Colin the Conqueror Read online

  A dark silhouette walked toward her, outlined by the flames. She blinked, her eyes beginning to tear and burn.

  “Heather,” Colin said, kneeling down in front of her. “Are you alright? Did he bite you?”

  She could barely see Colin’s face with the hungry orange flames backlighting him. “I want to go home,” she whispered.

  *

  She looked like a little girl lost.

  Colin gathered Heather up in his arms and held her. What damage had been done to her mind by Nicolas? Was she again going to crawl back into the shell that had taken him so long to draw her out of? Oh God.

  “Holt,” Colin said, turning but keeping Heather safely encased in his embrace.

  Holt stood a few feet from the fire, his axe cocked up on his shoulder. “What?”

  “Will you see to this? I need to get her back to the house.”

  Holt nodded and waved him on.

  Colin reached down and put a finger under her chin and tilted her head up so that he could see her eyes. “Are you too tired to walk?” he asked.

  She slowly shook her head. “No. I can make it.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Sure?”

  “Mmhmm.” A shaky little smile graced her lips. “I’m stronger than you think, Colin Moore.”

  Colin chuckled, catching the twinkle in her eye. She may have been lost for a few moments, but Heather quickly regained her spunk. “I guess you are, Heather Green.”

  Epilogue

  One week later…

  Heather parked her hands on her hips. “Colin Moore—are you ever going to finish packing? We’re leaving today, you know.”

  “Heather Green—you sound distinctly as if you are my wife.” He carefully folded another pair of slacks into the suitcase that rested on the foot of his bed.

  “I will be your wife in two days,” she said, coming up behind him. She slipped her arms around his waist and rested her cheek on his wide back. “Are you regretting it even before the deed is done?”

  “Of course, I’m not regretting it,” he said, turning so that he faced her. “It will take me about fifty or sixty years to start regretting becoming involved with you.”

  Heather looked up into a face that had become as familiar to her as her own reflection in the mirror. She reached up and brushed her fingers through the hair at his temples. “I don’t know. You’re getting a bit gray here. Think you have fifty years left in you?” she asked jokingly.

  Colin sighed and squeezed her tightly. “Maybe not. You do tend to wear a good man out.”

  “You just wait until I get you to Vegas. After the wedding, you won’t be seeing any of the night life,” she said. Then she rose up on her tiptoes and swiped her tongue along his neck just under his ear. He shuddered which made her giggle.

  “Why should I wait,” he growled, swinging her around and tossing her onto the bed beside the suitcase.

  Heather landed with a bounce, laughing hysterically. “C-Colin we haven’t got t-time,” she sputtered, trying to stop his hands from undoing the button at the waistband of her jeans.

  He stopped long enough to glance at his watch, then he went back to undressing her. “We’ve got four hours.” She felt the zipper slide down. Then he started tugging at them. “You’re already packed,” he said, working the jeans over her hips then whipping them off her legs. “We’ve got plenty of time.” As soon as his fingertip slid beneath the edge of her panties, Heather stopped fighting.

  Colin knew exactly what to do to make her melt. Her breathing became ragged with the loving strokes of his experienced fingers over the pearl that lay in the center of her cleft.

  “See,” he crooned. “You didn’t want to argue about it anyway.”

  * * * *

  Colin was in heaven. Again.

  After he had unclothed Heather, she had insisted on allowing her to pleasure him. And she did. Except pleasure wasn’t quite the right word.

  What she did with her mouth constituted supreme ecstasy.

  Within half an hour, both of them were spent. Now they lay limp on the bed on top of the coverlet, trying to catch their breath.

  “Nothing will ever be the same now, will it?” Heather asked softly.

  Colin frowned, keeping his eyes closed. “What won’t be the same?”

  “This. This place. This family. The Unkindness of Ravens.”

  Colin thought about it. Heather was right. By all purposes, the Unkindness of Ravens would no longer exist. He thought back to that night—the night of the battle…

  When he and Heather had returned to Ravencrest, Colin had left Heather in Lydia’s very capable hands then joined the others in what was once the main living room of the mansion.

  Now it was nothing more than a blood-soaked battleground littered with the bodies of the defeated.

  Colin saw John first when he entered the room. His face was grim and dark, his eyes dull. “John?”

  John slowly raised his head and met Colin’s eyes.

  “Are you alright?” Colin asked. He felt a tightening in his chest. John looked as if he had lost … everything.

  John turned his gaze back to the carnage. “I’m fine. Once we take care of this,” he waved his hand, encompassing the room, “everything will be fine.”

  Colin drew in a breath. “Do you think…”

  John shook his head vehemently. “I’m trying not to think, Colin. This is…” his voice trailed off.

  Colin could swear he saw a glimmer of wetness in John’s eyes. Colin knew what John was thinking. Ravencrest had been breached. Their safe cocoon was tainted. Colin looked to Holt. As always, Holt’s jaw was set but his eyes … they held an anger that Colin had never seen burn so strong before.

  Sighing, Colin felt the same way. Ravencrest had been their haven of safety. Now it was bloodied, breached. There was a sadness that infiltrated the house.

  John took a deep breath and blew it out. “Let’s take care of this. Now.”

  Then they began the clean up. Colin could see the determination in the Ravens … but still, it would never be the same.

  It had taken them until well past dawn—Eric and Dirk arriving in the middle of the clean up—to properly dispose of all the grisly remains. Though a couple of the women had volunteered to help, the men would hear nothing of it.

