Page 4 of Torn Between Two Worlds

She never let him in where Alcott was concerned, he would have thought she had lost her mind. Her secret would've broken them, and it was just another reason she was glad they had chosen to end their relationship as friends. She would need the support system far more than she needed someone to share in a secret she’d been guarding for so long.

“Ciara? You sound funny, are you alright?”

Damn it.Derrick really was perceptive to her after so many years, even if she hadn’t really shown any emotion since the car accident.

“Yes, I'm fine now. I just got a little intimidated with the responses to my story submission in Burke's seminar is all. Nothing to worry about. Does this mean that you'll be home a little earlier?” her voice lifted at the end, hoping and praying he would say yes.

She needed him more than ever, the secret had never stopped her from seeking his solace before, and it wouldn’t work then. He was the only rock she had left. Alcott had been both a brother and support system to her, Derrick had as well, but in other areas. She'd been praying for a few days that it wouldn't change simply because the title on their relationship had. It had only been about three weeks since the big decision to go their separate ways, and it really didn't feel like anything had ended just yet. She just hoped he would be her rock, at least one last time.

“Yes, that sure is exactly what it means. Goodbye, shitty mall job. Hello, Italy. I'll be home after I check on something at the bank, and you can vent away about Burke. I'll even grab some ice cream so we can pretend I'm the one who made you eat it. I love you.”

She couldn't help but laugh. He knew what she needed, the ice cream, and was even being sweet enough to listen to her vent. Shit. She had better think about what exactly she was venting about. His ‘I love you’ had likely slipped out, and her heart twisted a little, a small amount of sadness from their situation mixing with her hurt for her missing Guardian.

“Sounds perfect!” A fake cough pulled her attention from the phone to the car.

Stryder had been standingbehind the girl, watching her cry for at least the last half an hour. He couldn't understand why the few people that had passed by her just turned and looked busy as if they hadn't seen her. Surely, people in her world had a little more compassion for the girl. No, not the girl, Ciara Miller.

Ciara, the girl who would either be his savior or his destruction. He'd been minding his own business, well no that wasn't exactly right since, being a demon, he never minded his own business, but he hadn't been making trouble for anyone. He'd been enjoying a beer with his brothers in New Orleans, which as he had recently learned, was nothing more than a scene in some damn book, when a man had shown up. There had been nothing impressive about the man, just a man in jeans and a trench coat. It was what the guy had told him that was spectacular.

The man had all but thrown his life into a toilet and pushed the plunger, flushing it all down in a swirl. Supposedly, he was nothing more than a book character. He'd explained that there were people able to grant characters life, ones that needed protection. Of course, he hadn't believed it at first, but it was kind of hard to argue with a man who could recite more of his past than he could, so Stryder hadn't questioned it after that.

Stryder had been given a choice. He could choose to be some girl's Guardian, or the man would kill him, and that would upset the balance because she needed protection. Stryder didn't like his lot in life, but he wasn't going to throw the towel in and leave everything to his brothers either. So he'd told the man to keep talking, and his smile had been genuine when the guy mentioned the sexual link he'd experience. Stryder was never one to turn down sex, he had a theory—the more sex you had, the more apt you were to find your mate.

The decision really wasn't his to make, and sex with some all-powerful being sounded pretty damn good to him. That was, until the guy had kept talking.

Apparently, the bad things in the books, like his demon buddies and even his family, were also made aware of a Word Speaker when a character was granted release. The guy hadn't said how, just that they were. Stryder would bet his left nut the jerk told them himself and just wasn't sharing that info. Some of the evil would simply try to kill the girl, others to manipulate her. It would all be up to good old Stryder to stop anything from actually succeeding. He personally felt attacking an innocent girl was a chicken shit move and had even told the guy in the trench that much.

The protection was a trade off for being given life outside their fictional world. A Word Speaker would shift between them until they found the right one, the one they fit best with. Then, when the Word Speaker turned twenty-seven, that character would be free to live until this man called them to fight in a prophesied war.

