More Than Life (Arcane Crossbreeds) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  About the Author

  Other Books by Amanda Vyne:

  Arcane Crossbreeds 2:

  MORE THAN LIFE

  Amanda Vyne

  AMC Publishing

  Copyright 2011 Amanda Vyne

  Arcane Crossbreds 2

  More Than Life

  Twenty years ago, Agent Raife Merrick came to San Francisco to die. He hadn’t intended to save a sweet little blood-sucker from certain death and he sure as hell hadn’t meant to stick around and watch her grow into a beautiful woman. Yet fate obviously hadn’t given a damn what he wanted and it definitely didn’t care about the future of that woman now… but Raife did. Despite her distrust, he’s willing to do anything to protect her and finally make her his.

  The last thing Katya Schaffer saw before waking up a subject in a genetics lab was Raife’s face. So when he suddenly shows up in her cell a year later to save her, she doesn’t trust him. She’s no longer the sweet and innocent little girl who worshipped him. After being subjected to painful experiments, she’s acquired some mad skills, even if she can’t exactly control them. She doesn’t understand why they turned her into an abomination or why so many factions of the Arcane risked public exposure to capture her, but she intends to find out. Unfortunately, Raife and his team of agents are her only hope of surviving long enough to get her answers.

  Arcane Crossbreeds 2: More Than Life

  Copyright @ 2011 by Amanda Vyne

  ISBN: 978-1-61118-515-7

  Kindle Edition

  Published by AMC Publishing

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, business establishments, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All right reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this eBook only. No part of this eBook may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without prior written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Warning: This book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to same readers. This book is for sale to adults only, as defined by the laws of the contry in which you made your purchase.

  Dedication

  I have been incredibly blessed to have spent all of my life surrounded by people who encouraged me to read and write…from family and friends to teachers and other authors. You make me grateful. Thank you.

  Prologue

  She never screamed.

  How odd that her silence should impress him. She was no more than a baby, her crystalline blue eyes glossy with tears as her little rosy bow lips quivered in terror. She was huddled in one corner of the old warehouse, tucked among two rotting crates. Her eyes left the gruesome scene not six feet away and met his across the dark expanse of the warehouse as though she knew he was there.

  Raife Merrick shouldn’t be there. He was just passing through San Francisco, in search of a mate like every other poor bastard of his species. In fact, had no fucking idea why he had slipped into the warehouse with the deranged blood sucker, not when the appropriate authorities were even now amassing outside. He wasn’t exactly the hero type. In fact, he didn’t even like blood suckers. They gave him the creeps. Yet he’d been drawn into the warehouse by a sense of overpowering urgency. So he’d circled the old abandoned warehouse and slipped through a broken window.

  “Little guuuurrrrrrlllllll.”

  The little girl jerked, her blue eyes widening in her alarmingly pale face as they came back to the…thing that stood in the center of the space. So this was what a deranged blood sucker looked like. Blood bubbled from his lips with the growling sounds he was making. His eyes were a flickering red. The crimson stained the front of his clothes, a suit and tie no less. Another stupid blood sucker addicted to the tainted blood peddled by the local blood dealers. He’d obviously bought some really bad stuff. It turned them into deranged lunatics that had an unquenchable thirst for anything they could find.

  He curled his lip in disgust.

  Even innocent women and children.

  The fear from the little girl crashed into him in sickening waves when the monster stepped away from what had kept his attention. There was a woman crumpled on the dirty concrete, her long bare legs spread, stained skirts thrown up over her bare torso. Blood marred her pale thighs and the torn arch of her throat. Her pale blue eyes were open in an eternal expression of terror. It didn’t take a detective to guess what had happened.

  “Shhhhh, baby, don’t look.” He whispered in her mind.

  The little girl jerked back to him, a tear suspended on her thick bottom lashes. She was a beautiful little girl for a blood sucker and her terror was palpable. That alone made the mind numbing rage stalk through his large frame. She was barely a baby and that deranged blood sucker had raped and drained her mother right in front of her eyes. It sickened him.

  “I can smell you. You smell so sweet.” The deranged blood sucker made a gurgling sound of pleasure. “Little guuuuurrrrllll.”

  “I want you to close your eyes.”

  Her eyes slid trustingly shut. With the fury pounding through him he rushed the blood sucker that was howling for the little girl, his burst of speed blurring his large form. He was on the deranged man before he even knew what hit him, snapping his neck and tossing his lifeless body to the ground without one iota of regret.

  With another burst of speed he was crouched in front of the little girl, the wide spread of his shoulders blocking the carnage from her view.