  The cleansing fire was overlarge that day, burning so brightly behind the mansion that it rivaled the brightest July sun. Not only did they burn the remains of the vampires but they also burned every piece of furniture and every rug and drapery that had been in the room. They didn’t worry about anyone reporting the fire—the expanse of Ravencrest’s grounds had always more than insured them privacy.

  All of them had stood around the fire—a circle of guardians no longer needed—watching until there was nothing but glowing embers and an acrid stench in the air.

  It was done. The battle over, though none of them could honestly believe that the Horde of vampires had been completely exterminated.

  After they had all rested, they came together again in John’s office. They discussed the possibilities of other clutches still being left ‘alive’. But according to the recent lack of vampire activity—save Kaitlyn’s experience in New York and then she herself in Indiana—there didn’t seem to be any vampires on the prowl.

  Maybe what Nicolas had said was true. Maybe—it was done…

  “What are you thinking about?” Heather asked, placing her hand on his chest over his heart.

  Colin sighed. “Change.”

  “I can’t believe everyone is leaving Ravencrest,” Heather said with a sigh. “I haven’t been here all that long but the rest of them … this is their home.”

  Colin nodded. “True. It is their home but maybe now, to them, Ravencrest represents all of the struggle and loss that they have been exposed to. You have to remember, they’ve lived with this threat their whole life. It could be that they want to try to live a normal life now.”

  She rose up, propping herself on her elbow. “Dr
ake and Holt are staying though. Ivy and Grace too.”

  Colin reached up and tucked a strand of her golden hair behind her ear. “Yes. They are staying. They didn’t want to completely abandon Ravencrest. Besides, with them here, they have the capability to monitor anything that even resembles the actions of a vampire.”

  “That’s what Ivy said.” She drew a slow circle over his heart with her fingertips. “I’m going to miss her.”

  “We’ll come back to visit.”

  “Promise?”

  He reached up and tweaked her nose. “Yep.”

  She grinned at him.

  Colin sighed. He was going to miss what he deemed to be his family, too.

  John had decided to take Madison, Skylar and Lark to Arizona. He planned on opening a private investigator’s office, just to give himself something to do and he thought that the warmth of Arizona would do Lark some good. They had left two days ago.

  Eric and Lydia had returned to upstate Maine, where they had met. Lydia was going to continue her research and Eric decided that there was nothing he would like better than to be her assistant. They had left yesterday morning.

  Dirk and Casey had settled on leaving for Salt Lake City, Utah. Casey could do her own genealogical research at the largest genealogical library in the world there and Dirk, a computer junkie when he was tied to home, would start his own business as a web designer. They weren’t leaving for a few days yet. Dirk had been busy updating the computer system at Ravencrest, not wanting to leave until he had shown Ivy, who also found she had a knack for computers, how to monitor the new systems and what to look for. Just in case.

  That left Rogue and Kaitlyn. Rogue had decided that he was ready to settle down. With Kaitlyn. Back home in Kentucky. Colin had found it strange that Rogue wanted to go back to Roan County. Rogue had always complained that there wasn’t enough excitement there to keep him out of trouble. When Colin had questioned him about it, Rogue had just smiled and told Colin that he couldn’t think of a better place to raise a child. As soon as they got there, he and Kaitlyn were going to see about adopting a child. Two or three, if Rogue had his way about it. They would try adoption first. If it didn’t work out, they’d try to find a surrogate mother. They already had a home waiting, Grace having kept the family home out of sentiment. It sounded to Colin like Rogue had grown so much—was now a man who knew exactly what he wanted. Rogue and Kaitlyn weren’t leaving right away. They were flying to Las Vegas with him and Heather to be witnesses at their wedding.

  Colin had set up accounts for everyone in their respective destinations. None of the family actually needed to work. They could live quite comfortably off their investments and that’s the profession that Colin would continue—managing the legal matters and investments of the Raven Clan. He could do it from anywhere so when Heather had said that she would like to live in Hawaii, Colin had readily agreed. After the wedding, they were to spend three more days in Las Vegas, then fly to Hawaii where Colin would spend most of his time thanking God for his beautiful Heather.

  Heather.

  He looked at her, his heart filling with love.

  “You were off someplace again,” she said, raising an eyebrow.

  He smiled and grabbed her, rolling her on top of him. She giggled, feigning a struggle, then relaxed. “You know,” he said, “if you wouldn’t have taken it upon yourself to conquer Nicolas—all of this may have turned out very differently. I should have stepped in for you. I shouldn’t have allowed you to do it.”

  “What are you talking about?” Her brows drew together in a frown.

  “I should have attacked Nicolas.”

  Heather shook her head. “Colin Moore—you…” she poked a finger in his forehead, “—conquered something far more powerful and dangerous than any old vampire.”

  “Really? And what would that be?”

  “Me,” she said with a smile. “You conquered me.”

  The End

  About the Author:

  Rhiannon Neeley has thought about writing all of her life and has now finally made time for it, along with learning to play an Irish jig on her fiddle. Rhiannon is a very busy woman who has her fingers in almost every pie but she does make time to reply to email if you give her a day or two.

  You can email her at [email protected] . For those of you with Irish roots, Rhiannon's 'Neeley' line hails from County Tyrone, Ireland. She has done quite a bit of research into her family tree. And of course when it come to romance, Rhiannon likes them hot and steamy and preferably paranormal.

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