February
Moscow, Russia
It had been many years, but he still remembered winter in Japan during his mortal life. The icy burn of a brittle wind on his cheeks, the heavy wet of snowfall soaking his clothes, and the tingling sensation from the relief of fire from the hearth they called an irori.
Now Kiyo didn’t feel the cold as he had when he was human.
Then again, he’d never experienced a Moscow winter.
For the first time in a long time, he felt the chill. Not as the humans did, but still … the icy dampness tried to invade him as he stalked through the well-lit darkness of the Kitay-gorod district.
To blend with the humans he wore a winter coat and scarf, forgoing a hat and gloves. His feet were sure and steady on the paved ground of Manezhnaya Square. Although the square was mostly clear of snow, small patches of ice and muddy rocks of frozen, dirty water lingered here and there.
As he neared the hotel his quarry resided within, Kiyo slowed.
His timing couldn’t have been more perfect.
The tall brunette stepped outside the entrance of the Four Seasons and forged out into the subzero temperatures without a glance left or right.
He narrowed his eyes on her short dress, her legs bare and uncovered except for her calves, protected by a pair of knee-high wedged boots. She turned left, walking with a steady grace, uncaring of the weather. Her conspicuous behavior knew no bounds, apparently. Humans shook their heads at her supposed stupidity as she walked through Moscow without a coat.
They didn’t realize that as fae, although she felt the freezing temperature, it didn’t affect her.
Following, Kiyo tried to keep enough distance between them that she wouldn’t sense him. He’d been told that her kind had a radar for fellow supernaturals.
Impatience niggled beneath his skin. He wanted this part of the job over with.
At first, he thought she was heading north, but then she took another left, leading them east. He had a sneaking suspicion regarding her destination. As difficult as it had been these past few weeks to keep up with her, reports placed Niamh Farren at nightclubs throughout eastern Europe.
Either the fae-borne woman liked to party after playing Superwoman, or she was still playing Superwoman at these bars. As cliché as it was, vampires loved a dark nightclub.
Kiyo knew Niamh was rescuing people from bus crashes and burning buildings, but if she was also playing dark hunter, she was in more trouble than he’d thought. And according to his employer, Fionn Mór, Niamh was already buried under a pile of enemies. The last thing they needed was the Consortium coming after her on top of the Blackwood Coven and The Garm.
Twenty minutes later, he watched from a distance as the brunette disappeared into a club not far from the Kitay-gorod Metro station. Kiyo waited a minute and then followed her in after two huge doormen gave him a once-over. He hated clubs. He much preferred the ruckus of an underground fight.
He immediately felt enclosed by the dark, concrete walls of the venue. Kiyo paid the entrance fee and took the stairs upward to an open landing. Music pounded and pulsed behind a set of double doors guarded by two men as large as the doormen outside. To the right was a cloakroom where clubbers removed their layers of winter clothes to reveal uniforms of mostly jeans and T-shirts.
Relieved to be rid of it, Kiyo removed his coat and scarf and took the ticket he’d need to recover them, already knowing he’d have no time to.
He pulled out his cell and typed a quick message to Val to let him know which club he was in.
Stepping inside the main venue, Kiyo scowled as he tried to focus out the noise of the rock band playing on stage at the north end of the room. It wasn’t a huge space, and it was crammed full of mostly young people. He looked up into the darkness; lights flashed overhead, revealing a U-shaped gallery crowded with more humans.
From the ages of the average patron, the kind of music the band was playing, and the low-cost entry to the club despite its location in the most tourist-driven area of the city, Kiyo would guess this was a local student spot.
Ignoring the jostling of the surrounding bodies, Kiyo grew very still as he attempted to filter out the band and zero in on his prey.
His cell vibrated in his pocket.
Val had replied. He’d hired Val, a local criminal with a reputation for keeping his mouth shut, to drop the car where he’d need it. There was a parking lot behind the club, used for its employees and those of the businesses in the surrounding buildings. Val had left the keys on top of the driver’s side tire.
