even Saige had known was unhealthy—but in her own way, had understood. Fragments Saige herself had spent her life working to piece together. To fully understand.
Or…was the threat merely a mortal one? Had she already become a target of the Collective Army? Saige had no doubt that, once aware of the awakenings, the ruthless human mercenaries devoted to obliterating all preternatural life from the world would do everything they could to destroy the Merrick. All of which meant that until she actually came face-to-face with her enemy, she would be left guessing as to which one had found her first—supernatural monster…or human zealot?
“And where exactly does the guy from the bar fit in?” she grunted under her breath as she hoisted her backpack higher onto her shoulder, her fingers biting into the strap so hard they’d gone numb. Was he after the powerful cross she’d unearthed in the depths of the jungle…or her life? Either scenario seemed likely, and yet, it wasn’t ancient weapons or murder she’d seen when she’d touched that empty beer bottle. It had been sex. Hard, grinding, explicit images of the two of them together, his mouthwatering body covering her, thrusting savagely between her spread thighs, while he growled her name and she sank a heavy pair of fangs into the side of his strong, corded throat. Her body had writhed beneath his dark, beautiful form, consumed by searing waves of pleasure, and she nearly stumbled as she pressed her left hand low on her belly, against the strange, provocative sense of heaviness that filled her. It was almost as if he were actually a part of her—as if he were, in that moment, driving that thick, heavy part of him deep inside her, igniting a fire that threatened to consume her—and she bit her bottom lip to keep from moaning at the breathtaking sensation. Her temperature spiked, a stinging in her gums unlike anything she’d ever experienced before, the painful cadence of her heart more from the hard, demanding rise of hunger than from fear.
Which means that you’ve gone stark barking mad! You don’t feed from the enemy, you idiot. And that guy sure as hell wasn’t your buddy.
Frustrated that she had so little control over the violent, visceral cravings of her Merrick, Saige ground her teeth and focused instead on keeping her body moving as quickly as possible, her speed so much greater than a human’s, despite the fact that her awakening had only recently begun. She still looked the same…still sounded the same, but inside…inside she was becoming something so much more than what she’d been. Her senses were sharper, the vivid, breathtaking details of the surrounding jungle swarming her mind with a brilliant, chaotic flood of information. Colors exploded with electrifying focus, her hearing so precise she could detect the nocturnal animals scurrying for shelter in the underbrush.
Certain that she could sense the stranger closing in behind her, Saige pumped her legs with greater force, ignoring the sharp burn of pain in her muscles as she shoved at the thick, damp leaves that crowded in on her. The small, silver compass that she wore around her neck thumped repeatedly against her pounding heart, beneath her sweat-damp shirt, and for a moment she wished that it was the cross, which could supposedly be used as a source of protection for anyone who wore it.
Wincing as the jungle flora scratched against her arms and legs, Saige figured a little protection would have come in handy right about then, but the cross was already gone. After finally uncovering the second Marker’s resting place that very morning in the stifling, humid depths of the rain forest, Saige had secretly sent the cross to Colorado in the care of a fellow colleague named Jamison Haley, then purposefully remained behind as a decoy. It’d been a risky move, but she was banking on the expectation that if they were out there watching her, the last thing in the world the Casus would expect her to do, after discovering one of the Markers, was separate herself from the powerful talisman.
Which apparently wasn’t the smartest move, now was it?
Obviously not. She might have managed to throw them off Jamison’s trail, but at the expense of throwing herself into what looked to be one heck of a fire.
“But it’s not like you had any choice,” she muttered to herself, casting a quick glance over her shoulder before narrowing her gaze back on the darkening forest. Untold dangers lurked in its shadowed depths, her Merrick blood altering her vision, allowing her to see far better than her human eyes had ever done—and yet, she still couldn’t say what lay ahead in the coming flood of night. She only knew it was there….
Enemies are coming who will take me from you.
When she’d laid hands upon the mysterious weapon, those were the words its voice had whispered through her mind, eerie and ancient and soft, so unlike the “voices” or “images” she usually picked up. But then her strange little talent for reading physical objects was most often a lark…a fluke. Only in her work did it tend to give her something meaningful. An object unearthed from hundreds of years ago, if not more, revealing its secrets to her as Saige first touched her fingers to its surface.
It was when it came to everyday life that the excitement faded. She would pick up a ketchup bottle in a restaurant and find herself privy to the internal thoughts of the last person who’d held it. Did I turn the iron off? Are these calories going straight to my thighs? Should I have the ice cream for dessert…or the apple pie? Hardly earth-shattering revelations, and she’d gotten good at shuffling the mundane facts in and out of her mind, like a revolving door, giving them little notice. Only when touching something from the past did she pay attention—focus and search for more.
Like when she’d found the first elaborately carved cross—or Dark Marker, as Saige had learned they were called—in Italy last year, and it had told her of its power: that it was one of the ancient weapons meant to destroy her enemies, as well as a source of protection. Saige had been awed by its warmth against her skin, by the beauty of its intricate design, and she’d vowed to search for the others with the use of the maps she’d found wrapped in an oilcloth, buried beside it. Worried that her discovery of the Marker was a portent of things to come, she’d wanted her mother to have the cross’s protection, and so she’d left the talisman with Elaina Buchanan while on a trip home to South Carolina. Now that her mother was gone, Saige only hoped the right decision had been made in passing the Marker on to her eldest brother, Ian. Her mother had written a letter asking that the cross be left in Ian’s possession, and Saige had found it impossible to ignore Elaina’s last wish. Knowing how much Ian had always despised any talk of the Merrick, all she could do was pray that the first Marker wasn’t lost…or thrown out, because there was no doubt they were going to need it. Especially now that she knew there were others who wanted the powerful, mysterious weapons.
After hearing the second Marker’s chilling words of warning, Saige had known she had to do everything she could to protect it. With the rest of the international research team having headed back to their various home countries the week before, she and Jamison, an archaeologist from London, had been the last remaining members to stay behind, continuing on with her private search. Over the course of the past year and a half, Saige had come to know Jamison well, and he was one of the few of her colleagues she actually considered a friend. Young and studious, the freckle-faced Brit wasn’t exactly a warrior, but what he lacked in brute strength he more than made up for with brains, and Saige trusted him implicitly—which was why she’d entrusted him with her precious find. She would meet up with him on Tuesday afternoon in Denver, and then once reunited with the cross, her plan was to track down her brother Riley and force him to take the Marker whether he wanted it or not, knowing he could protect it better than she ever could.
It would have been nice to think that Riley, a county sheriff in the Rocky Mountains, would invite her to stay with him, so that they could go through this nightmare together, but Saige had no illusions. She knew her brothers had loved her in their own way, but her and Elaina’s obsession with the Merrick had driven a painful wedge between them, a rift that had only widened as they’d grown older. She hadn’t talked to Ian in years, and even though she still saw Riley from time to time, their relationship