  He’d been absolutely silent but she slowly slid her glittering blue eyes open in her small pale face and looked straight at him as though she knew he’d be there. After studying him for a long moment she lifted her little arms up to him. With barely a pause he lifted her slight form into his arms and stood. He wasn’t real familiar with children as his people didn’t really have many of them. His experience was limited but this felt right. When she wrapped her tiny arms around his neck and she pressed her little tear stained face trustingly into his neck he knew it was right.

  The breath that fanned his neck was broken and slow. With a frown he pressed a large hand against her small back and could feel the weak, stuttering beat of her heart.

  She was dying?

  With a curse, he carefully tipped her back into the breadth of his palm and her head lulled to the side, white blonde curls spilling around his long fingers. Blood was soaking the pale pink of her dress from the ripped flesh of her neck. That fucking blood sucker had already bled her? Her mother must have tried to save her. She was only a baby. Fuck!

  His eyes jerked up to the windows circling the upper level of the warehouse. Those worthless bastards were probably still outside determining
the best plan of attack. The pulse of her heart paused against his hand at her back for one long moment and then fluttered to an erratic beat again. Shit! She wouldn’t last until they pulled the right head out of the right ass. She needed blood now.

  He glanced down at her again and those luminescent blue eyes peered back at him in complete trust. Blood suckers couldn’t drink human blood without becoming deranged but what of …other blood. Like his. He definitely wasn’t human but would his blood have a similar effect on her? Her eyes slid shut and something tightened in his chest.

  Without giving himself time to dwell on the repercussions he dropped to one knee and reached into his leather boot to pull free a small knife. Sliding the lethal edge over his wrist he watched the crimson fluid well and glide over his tanned flesh. Bracing her limp form in the crook of his arm he pressed his wrist to her pale lips, careful to guide the blood into her mouth.

  “Come on, baby girl. Swallow.” A single rivulet slid from the corner of her small mouth and he shifted her head in the crook of his arm. “Come on, come on.”

  With a gusting breath of relief he saw her little throat shift and writhe as she swallowed. As her small bow lips began to suckle against his wrist he was taken aback by the incredible sensation that flooded him. Life…he was sustaining life with his own body. The sound of shattering glass jerked him back to the present and he was pleased to see color had infused the little girl’s skin.

  Pressing his lips to her white blonde curls he stood and carried her away from the grisly scene. It was fate that had propelled him into the warehouse. The blood sucker officials would have followed the rules to the letter and arrived too late to save her. It had been his responsibility to save her, to continue to keep her safe.

  She belonged to him.

  Chapter One

  Agent Raife Merrick had finally found the hell he’d been searching for these past months.

  Glaring overhead lights drove ice picks into his skull even through his closed eyelids, and he didn’t want to give too much consideration to what caused that distinctive taste in his mouth. Considering the roiling happening down south, he wouldn’t be surprised to find evidence of dinner on his shoes or—God help him—on his clothes. Provided dinner hadn’t come in a bottle again, that was. He was sprawled flat on his back, and he knew it wasn’t his bed because he was usually in the facedown orientation for that one.

  And chains weren’t normally involved.

  He gave an experimental tug against his restraints. All of them. Shit, they weren’t messing around. He could barely move. Shifting against the hard table, he almost laughed and would have if there hadn’t been tape over his mouth. He flexed his jaw behind the tape, ignoring the splintering pain that ricocheted through his skull from the movement.

  Inside him, the lurking presence of his daemos, the spirit of his inner dragon, stirred restlessly against the restriction. The last several months had darkened it, darkened him. Instead of the guide it was meant to be, its bleak cravings weighed on him, making him more volatile the closer he came to the end.

  In due time, he promised his dragon. They would never have their mate, never be whole, but they could have this – this last fight and an honorable death.

  Honor. Humor bubbled up cold and dangerous. Some cold fucking companion that made, but if he couldn’t live fighting, the next best thing was to die fighting. His people were taught that before they learned to walk.

  “Agent Merrick, you’re awake, I see.”

  Raife snapped his head toward the voice that came from behind him. Dark spots crowded his vision with the sudden movement, and he cursed behind the tape across his lips. His brain must have been fried if he hadn’t thought to mentally check the room as soon as he came to. Dumb-ass.

  “Why don’t we get you in a better position to talk?”

  The voice was smooth, measured. Unfamiliar. He reached out with his senses to touch lightly on the presence of that deceptive voice. A cold and solid mental barrier met him. The man was immune to telepathic probing, which meant he likely wasn’t human. Those poor bastards didn’t know they needed to guard against telepathy, which made most of them easy to read. Evolution at its finest there. But not this asshole. Was the man like him, a species of the Arcane?

  The table he was strapped to hummed beneath him and began to tilt until it was in a vertical position. Raife lifted his head away from the table and cursed silently – his skull felt like it was cracking wide open. Nausea swamped him, flowing like a chill up over his flesh to settle in the back of his throat, and he swallowed it down. Choking on his own vomit wasn’t the honorable death he had in mind.

