Bound by Darkness
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
EPILOGUE
Teaser chapter
Praise for Drawn into Darkness
“Lachlan MacGregor looks like a rather hunky priest, but the 400-year-old undead hero of McCleave’s entertaining paranormal romance debut is actually serving penance by gathering souls destined for Heaven, saving them from demons.... Readers will hope for sequels in which Emily grows up to be as feisty as Rachel and as powerful as Lachlan.”
—Publishers Weekly
“This is a fabulously entertaining tale of demons, angels, and beings in between. The world building is unique and detailed, drawing the reader into an age-old battle between good and evil. The next installment will be eagerly anticipated.”
—Romantic Times
“Fast-paced, dangerously sexy, and full of fun! Annette McCleave has created a world where good and evil fight for the possession of human souls, and love is found despite seemingly unbeatable odds. Drawn into Darkness will keep you turning pages and anxious for more!”
—USA Today bestselling author Kathryn Smith
“Deliciously dark and spellbinding! Annette McCleave weaves magic so powerful, you’ll believe in immortals. Drawn into Darkness is sexy, fast-paced, and intense. Readers be warned—the Soul Gatherers sizzle on the page.”
—Allie Mackay
“A phenomenal debut! A refreshingly unique and vividly realized world with dark dangers and richly drawn characters. I loved every word. McCleave more than delivers!”
—National bestselling author Sylvia Day
“Her intriguing blend of dark fantasy and romance has created an engrossing story that keeps the reader turning pages.”
—Katherine Kerr
ALSO BY ANNETTE McCLEAVE
Drawn into Darkness
SIGNET ECLIPSE
Published by New American Library, a division of
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First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library,
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First Printing, May 2010
Copyright © Annette McCleave, 2010
eISBN: 9781101433492
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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To Dad,
who taught me to love the written word
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book wouldn’t have been possible without the wonderful support of my editor, Kerry Donovan, and the entire team at NAL. I must also thank my agent, Laurie McLean, for her spot-on advice in shaping the character of Lena Sharpe.
Over the past two years, I’ve been privileged to be part of a talented group of writers who, like me, were finalists in RWA’s 2008 Golden Heart contest. The spirited enthusiasm of this group—known as the Pixie Chicks—has brightened my life in unimaginable ways, and I owe them a huge debt of gratitude. Pixies rule!
My family and friends, who’ve been there for me day in and day out, continue to amaze me with their generosity, praise, and flagrant hand selling. Thank you, one and all.
1
No one expects Saks Fifth Avenue to blow up under their feet.
Yet, as Brian Webster weighed the pros of a blue-on-blue-striped Gucci versus a classic white Zegna dress shirt, the famous store did exactly that. With very little warning, a low boom rose through the carpeted floor, vibrating his shoes and rattling the windows. Before he could leap, the chilling shriek of bending metal accompanied a four-inch drop in the floor.
Only his Soul Gatherer reflexes kept him upright.
Instantly, panicked screams, warbling alarms, and heavy crashes of crumbling infrastructure replaced the moneyed hush of the posh emporium. An etched-glass chandelier crashed to the ground, strafing two fallen customers with shattered remnants. Several brass-and-wood displays toppled, knocking a suit-clad salesman to the ground.
A thin tendril of smoke and the smell of burned matches curled up from a gaping hole in the floor, but it was the oily aftertaste of charcoal that connected all the dots for him. With his pulse surging, Brian tossed the shirts onto a mahogany table now littered with glass and raced for the elevators. That blend of odors was all too familiar.
Brimstone.
Somewhere below him, a demon had popped in from hell.
At the elevator lobby, the scene was a mess. The marble flooring had shifted like tectonic plates. Dust and fragmented glass coated every surface. People hugged the walls, dazed or crying, a few of them praying. Brian paused. The creature wreaking havoc on the floors below needed to be stopped—no doubt about that. But one of the elevator cars, jarred by the explosion, had slid several feet with the doors still open. Three women and a toddler screamed for help from its depths, terrified they would plummet to the ground floor.
And there was no way to be sure they wouldn’t.
A very large man in a yellow golf shirt br
avely lay on his stomach, reaching his plump arm into the gap between the floor and the top of the car. Choosing lives he could see over those he could not, Brian dove to the uneven floor beside him.
“Come on, ladies,” he coaxed urgently. “Let’s get you out of there.”