With his exit strategy confirmed, he slid his cell back into the ass pocket of his jeans and pushed into the crowds. With his nose and ears on high alert, he scoured the throbbing space for the fae.
A whiff of familiar caramel caught his attention and his head snapped to the right.
There.
She stood in among the crowd as the humans jumped around her, fists pumping in the air, voices rising with the music as they sang along with the band.
Her base scent was the same as Fionn’s and his mate Rose. Rose’s and Fionn’s individual scents had joined, proclaiming their identity as true mates. The notion of true mates was ridiculous to Kiyo, but he couldn’t deny that such a thing existed—two souls fated to be tied to one another for all eternity.
It sounded like hell.
Niamh’s base scent held the same heady caramel sweetness as the fae couple, but it was overlaid with something spicy. Almost like cinnamon, but not quite.
It was such a distinct scent that it would make it easy to keep track of her from now on when she was in the vicinity.
Niamh had no apparent interest in the band.
Instead, she stared intently at something in the middle of the crowd.
Kiyo followed her gaze, searching … searching … and then he spotted what had her attention.
There was a man harassing a young woman in amongst the revelers, and no one seemed to be paying attention except Niamh. The girl kept trying to push his wandering hands off her body, but he was having none of it. He laughed like it was a joke.
Looking back at Niamh, Kiyo caught the hardness in her expression as a beam of light lit her face.
Fionn had explained that Niamh was psychic. That she’d spent most of her life following her visions. Is that what was happening here? Had Niamh seen something that brought her to this nightclub, to this girl and this man?
Moving toward the couple, Kiyo lifted his head and sniffed the air. They were definitely both human.
But if Niamh was here to stop something from happening, then it was his opportunity to divert her attention. A werewolf stalking a human would be of much more interest to her, no matter her visions. She’d probably even think he was the reason her visions had led her there.
Kiyo reached the struggling couple and took a small amount of pleasure in shoving the man off the girl with just enough strength to put him on his ass. The place was so packed, the prick took down a couple of people in his path. But Kiyo couldn’t be sorry.
Especially when the girl looked up at him with hero worship and interest in her dark eyes.
Well, this is going to be easy.
Her cheeks flushed prettily as Kiyo stared down at her. She was perfect for snaring Niamh in his trap.
The girl leaned onto her tiptoes and he bent his head toward her. Her lips brushed his ear as she said, “Spasibo.”
He nodded and lifted his head. “You’re welcome.”
She frowned.
He searched his memory for the little Russian he knew. “Pozhaluysta.”
Beaming, she grinned flirtatiously. Kiyo took hold of her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. He mimed taking an invisible drink with his free hand and raised a questioning eyebrow.
The girl lowered her lashes and nodded coyly.
Kiyo led her through the surging bodies. But not toward the bar at the back of the room. As he moved, he looked for a glowing exit sign. Discerning the green one that read выход was it, he stalked toward it. He felt the girl wrap her other hand around his wrist and give a tug. Glancing over his shoulder at her, he found her frowning warily.
As he offered her a reassuring look, he tried not to appear triumphant as the smell of caramel and spice grew closer. His skin tingled with awareness, the hair rising on the nape of his neck.
Niamh was following them.
Gripping the girl’s hand tighter, he pulled her to the exit door, ignoring the barely there sting of her nails on his skin as she resisted. He yanked open the door and hauled her past him, thrusting her into the darkly lit hallway. Steep concrete stairs led down to a fire door.
The exit door slammed shut behind him and the girl backed away, her eyes round with fear.
Kiyo let the growl of the wolf rumble in his voice as he ordered, “Run.”
She might not have understood English, but she understood his command. She ran. Without hesitation.
She took the stairs three at a time and blasted out through the fire door without looking back.
A shiver cascaded down Kiyo’s spine, shocking him as his claws unleashed, as if his body had a mind of its own. Something satisfying and needful tugged at his gut. It was like the call of a full moon. As her scent tickled him, Kiyo realized the sensation was Niamh drawing near.
