Death Wish

Death Wish
Amy Blankenship

Blood Bound Book #12
Ren thought he’d caught him a little thief only to find that hidden under layers of boy clothes and dirt was the most desirable temptress he’d ever seen. Realizing that she’d been branded with a demon’s mark and seemed to have a death wish, Ren quickly decides that the only way to keep her alive is to not let her out of his sight. If the demons were suicidal enough to think they were going to steal her away from him, he would give them their own death wish.

Getting mixed up with the underground thievery ring run by demons had been easy… it was escaping them once they decided to kill her that Lacey was having trouble with. When her partner dies just to give her a head start, she doesn’t let his sacrifice go to waste and runs like a horde of demons are chasing her… which they are. How was she to know that her escape route would lead her straight into the middle of a demon war and into the arms of a sexy stranger that was more powerful than her worse nightmare? Ren thought he’d caught him a little thief only to find that hidden under layers of boy clothes and dirt was the most desirable temptress he’d ever seen. Realizing that she’d been branded with a demon’s mark and seemed to have a death wish, Ren quickly decides that the only way to keep her alive is to not let her out of his sight. If the demons were suicidal enough to think they were going to steal her away from him, he would give them their own death wish.

Death Wish

Blood Bound Series Book 12

Amy Blankenship, RK Melton

Copyright © 2013 Amy Blankenship

Second Edition Published by Amy Blankenship

All rights reserved.

Chapter 1

Ren glanced down at the girl in his arms as he made his way through Gypsy's underground living room and past the beaded curtains that surrounded her bedroom.

The main thing that drew his gaze was the thin layer of dirt she’d smudged all over her face like makeup to cover up the fact that she had a smooth unblemished complexion. Unable to stop himself, Ren let his gaze slowly drift back to her perfect lips and then up to the fan of her long dark lashes where they brushed against her cheeks. It would take more than dirt and baggy clothes to hide her softness and beauty from him.

He could feel the thick cloth that she had wrapped so tightly around her chest and it annoyed him. It was no wonder she’d passed out like that upstairs… he doubted she could even breathe properly with those bindings squeezing her breasts so tight. He silently wondered whose bright idea it had been for her to dress up like a boy... hopefully not hers.

Ren stopped beside the bed and leaned over it to place Lacey down on the soft mattress. It was just his luck that the girl chose that exact moment to snap out of her dead faint and wake up fighting him.

The first thing Lacey noticed was the strong arms that were wrapped around her so possessively. Her brain automatically went into overdrive when her paranoid mind sincerely thought that the dangerous demon that she’d been running from for the last couple weeks had finally caught up with her.

If this was the end of her, then like hell she was going to go down without a fight. Before the darkness even had a chance to clear from her vision, she started throwing punches at the monster holding her.

“Let go of me you black hearted bastard!” Lacey yelled and began kicking her feet to throw the demon off balance.

Caught off guard by her quick awakening, Ren snatched his sunglasses back out of the air where she’d managed to knock them off his face because his hands were full of her. Quickly becoming frustrated, he gritted his teeth and dropped her gracelessly on the mattress.

Not bothering to put the glasses back on just yet, Ren stood to his full height and watched as she bounced once and somehow managed to fold her knees under her in midair so that she landed on them. The movement was fast for a human… very impressive.

Lacey blinked and felt overwhelming relief when her vision finally cleared and she realized it was just Gypsy's heavy handed I want to rock you bodyguard. However, she did frown when her gaze was drawn to his strange eyes. It took less than a heartbeat for her to decide that the color of his irises reminded her of pure mercury with the hint of ice blue around the edges. Oddly enough, they added to his sex appeal since she was damn sure he wasn’t blind.

“Oh, it’s just you,” she murmured thankfully then mentally cringed when he lifted one elegant eyebrow at her inquiringly.

“Who did you think it was… the boogeyman?” Ren asked as he slid his dark sunglasses back on. He was still a little stunned that she’d just looked him right in the eyes and not shied away or flinched in fear.

Lacey stared up at him forcing herself to push the scary image of the old demon and his underlings out of her mind. She crossed her arms over her chest and said with as much sarcasm as she could with her heart still racing a mile a minute, “Nah, you’re no boogeyman… just some creep that can’t seem to keep his hands off me.”

Ren half smirked and half glared down at her and retaliated with an equal amount of sarcasm, “You wish.”

“I wish?” Lacey demanded and rose up so that she was kneeling on the mattress.