  Without the lights glaring on him, he was able to get a better look at where the hell he was. Shiny silver everything – walls, sink, floor. No windows. He braved the pain shooting through his skull to look down over his shoulder. There was a drain in the middle of the floor. He snorted. Did they expect this to get messy?

  The muted clang of metal drew his attention to the corner and the tiny female in the lab coat who was arranging some utensils on a gleaming steel tray, none of which looked pleasant. She glanced back at him with sympathy in her eyes.

  Well, hell. Maybe they did expect it to get messy.

  He glanced over his body and frowned at his bare feet. They’d obviously found the knife in his boot. He was wearing his jeans and T-shirt from the night before. That was good. There was a tube leading up from his arm to a bag of clear fluids. Okay, that wasn’t so good.

  “We need just a wee bit of your blood, preferably without the taint of alcohol, thus the IV.” The man’s voice and the dull tap of shoes echoed in the small room as the owner of that voice moved from around his right side. Raife cocked one brow at the man who appeared.

  Hell, yeah. This bastard was definitely a species of Arcane.

  The man was tall but thin, and Raife got the impression to consider the man weak would be a fatal mistake. Power hung elegantly over the other man’s frame, much like the expensive dark gray suit. His pale blond hair was combed back, and ice blue eyes appraised him coldly. His look was mocking, speculative. Raife didn’t care much for it…or the sneering lift to the asshole’s lips. Not that he cared for much of anything these days.

  A side effect of fate fucking him over.

  Raife narrowed his eyes and followed the man’s path until he was directly in front of him. The man’s blond head tilted, those impassive blue eyes considering him. “For a man trying so hard to be caught, you almost didn’t leave us enough to work with.”

  The man was no doubt taking in Raife’s bloodshot eyes and the several days of growth shadowing his face. He’d seen the damage the last few months had wrought in him. He saw it every damn time he looked in the mirror. Something he avoided as much as possible.

  It was better to look forward than back, because he would change nothing, even if he could.

  Raife willed the pain away and eyed the lithe man with an equally mocking expression. “Yeah, well, beggars can’t be choosers. If you don’t like what you see, you could always throw me back and offer your hospitality to someone else.”

  The man’s smile was humorless as he cocked his head to the side, not betraying any surprise at Raife’s ability to speak telepathically.

  Interesting. Of course, if this was the asshole collecting unmated male Drachon, then it was likely he would know a thing or two about that species of Arcane. It explained the tape over his mouth. The man wouldn’t want to risk getting his hide sizzled by a roar from a Drachon. Even a sorry-ass, dying Drachon like him could still do some damage.

  It had taken him too long to get here to screw it up by trying to get away so soon. Not before he got some answers for his clients. This was his last case. He’d started it before…before his life had gotten shitty. And he always finished what he started. After that… He didn’t give a damn what happened after that. Maybe he’d see how many bottles of Jack it took to give a Drachon alcohol poisoning.

  Raife studied the man c
losely. Since his mind was closed to him, he had to use plain old-fashioned observation to get the guy’s measure. What he saw wasn’t encouraging. He had a sharp, fluid edge, like that of a blade. Carefully honed—deadly—with this aura of power. Only one species of Arcane carried themselves that way. Only one species drew power to them like magnets.

  Fucking Elementals.

  The man’s smile was lethal, his gaze cold and piercing as if he could see right into him.

  Raife shifted his big body under the scrutiny and the sensation that this man was peeling back his every defense and looking too deeply. Seeing deeper than he allowed anyone else. Elementals weren’t typically telepathic, but there was no such thing as typical these days. And no one trusted an Elemental. Many of them were no better than power-hungry witches, even the ones in respectable covens. What would an Elemental want with an unmated Drachon? He couldn’t siphon off any useful powers, and all of the missing Drachon were late in their last heat, which meant they were close to dying. Unless it was for that reason they were useful in the first place. But then why would a weak, dying species of Arcane be useful to an Elemental?

  “Ah, yes. The Drachon mind never fails to amaze me. So very quick. Too bad you cannot seem to save your sorry species from extinction with it.”

  Raife held those cool, predatory eyes without flicking a glance to the woman pushing the medical cart toward his side. She could take whatever she needed from his body; it had betrayed him anyway. It had made him push away the one good thing in his life.

  “Gotta go sometime. May as well be here.” Raife cocked one brow tauntingly. “Care to join me?”

  The man crossed in front of him with slow, precise steps, each hollow click of his footfalls distinct. Eerie, like the man himself, and it put Raife on edge. Why couldn’t it have been some other species or even a psychotic human? He hated Elementals.