Darting into the darkest corner of the hall, he retracted his claws and held his breath as the exit door opened again.
Niamh stepped into the hall, her scent enveloping him.
The hair on his arms rose.
His heart raced.
What the hell?
“Hello?” She turned toward the staircase.
Kiyo knew Niamh was fast. Faster than even him.
It was a risk to take her like this.
But he really saw no other choice.
Niamh tensed, turning her head so she was in profile. Her lips parted in surprise and he knew she’d sensed him.
Too late.
Faster than most werewolves, Kiyo was a speedy blur as he crossed the short distance between them, grabbed her head between his large hands, and snapped her neck.
The fae crumpled, and he quickly swept her warm body into his arms. Her head lolled horribly, but he refused to feel guilty. Guilt was a foreign emotion. Anyway, a fae didn’t stay down long from a broken neck. Or so Fionn and Rose had told him.
As he pushed out into the freezing Moscow night, he searched the parking lot for witnesses and was relieved to find none. They were alone. He rounded the vehicle and swiped the keys off the tire, pressing them to open the car. Remembering how important this woman was to Fionn, Kiyo found himself easing her onto the back seat of the car with a gentleness that did not come naturally.
And was pointless, really, considering he’d just broken her neck.
Before coming for her, he’d torn open the leather of the car bench and lined the inside with pure iron, and then taped the leather back up. If Niamh awoke before he returned to the apartment, the iron would weaken her without hurting her.
Pure iron, Fionn had confessed, was the only weapon on earth that could harm a fae. They did not have pure iron on Faerie, which was why the fae were truly immortal in their own world.
Sometimes he had to remind himself this shit was no longer a fairy tale supernaturals scoffed at or the religion that some of them clung to, to explain their existence.
It was real.
Still, Kiyo reckoned it would never feel truly real unless he, one day, saw Faerie. And if that happened, the world was screwed.
Moving with urgency, Kiyo got in the car and tried not to speed out of the parking lot. The heat from the traffic within the city center melted the snow and ice, but Kiyo drove west at an inconspicuous speed. At this hour the traffic wasn’t bad, but it still took thirty-five minutes for them to reach the apartment in the Solntsevo District.
Niamh had been awake for most of that.
She healed with remarkable speed.
Kiyo knew she was awake because only five minutes into the drive, an almost imperceptible whimper had escaped her lips. Glancing in the rearview mirror angled toward her, he found her lying limp, eyes closed.
But her neck no longer lolled at a hideous angle, and her chest rose and fell ever so slightly. His gaze darted down her sweetly curved body to the long legs that he’d had to bend at the knees to make them fit on the bench.
Staring back at the road, Kiyo felt every muscle in his body lock with tension. He had no idea if the pure iron sewn into the seat would work.
Eventually, he relaxed. The fact that she hadn’t attacked him the entire ride or traveled out of the car using fae magic was evidence that his strategy was a success.
Parking the car in a dark neighborhood of dangerous reputation, one chosen specifically so if anyone saw him hauling a woman into his apartment, they might be less likely to do anything about it, Kiyo waited a moment. He had excellent vision and even in the car’s dim light, he could make out Niamh’s every feature. She still pretended to be unconscious.
That strange shiver cascaded down his spine again, and his pulse jumped. He frowned. It was unlike him to be anything but calm in a situation.
Reaching into the glove box, Kiyo removed the handcuffs he’d had specially made. They were pure iron but covered in thick leather so they wouldn’t burn her. He’d seen the burn scars on Rose’s wrists from whoever had held her captive. To press pure iron to Niamh’s skin would be tantamount to torture.
And while he wasn’t in the habit of torturing innocents, Kiyo also wasn’t keen on testing the unbreakable contract with Fionn. If he hurt or abandoned Niamh, Fionn would be able to summon Kiyo to him using magic. Though Kiyo was unkillable, he was pretty certain Fionn would be able to imprison him for all eternity or until he found a way to end Kiyo’s life. Kiyo didn’t mind the ending his life part, but he knew with absolute certainty there was no way to kill him.