She straightened her arms down at her sides and balled her fists up while she fought off the slight fear that was still trailing up her spine. She didn’t have time for this. If she didn’t get out of here, there was a chance it would be too late to leave and she was looking directly at the reason for the delay.

“Yeah… you wish,” Ren repeated wondering how such a spitfire of a girl could look so cute dressed as a boy.

“I’ll tell you what I wish… I wish you’d just let me get what I came here for so I can be on my merry little way,” she tossed back at him raising her chin.

“Speaking of that… what exactly were you trying to steal and who were you stealing it for?” Ren demanded as he leaned down a little closer to intimidate her into answering the one question that was gnawing a hole in his brain. He didn’t like the thought of her putting herself in danger by working with demons and resisted the urge to shake some sense into her.

Even though she couldn’t see his eyes because of the sunglasses, Lacey could feel his silver glare leveled on her and she had to suppress a shiver. Keeping her wary gaze on him, she scrambled backwards in order to put the bed between them only to blink in surprise when he suddenly vanished from view.

She couldn’t control the frightened gasp that escaped her when she felt two hands take hold of her shoulders just as her left hand met thin air instead of the flat surface of the mattress. If he hadn’t moved so fast, she would’ve fallen backwards off the bed and onto the floor.

“How about staying put for a damn minute,” Ren said a little more harshly than he’d intended but this girl was going to have to chill out before she hurt herself.

Lacey's breathing sped up and her gaze darted around the room searching for a weapon of some sort. Much to her relief, she noticed quite a few decorating the walls and mentally smirked at her grandpa’s knack for thinking ahead. Too bad they were still out of her reach.

The man holding her shoulders had moved too fast to be human… which meant he was a demon. If that was indeed the case, then what the hell was a demon doing inside her grandfather’s secret bomb shelter and why was she alone with him?

She slowly blinked and all thoughts of fighting back left her when the memory smacked her in the face… hard. Grandpa was dead. A sound by the door made her jerk her gaze up and she spotted Gypsy and the other guy that had broken down the front door of the shop come into the bedroom.

Gypsy’s shoulders slumped when Lacey’s expression slowly turned from sadness to accusing as they stared at each other from across the room.

“Can you get them out of here and give me a moment to think clearly?” Lacey demanded angrily as she fought back the tears that thoughts of never again seeing her grandfather had provoked.

“Need I remind you that you’re the one who snuck in here uninvited,” Ren shot back wishing there was a demon nearby that could read minds so he could snag that power. He’d give a king’s ransom to know what this girl was thinking right now. The last thing he needed was for her to have enough time to come up with a cover story before he could get the truth out of her.

“Ren, please… can you and Nick give us girls some privacy?” Gypsy asked gently, feeling sorry for Lacey. She’d already dealt with her own grief over the death of their grandpa… but here Lacey had just found out.

Ren stared at Gypsy for a moment before looking back down at the girl he still had a hold of. Tightening his grip, he leaned forward until his lips were only a few inches from her ear, “I won’t be far.”

Now Lacey was born at night but she hadn’t been born last night and understood the man’s underlying threat in his words perfectly.

Gypsy sighed and shook her head before waving both men out of her room. “Go on, I think I can handle it from here.” She blew a strand of dark hair out of her eyes when they stepped out of the sleeping area but stopped just inside her living room to turn around and look at her.

Frowning, she calmly approached the bomb shelter door and pointed out. “No offense to either of you, but I haven’t seen my cousin in over a year and I think she has just as many questions as you do… so out.”

Nick placed a hand on Ren’s shoulder and gently pushed him toward the door. He quickly removed his hand when Ren shrugged it off and stormed out of the room ahead of him.

Before he followed, Nick turned his head and gave Gypsy a reassuring smile. “We’ll be right outside if you need anything. Take your time.”

Ren spun around to contradict the allowance of time but the words died on his lips when he saw that Lacey was now standing right behind Gypsy with a smug smirk on her face like she’d just gotten her way about everything. The little brat was infuriating and on the verge of actually pissing him off… so he decided to play her little game.

Tilting his head down so she could see the silver of his eyes, Ren returned the smirk with a darker one of his own making her expression slip just a little.

Lacey couldn’t believe this guy was actually smirking at her like he knew something she didn’t. Well, to hell with that. In retaliation, she reached out and slung the door to the bomb shelter closed hard enough for it to make a very loud bang about a second before she locked it.

‘Take that you sexy eighties reject,’ She mentally ranted, completely missing the fact that she’d just given him a compliment and an insult in the same sentence.