His logic was screwy and he was hiding something.

Olivia folded her arms across her chest. “Your enemy could have killed you rather than dump you at my door. I still don’t get why you haven’t just killed him before. You’ve been at war for four thousand years. There must have been opportunities.”

“I almost succeeded once.” He began pacing again, long strides eating up the stone floor with ease. The man couldn’t keep still whenever he felt agitated and watching him pace only served to agitate her. It showed off his body in far too good a light and gave her a terrible excuse to stare. “I came close to killing Vail’s ki’ara... it would have given me a chance to capture him.”

Olivia didn’t miss that he had said capture him. Not kill him. Now she knew why they had been fighting for so long. The prince couldn’t bring himself to kill this psychopath. Why not?

“What’s a ki’ara?” She figured it was safer than probing about his reasons for not killing his enemy.

He glanced across at her. “It is our term for our fated female... our eternal mate. You are my ki’ara. The dark witch named Kordula is Vail’s ki’ara.”

So his enemy was another elf, and he had a fated female too, and the prince had tried to kill her.

“Do you get like a harem of them... or is it a one-time deal?” She hoped he didn’t say that each elf only got one ki’ara, but the solemn edge to his purple eyes warned that he was going to shatter that hope the moment he spoke.

“We have one fated female.” He looked away from her again, his head lowered now, his focus on his knee-high black boots.

Whatever this ki’ara thing was, she had the impression that elves placed a lot of value on it and it wasn’t something they gave up lightly. She couldn’t imagine having just one shot at true love. The prince was five thousand years old and now he had found his ki’ara, in her, and he didn’t need to say it aloud for her to know that he was thinking about giving her up. He didn’t act or look like a man who was happy to have found his soul mate and was going to fight to keep her.

“What happened with Vail and his ki’ara?” Olivia said and he stopped pacing, his gaze on the floor and his eyes widening.

He frowned and spat out what she could imagine was a vile curse.

“I am a fool. I have been looking at this all wrong.” He threw his head back and growled, his fangs sharp and ears pointed again. “Vail will seek you out and torture you to drive me to the brink. He is seeking revenge and desires me to suffer as he had. He will use you to hurt me.”

Olivia’s blood chilled to sub-zero temperatures and she stared at him, struggling to get past the part about this madman torturing her.

She managed to reach the end of what he said and realised that what he had told her earlier hadn’t been something romantic or noble at all. He had meant it literally. If someone hurt her, then he would feel it. He would share her pain.

Olivia couldn’t comprehend that. It was too much. She couldn’t breathe as the weight of it pressed down on her and the thought of being tortured closed her throat. Her head spun, the room viciously turning with it.

“Calm yourself!” he bellowed, a dark commanding snarl.

No. She was damned well going to have herself a major panic attack and he could damned well deal with it. She was sure that a panicking woman wasn’t on his list of things he enjoyed dealing with, but he had just announced that someone was out to torture her and considering this man had beaten the crap out of the prince, she felt her demise at his hands was somewhat inevitable.

“Female,” the prince gritted out and Olivia tried to focus on him.

He wobbled into focus and she frowned when she saw he was clutching his chest and was paler than ever, on the verge of collapse too.

Oh my God. He didn’t only share her pain.

His knees gave out, sending him crashing to the floor, and he whipped out a vicious curse in English this time, his handsome face contorting, revealing how much he despised what was happening to him. Olivia rushed to him and crouched before him. He inhaled hard, his shoulders heaving with each breath, struggling for air just as she had been a moment ago. She laid her hand on his shoulder. He was shaking like a leaf.

Olivia ran her hand along his jaw and lifted his chin, and studied his eyes. She tilted his head towards the light and away, monitoring the responsiveness of his pupils.

“What’s wrong?” She checked his pulse, pressing her fingers against his neck. It was fast, far quicker than it had been when she’d had him hooked up to the machines in the lab.

She dropped her hand away.

It matched hers.

“Not used to the pace,” he ground out. He was talking about his heartbeat. Her heartbeat. She swallowed, stunned by the reality before her.

The bond between them was so deep that it affected him physically. It linked them right down to their hearts.

Incredible.

He sat back in front of her and drew in slow breaths and her eyes widened when her pulse began to slow. He was the one making it happen.

Olivia tried to help him, seeking calm amongst the raging storm of her feelings, but it was hard. She was in a strange environment, felt threatened and overwhelmed, and someone was out to torture her. Just thinking about that had her pulse picking up again.

“Calm yourself.” He was back to commanding her again.

“I’m trying... it’s... I can’t... it’s too much.” Olivia’s panic spiked, her hand shaking against his face.

He looked deep into her eyes and then she was in his arms, held close to him, and they were kneeling together on the floor.

Familiar scents swirled around her and she instantly felt more relaxed. “What did you do?”

He drew back from her and she found that he had taken her home and they were kneeling in the middle of her small living room on the cream carpet, between the beige sofa and the TV.

The prince brushed cool fingers across her brow. “You feel better now.”

She nodded, her heart levelling out again, the soft feel of the carpet beneath her knees and the familiar surroundings making her feel comforted and safe.

He sighed.

“I cannot remain here... and that means you cannot either...