War had gotten his attention. He didn't want to be a pawn again. Once more, the man had reminded him it wasn't an option. He either chose to protect Ciara, or he would die. Mind blowing sex and enough violence to keep his Horseman, War, happy. Which made Stryder cool with the protection angle. He couldn't deny his curiousness about being released. Maybe she could do it more than once, and he and his family could kiss the hellhole goodbye. The only real glitch was he didn't want to be tied to the chick. He wanted to come and go as he pleased.

He had agreed, and then, good old buddy that the man was, he had dropped one more bomb on him. Ciara was the most powerful of her kind in a long time, and she would not be happy to see him.

Judging by his greeting, she certainly wasn't happy to see him. In fact, she seemed disgusted, if not angry at him. Curious about her, he’d followed her when she left the apartment and looked down at her while she sat on the sidewalk crying her eyes out, but hadn't said anything. He didn’t really know what to say to her, but he sure as hell had looked, and felt himself possessively stating “mine,” which was what demons did when they finally found their mate. There weren't a lot of female demons, and males were extremely territorial.

Fucking hell.

Sure, he had been searching for his mate for centuries. He wasn’t some idiot who wanted to be alone in his immortality. Shouldn't he have been better suited to be mated to his own kind, even if he was eventually going to become a traitor? And if he was a book character, how was he mated to someone that wasn't an author’s invention? His head spun again at all the craziness of his life.

Ciara Miller was stunning, breathtaking, and he was pretty certain he would think that even if she wasn’t who he had been looking for since Fasheem had found his own mate. She was short, especially to his six-foot-three-inch height. He pegged her to be about five-foot-four, which was fine with him. She'd fit perfectly against him. Her hair was ebony, and so glossy it seemed to shine as it that fell to her waist. Her eyes, though he'd only seen them for a moment, were as blue as sapphires. Her body was nothing to ignore either. She was an athlete or had an athlete’s build at the very least. Ciara had the perfect amount of muscle and generous curves. He wished she was a bit bigger, he figured her for a size two, and demons could be rough in bed.

Bed. His cock jumped at the thought.

He listened silently while she was on the phone. He had heard the person on the other end say “I love you,” and he had almost reached down and thrown her phone into the dumpster behind her car. There had been no mention of her being involved with someone. Well, didn’t that just ruin the sexual part of the relationship, not to mention the fact that she was his mate, he was pretty damn sure of that.

Practically growling, he walked in front of her and reached down. In a swift movement, he yanked her off the ground just as she was putting the phone in her pocket. “You are coming inside. Now.” He started to tug her back to the apartment, not giving two shits that it would look like she had a possessed arm if anyone saw her, but she had pulled free and was walking up the steps herself. He could still hear her fucking sniffling.

At the top of the stairs, she paused, and he picked her up, pressing her breasts against his chest. Her hands beat at him, and she cursed him, but he didn't put her down. His erection pressed against his zipper the more she struggled, the more she pressed her body against his, and it set his blood boiling with need.

He flung her through the still open apartment door, and she landed with a thud on her couch. He was getting ready to tear into her for Gods only knew what when she turned to him.

“You will get out right now. You will take your demon ass back into that book, and you will stay there until I call you!”

The words were barely out of her mouth when he felt himself essentially pop somewhere. It wasn't disorienting, but he knew that he'd moved without actually moving.

Looking around, he took in his surroundings. Low wattage lighting, loud music, shouting and his brothers; Fasheem, Demarcus and Jameson. They were staring at him as if he had grown his horns, which demons did not have unless they were enraged. His eyes scanned the bar looking for the shimmering thing he'd walked through to get to her and didn't see it. Realizing something had gone horribly wrong, he hoped that the guy wouldn't be back to punish him for leaving her unprotected. Then he would be forced to fight some supernatural being, which just might be stronger than him and his brothers combined.

Oh, shit.

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