Even as he spoke, another explosion shuddered through the building, heaving the floor beneath their bellies and bringing ceiling tiles down on their heads. The elevator gave a deep metallic sigh and scraped a few inches lower, sparks flying. The women’s screams rose another octave, and the man beside him jerked. To give the guy credit, though, he didn’t pull away.
Two of the trapped women, spurred by the realization that they were about to die, latched onto their arms. Brian easily tugged his elderly victim clear of the car, then helped his corescuer free the other. Only the woman with the child remained inside. Between the terror wringing their faces and the constant streams of tears, he doubted they could see straight.
“Give him the baby,” Brian told the frantic woman, holding her watery gaze. “You take my hand.”
She responded well to his firm voice. Crossing the car with hesitant steps, she handed off her young son. Once the boy was safe, however, everything seemed to overwhelm her. Shock took hold. Her arms and legs trembled violently and her breathing became labored. She grabbed at his hand several times, but fell back into the car.
The elevator car shuddered with every attempt.
Brian hooked a foot around a heavy potted palm. Leaning in farther, he wrapped an arm around the frightened woman’s waist. Her shirt was damp with cold sweat, and the shudders racking her body echoed through his own. As another grind of metal presaged disaster, he clenched his stomach muscles, pulled up sharply, and hauled her out. Trading her tearful words of gratitude for a quick hug, he gently guided the woman toward her son, who clutched his savior’s shirt with balled fists.
“Head for the opposite side of the building,” he advised his fellow rescuer. “Get everyone out, quick as you can.”
Taking a deep breath to prepare for what lay ahead, he ran for the red EXIT light.
In the dim stairwell, he pulled his sword out from under his suit jacket. Freed of its mystical scabbard, the fifteenth-century Oakeshott replica became visible, but witnesses were the least of his worries. A solitary explosion would have meant he was dealing with a havoc demon. But a havoc demon broke through the barrier into this realm only to cause random accidents, and it had just moments to execute its sorry-assed deed before it was snuffed out like a spark of hellfire. It didn’t have the juice to hit a joint twice.
This was something else.
He murmured a quick shield spell and then slowly descended to the fifth-floor landing. His feet crunched on the debris littering the stairs—chunks of concrete, crumbled mortar, a fallen sign, and a thick layer of gray dust. Every step echoed eerily against the walls and eliminated all hope of a stealthy approach. Not that covertness mattered to the victim sprawled on the landing. He was beyond help.
Brian scanned the man’s lifeless figure, taking in the scorched black suit and the rose quartz rosary entwined in his burned fingers. A cold sense of dread settled in his belly. He knew without turning the body over who it was. Father O’Shaunessy. The man he’d arranged to meet here in the store in less than an hour.
This was no random demon attack.
His gaze traveled outward, over the numerous scuffle marks in the dust to the gray-painted cinder-block walls, where a series of large scorches marked the pitted concrete. A brutal battle had been waged here with bolts of supernatural energy pitched by both sides, every returned blast a valiant attempt by the priest to defend himself and ...
Brian frowned. Not all the dark stains were soot. There was blood, too. A lot of it.
Yet O’Shaunessy’s body showed no sign of an open injury, only the searing wounds consistent with fending off firebombs. Had someone else been here? Was someone left alive?
Brian quickly put a hand to the priest’s throat. Soothing warmth flowed into his fingertips, fluttered up his arm, and wrapped around his heart—the telltale transition of a soul destined for heaven.
Another explosion hit the building. The walls of the stairwell vibrated, and mortar dust and a piece of concrete the size of a bread loaf dislodged from somewhere above, smashing to the ground a half inch from his toes. Screams floated up from the floors below and curled in his gut. Whether the priest had been alone was irrelevant. Whatever was down there needed to be destroyed.
Leaping over the metal handrail, he dropped four floors in a blur. He landed at the bottom in an easy crouch, then sprang to his feet.
Sword in hand, he strode through the smoke and into the shattered ruin that had once been Ladies Cosmetics. His stomach knotted. The first floor tended to be one of the busiest spots in the store, filled with gawking tourists and trend-worshiping teens. Tonight was no exception. At least two dozen bodies lay strewn about like crumpled garbage, dampened by a barely functioning sprinkler system. Men, women, and ... at least one child. Several alive, some not.
Brian tore his gaze away from the human devastation, searching the hazy interior for the demon. Dealing with the painful toll would have to wait. Right now, stopping the carnage took priority.