Unlike every other being on Earth, Kiyo was a true immortal.
Eternity was a terrifying prospect Kiyo avoided the thought of by working as a mercenary and battling in underground fights.
Eternity in prison … he didn’t dare contemplate the hell it would be.
So, he’d do as Fionn asked, even if Niamh Farren turned out to be the biggest pain in the ass. He was being generously compensated to do so.
Kiyo exited and rounded the car to the passenger side where Niamh’s head rested. He didn’t want to take the chance of opening the other side and her using what strength she had to kick him to Timbuktu. Moving at wolf speed, he fastened the handcuffs around her wrists. She couldn’t hide her flinch.
Frowning, Kiyo double-checked the iron wasn’t burning through the leather.
It wasn’t.
Her reaction had to be the weakening effects of the iron.
“I know you’re awake.”
Her eyes flew open and it was like the breath was knocked from his body.
Her irises were liquid gold.
The gold suddenly melted, and she stared up at him with the most extraordinary aquamarine eyes. Striations of gold remained in them.
He was surprised by the fear he saw in her gaze. He hadn’t imagined a powerful fae capable of fear.
But she didn’t know his intention, and she wasn’t completely invincible.
Plus, he’d gotten the drop on her. Of course she was afraid.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he promised. “I’ll explain everything once we’re inside. But first … apologies for doing this to you again.”
Her lips parted in question, but Kiyo broke her neck before she could speak.
Sliding her carefully out of the car, he gathered her into his arms, annoyed that her dress was now showing an indecent amount of skin, skin he’d touched and was adamantly ignoring the silken softness of.
Using his supernatural speed, he hurried across the lot, into the building, and up the five flights to the apartment he’d acquired for his purposes. Once inside, he laid Niamh on the graying mattress and pulled her dress back down around her thighs.
Retreating, he stared at her sprawled across the mattress on the floor of the dingy apartment. Her long, brown hair cascaded around her face in wavy tendrils. It wasn’t her natural hair color. The first surveillance photos Fionn’s research guy, Bran, had provided showed Niamh with light blond hair.
Tension drained out of Kiyo’s body as he settled into the grubby armchair that made up the small collection of furniture in the two-room apartment. Kiyo had kept the three table lamps lit for his return, preferring the warm light of those to the glaring overhead bulbs.
The beige paint was peeling off the walls, marred with food stains and fingerprints and even graffiti. But you couldn’t see that now. Nailed on top, without an inch of space between, were thin sheets of pure iron.
He’d made Niamh a cage.
Kiyo wasn’t sure how Fionn would react to his methods, but what else did he expect? Niamh Farren could teleport herself out of any room, and Kiyo needed to disable that skill long enough to explain who he was and why he’d come.
And if he felt she wasn’t amenable to the idea of him guarding and stopping her from using her powers without circumspection, then he’d have to consider keeping her here indefinitely.
Thinking of the vile bathroom he’d scrubbed clean with bleach only hours ago, Kiyo really hoped Niamh would get over his aggressive methods and trust he was who he said he was.
Months of living in this shithole as a prison warden instead of a bodyguard didn’t exactly appeal to him.
But Fionn Mór was not someone you crossed. Kiyo had known Fionn since the late ’60s. Kiyo had left New York several years before because it was no longer safe for him to remain there. Although he’d kept to himself and moved from borough to borough, he’d begun to encounter one too many older people who remembered him from their youth.
Since then, Kiyo had lived the life of a nomad, a mercenary for hire. He’d been a silent assassin, hostage negotiator, soldier, bounty hunter, kidnapper, bodyguard, and thief, to name but a few occupations in the unseen wars of the supernatural world. Even in the human world. There were humans who were aware of the supernaturals, some to fear and avoid, others who paid a great deal of money for the advantages of supernatural power.
The supernatural world questioned Kiyo’s longevity, considering he was a werewolf, and there had been those who’d tried to kill him as an abomination, and failed. There were those who’d tried to use him and failed at that too.
