Midnight's Master (Midnight 3)

without even trying."

That was the shit-end of the draw?

"But the only thoughts he could pick up were from killers. Rapists. Twisted pervs who wanted to hurt and maim. And Sam couldn't turn the voices off, no matter how hard he tried…until he found the meth."

Peter's voice drifted through her mind. "You ever have nightmares, sis?"

"We all have nightmares ." They'd been in the kitchen, getting ready for school, and running late, as usual. She'd rolled her eyes and chugged her orange juice.

He'd been fourteen. She'd been thirteen.

"No. Not a snake's gonna bite me shit-"

"Shh! Don't let mom hear you say that-"

He'd grabbed her arm, knocking over the orange juice so that it poured over the tabletop and dripped onto the floor. "I'm talking about seeing people die. Getting ripped apart. Over and over-

hearing some bastard laughing and-"

"Peter Marcus Storm!" Their mother's voice shrieked at them. "What have I told you about…"

"Cursing in my house," she whispered. Oh, shit. Oh, no. Peter had never talked about his nightmares to her after that. When they'd climbed onto the school bus, he'd stared at her, eyes sad and said simply, "You don't have them."

She hadn't understood.

Niol touched her cheek and she flinched away from him. "You remember, don't you, Holly?"

Peter had spiraled away from her so fast.

"When puberty hits, most demons come into the power, and for those with the Dark Touch-"

"The Dark Touch?" They had a name for it? Goose bumps covered her arms. Peter's face was so clear in her mind right then. Not the face after death-the bloated, pale face with the glassy eyes.

The youthful, worried face of her brother. Her nose, her mouth. His intense eyes and strong jaw.

"Those with the Touch pick up the negative energy and it can warp their minds. Demons have a well-deserved reputation for many reasons. The fact that those with the Touch fight insanity is one of 'em."

She wanted to scream. To yell that he was wrong about her brother, about every damn thing. But Niol knew demons far better than she did. "And what? Drugs are their only hope? Getting wasted?

Overdosing and dying?"

"Mind shields." His jaw worked. "We have to find a way to screen the kids and get them suited with shielding to block out the energy. It can be done, it can-"

"Doctor Drake is teaching me how to shield." Said slowly.

Surprise flickered across his face.

"I won't be helpless again," she muttered.

"You never were." Niol's eyes held hers. "You never were."

So said the guy with enough power to fry his enemies from the inside out.

Her temples ached. There was so much to take in. "Niol, you-you really think my brother was one of those with that-power?"

"Can't know for sure. Not now."

Because her brother had been buried in Meadows Ceme tery for so many long years now. She visited him every Christmas, every February seventeenth-the day of his birth-and every August third-the day she'd found his body.

"If he was like that…" And dammit, she was believing that he could have been. "Then why am I different?" Normal.

"You're a hybrid demon."

She knew the term. Someone with the mixed blood of a demon and…something else.

"Maybe a quarter demon, could be even less-I'm not done shaking your family tree."

Ah, okay.

"Power manifests differently for hybrids. Sometimes…" His jaw clenched. "Fucking powerful bastards are born. And sometimes…"

"You get me," she finished. "I don't have any powers, Niol. I can't make fire." She glanced at the candles, all but sputtering out. "Can't read minds. Can't do-"

"You don't know what you can do. Neither do I. Time will show us." He didn't sound particularly concerned. "What I do know about you-you can cloak your powers like no one I've ever seen."

Well, that was something.

"I should have sensed you from the beginning, but the glamour is too strong. I can only see through it when you-"

Climax.

What had Dr. Drake said? Certain powerful instances or stressful situations may trigger the latent powers in you.

Her climaxes with Niol sure fell under the "powerful instances" category.

"If it turns out you're a level-one-" Niol continued.

The weakest of the demons.

"Big deal." His fingers tangled in her hair and he brought her face toward his for a hard, long kiss. "I'll still want you like f**king hell on fire."

Darkness.

The candlelight was gone. A ball of tight need stirred within her again, but she held on to her control, needing to know…"Niol…do you have the Touch?"

Her hand lay on his chest. Touching the flesh so warm it almost seemed to burn her. Feeling the heart beneath her hand-and the hard lurch it gave at her question.

"You don't want to know all that I can do." Said with absolute certainty. "If you knew, you'd be running from me as fast as you could."

She didn't move her hand. Didn't move her body. "I've already seen what you can do-"

"Sweetheart, that was just the start." Light flashed in the room, but not from the candles. Flames hovered in the air, small balls of spinning fire. "What I can do…it'd scare you to death."

"Nice light show." Her hands lifted to his face. Felt the faint sting of a late-night shadow lining his jaw. "I don't scare easily, Niol." She dropped the sheet. Straddled his hips. Let the aroused length of his c**k slide against her sex.

Flesh to flesh.

The way it had never been for them.

"I'm on the pill," she told him bluntly. "And I'm clean."

"I can't get any diseases that humans have-"

Her brow furrowed. "But I thought demons-"

"Lower-level demons can, weaker immunity. I'm not like them." He kissed her, hard and deep.

She lifted her hips, rubbing along the length of that swollen flesh.

Inside.

She stared into his eyes. So black. So many secrets. "I don't scare easily," she repeated, and arched her hips.

The tip of his c**k slid into her.

Face-to-face. Sex to sex.

Niol's hand eased between their bodies. Parted her folds. Stroked the bud that quivered for him.

Then shoved his c**k deeper into her.

"Good," he growled. "Because you're not getting away from me."

She pushed up on her knees. Drove down. Up. Down. The rhythm grew faster, harder.