A thin wail of sirens rose and fell in the distance, growing steadily closer. Reassuring, but not his focus. Filtering out emergency vehicles, electric crackles, and low moans of the injured, he homed in on the sounds that haunted a Soul Gatherer’s nightmares: the raspy murmur of hellish incantations and the whoosh of firebombs in the air.
And he found the bastard.
Left. About a hundred yards through the haze.
Most of Satan’s henchies wore a glamour to disguise their presence among humans. But not this one. It was a mottled red-and-gray colossus, twice Brian’s height and probably three times his weight, horns and talons everywhere. A long, ooze-dripping tail whipped back and forth, writhing with a life of its own. As demons went, it was easily the most imposing creature Brian had ever run across. But he dared not think about that.
Giving the flexible appendage a wide berth, he advanced through the rubble, visualizing his attack. The monstrosity conveniently had its back to him, so he leapt atop the remnants of a display counter and dove at the hulking figure from behind. His target was the heavily muscled neck. The Oakeshott was a very fast blade and the element of surprise would work in his favor.
Unfortunately, the remaining glass in the display chose that moment to fall to the floor, smashing on the tiles with a wince-worthy crescendo.
The demon pivoted just as the arc of Brian’s swing gained full momentum. Red eyes glaring, it raised a platter-sized palm, muttered a single word, and blasted Brian in the chest with a fat glob of red-hot lava. The missile sent him flying, and he landed on a display case in a splash of splintered wood and shattered glass. Worse, the lava bomb ate right through his shield, gnawed through his Jay Kos jacket, and drilled deep into muscle. Breathing became a serious chore.
What was this thing?
He surged to his feet, conjured a fresh shield, and brandished his sword, prepared to fend off another fireball. But nothing came at him. The behemoth demon had turned away, wading through the rubble toward the Fiftieth Street doors. It wasn’t interested in him, couldn’t care less about the angry Soul Gatherer determined to send its ass back to hell.
And that made Brian’s heart skip a beat. What demon could resist an opportunity to steal a soul now that it was collected and available for the taking? Especially when the odds appeared to be in its favor? If it wasn’t interested in snatching the priest’s soul, what was it interested in?
He peered through the smoke, past the demon’s massive frame, and frowned. The surprisingly intact door to the outside world was swinging shut. Someone had just left the building. Judging by the smear of bright red blood on the glass, an injured someone. Perhaps the someone from the stairwell.
Not pausing to sort out the whys, Brian put on a burst of
speed. He dashed around the demon, narrowly dodged a vicious stab of its tail, and pushed through the door into the late May evening. The sun was setting, leaving thin ribbons of tawny light falling between buildings. The traffic on the busy street had slowed to a crawl—heads popped out of car windows; wide eyes locked on the wafting smoke several floors above.
Brian scanned the gawking bystanders, looking for his wounded escapee.
There. Across the street, a bloodstained T-shirt on a figure limping up the stairs of St. Pat’s Cathedral.
The door at his back exploded in a thick moil of fire and greasy black smoke, pitching Brian and a million shards of glass and metal halfway across the street. He rolled over the hood of a Yellow Cab, bounced to his feet, and raced for the church entrance. New screams rose into the air and then were abruptly silenced as the demon swept aside a parked car and seared everything within a fifty-foot radius with a mouthful of furnace-hot heat. Brian shoved the ugly thought of fried bodies to the back of his mind and kept running. The demon never varied its pace, but every step gained it fifteen feet. It wouldn’t be far behind him.
Brian’s eyes adjusted instantly to the dim interior of the church.
The last afternoon Mass was over, but a few map-carrying tourists lingered in the pews and in the gift shop. Spotting his fugitive was easy. A bone-thin blond girl, no more than twenty, dragged a stiff leg up the nave toward the altar, one arm hanging by her side, the other clutched to her chest. It was a testament to the awe-inspiring beauty of the cathedral’s arches that no one noticed the blood trail she left behind on the marble floor.
Brian leapt over two rows of pews and sprinted.
He reached his target just as the demon hit the church with a masonry-crushing blast. The girl was on the verge of collapse. Deep cuts laced her arms and neck. The front of her threadbare Old Navy T-shirt was soaked with blood, and her lips were chalky white.
Each passing minute was killing her.
Behind him, the heavy bronze doors exploded inward, sailing twenty feet before landing on pews that buckled under the weight. The tourists ran blindly for the main entrance, far less interested in what had caused the explosion than in escaping the mayhem. Not bothering with introductions, Brian scooped the girl up in one arm and dashed for the Forty-ninth Street door.