Among all the supernaturals who had guessed at his immortality, only one man had garnered a modicum of Kiyo’s trust. Fionn. Kiyo had thought him a powerful warlock. They’d met fighting each other in the underground matches, and Kiyo was satisfied to have found someone who could finally challenge him. Fionn never pried into his personal life and vice versa. As the decades passed with Fionn never aging, Kiyo had surmised the Irishman had been cursed with immortality as he himself had.
Until last year when he arrived at an underground fight with his mate, Rose. Fionn hadn’t known she was his mate then, but Kiyo had understood Fionn was fighting his attraction to the woman. He’d come to the fight to take out his pent-up frustration on Kiyo, and in a moment before the fight, Fionn’s eyes had flashed gold.
He’d demanded Kiyo forget he’d seen it, and Kiyo had obliged.
But the origin stories had filled his mind. Stories of the fae and the gate, how it had been opened over two thousand years ago, and the fae’s interference with the humans on Faerie had brought about the creation of vampires and werewolves. The fae had been true immortals, beautiful, beguiling … and with eyes that flashed gold when their passions were high.
Fionn Mór was fae.
Of course, now Kiyo knew the whole story. Fionn had once been human. An ancient warrior king in what is now Ireland. He’d fought the fae as a human king and in punishment for killing a fae prince, the Faerie Queen, Aine, had enslaved Fionn. In return, his wife and children were spared. But Fionn lived on Faerie for several years as the queen’s consort. Before she’d decided to close the gate between worlds and send the supernaturals and humans back to Earth, she’d turned Fionn into fae to keep him with her.
However, he escaped. Upon his return to Ireland, his wife, now remarried to the new king, wanted to kill him for what he’d become. But in respect for the king he’d once been, Druids cast a sleeping curse over him and buried him in the earth instead. Personally, Kiyo thought that was worse than death.
In the early 1700s, the Blackwood Coven found Fionn. They were a powerful North American coven obsessed with reopening the gate to Faerie. It took them two years, but they eventually broke the Druid spell and woke Fionn. They thought he’d be the one to help them open the gate. The ancient Irishman had plans to do that but only to take revenge on Aine. He waited, as a few others of his time had, for the fruition of a spell that Aine had cast before she closed the gate. She’d prophesied the birth of seven fae children born to humans who would have the ability to open the gate between worlds.
Rose Kelly had been one of those fae.
Fionn found Rose and wanted to use her to open the gate. In a twist of fate, Rose turned out to be Fionn’s true mate. Now he was determined to protect her and to protect the gate from reopening. He knew what the fae could do to the human world. Aine knew. That’s why she’d closed the gate in the first place. But the twisted fae bitch couldn’t help herself from toying with the supernaturals and the humans by casting that goddamn spell.
There were only three fae-borne left.
The now-dead leader of The Garm, a supernatural group made of vamps and wolves, who were religiously against the opening of the gate, had killed three of the fae before his death. He’d died at the hands of the fourth who had been turned into a werewolf by her werewolf mate and was now no longer a person of interest to those who wanted to open the gate.
At the head of that group was the Blackwood Coven. They’d been focused on Rose for a while, but she was extraordinarily powerful, as was her mate. So, for now, they seemed to have abandoned her as prey. They were focused on one of the two fae left. The second was an unknown. Not even Fionn knew who the last fae-borne was.
But the first was lying on the old mattress in front of Kiyo.
Niamh Farren.
Fae-borne.
Hunted by many.
Protected by few.
One of those protectors had apparently been her human brother, Ronan. And Ronan had been killed by an Irish coven hunting Rose Kelly.
Since then, Niamh had lost all sense of self-protection. She used her powers in front of humans, bringing attention to herself from the supernatural world.
From the enemies who hunted her.
Kiyo was now one of her protectors. Fionn was paying him a lot of money to be.
Protecting Niamh from her enemies was one thing.
Protecting her from herself was a far greater challenge.