It wasn’t enough.

Julius threaded his fingers through her hair, angling her head to deepen the kiss. He explored her mouth, stroking her tongue with his and, Jesus, she tasted good.

But it wasn’t enough.

He didn’t remember moving, but he must have. She was no longer on his lap in the chair, but rather on the floor beneath him right where he wanted her.

This wasn’t a good idea, but her heat reached him despite the layers of clothing between them and drove him nearly out of his mind. She was so damn soft, so responsive and he needed her. He needed to be buried deep inside her. Wanted nothing more than to crawl under her skin. He rotated his hips against her and shivers collected at the small of his back.

She moaned low in her throat.

The image in his head shifted. No longer did a beautiful redhead fill his mind’s eye, but rather a thin blond woman. She lay beneath him, her lifeless eyes staring in horror. Her throat splayed wide open in a horrible grin.

SUBMIT.

He reared back. “Jesus.”

Someone had cut her torso from sternum to pelvis, her insides displayed in a macabre smorgasbord. Some bit of gore lay next to her on the pristine white sheets.

“Mary Jane,” he whispered the name. “Mary Jane Kelly?”

His hands shook. He raised them to wipe his eyes, but stopped. His fingers were bloody. Fuck. He was holding her liver.

No. He wasn’t with her. Couldn’t even see. He lifted his hand closer. Sniffed.

Soap. Not blood and gore, only soap.

He looked back at Mary Jane. This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be.

Mary Jane opened her eyes. She sat up and her insides shifted, sagging out. She reached for him with one hand, the other trying to hold her insides where they belonged.

OBEY.

Julius jerked back.

The gruesome scene blinked out and once again, he was blind.

Holy hell, had he done that? Was that a memory of his crime? If so, he needed to be ashed.

SUBMIT TO THE SUN. BURN YOUR SINS AWAY.

His own harsh breath echoed back to him in the silent room. He couldn’t hear Kat. Shit. Shit! What had he done? Had he—?

BURN. BURN. BURN.

With one palsied hand, he reached out to her. He touched her face, her neck, and she was whole. Her warm, steady hand slid into his.

BURN YOUR SINS AWAY. BURN AND BE FREE.

“What’s wrong?”

“I shouldn’t have.” He swallowed hard. “I can’t.” She had to get away from him because he didn’t want to . . . what if he—? He was insane.

OBEY ME. SUBMIT TO THE SUN.

That voice grew louder, stronger, more insistent.

OPEN THE BLINDS.

SUBMIT.

BURN.

He stood, and with her hand still in his, he helped her up.

Gaia, she was ten kinds of a fool.

Why would he want her? He was injured and here she was trying to seduce him. He was gorgeous and he had no clue what she looked like. Her cheeks flamed and she looked away, grateful he couldn’t see her.

A line of little dots of light appeared on the ceiling, the result of the first rays of morning sunlight streaming through the string holes on the closed blinds. Dawn had arrived. As the sun continued its assent, those dangerous little orbs of light would crawl down the wall.

She needed to get him upstairs where she’d boarded the windows. Where they’d be safe. Tonight, she’d board these windows so they could have full access to the house during the day.

Her gaze fell from the little spheres of sunlight to her mate. She opened her mouth to direct him upstairs, but hesitated.

Something had changed. It was subtle. A tension in his muscles. A deepening of the brackets around his mouth. A hardening of his presence. Whatever it was raised the hairs on her neck. He paced, shaking his head every few seconds.

“Are you thirsty?” A shiver snaked up her spine.

“No.” He prowled her small living room with the agitated grace of a caged lion, his fingers grasping, relaxing, clenching.

“Is anything wrong?”

Again, he shook his head. His mouth worked, forming words she couldn’t hear.

What was going on? Was he angry with her for her failed seduction? Was he angry at himself for almost letting her seduce him? Or was this another antic designed to make her kick him out?

The colors of his aura were all wrong. Deep angry black swirls twisted around his body.

“Submit.”

She jumped. “What?”

“Submit.” His jaw clenched tight. “Obey. Burn. Burn.” He turned and took two long strides to the window.

“No!” She ran to him.

He reached out, grabbed the cord for the blinds and pulled. Sunlight poured in. His skin turned red. Smoked. Blackened.

She tackled him, using a burst of Magic to snap the blinds closed. Struggled to keep him down, but he was too strong. He shoved her aside, leaping to his feet.

“Burn.”

“Watcher!”

He dropped to the ground, the memory curse overriding whatever voice he heard.

“Gaia help him.” The Watcher had killed him . . . it was only a matter of time.

Even through the seizure, his body tried to follow the commands. “Oh-oh-oh-oh-bey.” His muscles were all locked tight as he seized, he couldn’t move, couldn’t follow the commands, but he tried to speak them. “B-b-b-urn b-b-urn.”

She sagged back against the wall. The good news was that he wasn’t psychotic. Vampires were notorious for their self-preservation mechanism and yet twice now, he tried to destroy himself. A felo-de-se hex could explain this self-destructive impetus.

The Watcher wanted him to suffer. That’s why he only had to bind Julius’ memories for a short time because he’d placed a suicide hex on him. Already he had survived two dawns, much more than the Watcher could have expected considering both the Guardian and the coven wanted Julius’ ash.

“B-b-b-burn.”

She covered her ears. Tears etched itchy trails down her cheeks. It seemed like forever before Julius began to quiet. From the way the sun shone through the blinds it must be full daylight. Finally, between exhaustion and his injuries, he passed out.

She levitated him upstairs with Magic and lay him in bed, pulling off the singed remnants of his shorts and assessed the damage. One side of his face around the existing bandage was charred black, as were his chest, belly, hip, and the front of one arm.

The burns were superficial; she could reverse the damage. She held her hands over him, closed her eyes, found her center, and healed him.

The spell was simple and should have been an easy process, but she grew tired within minutes and her hands ached. Pain crept up her arms. She did her best to stay focused. She ignored her discomfort with firm determination and kept at the healing until the last of the burns faded to healthy pink skin. The whole time, the pain continued to intensify until her arms throbbed from fingertips to shoulders.

She opened her eyes, glanced at her arms and gasped. Her veins showed under the skin in stark relief. They webbed under her flesh in a thick black network all the way to her shoulders. She released her Magic. The black turned to a more natural color and then her veins faded beneath her skin.

She’d seen this once before. One night, Mother had overreached—tried to perform a spell solo that required a full coven. As she exhausted her Magic, the blackness had crept under Mother’s flesh and spread until she’d given up on the spell. Like this, once she’d released the Magic, the blackness had faded.

But she wasn’t overreaching. She’d healed tougher injuries than these burns. Such a menial task shouldn’t tax her Magic.

Unless she was losing her gift to heal.

No. Impossible. Trina and Lilith were both vampire and witch. Of course, they were also the Original—they shared the reincarnated soul of the first woman and they were meant to be both vampire and witch. It was what made them special and gave them the power necessary to maintain lawfulness among the daemons and the Watchers.

Oh, dearest Gaia, she was so stupid. A numb, eerie calm overtook her and she sank to the floor, cradling her aching arms to her torso.

She was losing her Magic.