Free A Forbidden Taking by Kathi S. Barton

than drop onto Megan, his body
depleted of all energy. Thankfully, at the last moment he was able to roll to
his side, pulling her with him. His last thought before exhausted sleep took
him was that they were truly mated and bonded.

 
    ~Chapter 9~
     
    Megan
woke sometime after one in the morning. It took her several terror-filled
seconds to realize the body next to hers wasn’t anyone she had hurt. Then a few
more tense seconds to remember where she was. Not that she knew actually, only
that Beau had brought her here. Moving carefully, she got up from the bed. Knowing
that looking for her clothes was futile she went to the open suitcase sitting
on a chest at the foot of the bed. She pulled out the first shirt-looking thing
she could find and pulled it on. She was finishing the last button as she
opened the door.
    She
was in a sublevel somewhere. There were small lights along a corridor that
lined the long hallway. She noticed that there were several other doors as she
went; all of them had a key pad outside of them. She wondered if that was there
to keep people in or out, but dismissed it as none of her business. Moving
toward the stairs she was amazed at how lovely everything was.
    Megan
emerged in a dark room with a door. She could see light just under it and could
hear voices. Knocking because she didn’t have a clue where she was, she opened
the door to a kitchen.
    “Well
fuck me, this can’t be good,” Megan said softly. There at the table sat the
Master Dingdong and Mrs. MacManus. The little man from earlier was there, as
well as a human woman.
    “It’s
nice to see you too,” Dingdong said with a smile. “Have a seat. Does Beau know
you left him?”
    She
didn’t sit. “Why should he care? I have to go to work. Can you tell me how I
get back to where I was? I need to change first.”
    Dingdong
looked at the woman and then back at her. Megan wasn’t sure she liked that look
and moved toward the door. She knew that she was going to need to make her
escape as best she could. He stopped her when he spoke.
    “I’ve
finally figured out why I can’t control you, Megan Reed. You don’t believe that
I’m anything more than...what is it you call me?”
    Shrugging,
she answered, “Master Dingdong. I don’t listen to you because you aren’t going to control me, not that I don’t allow you to. I would like to leave. So
unless you have some other tidbits of wisdom you’d like to impart, I’m leaving.”
    “The
man who is following you won’t stop. He feels that you have taken something
from him and he means to get his payment. You will be killed if he decides that
is what he wants. If you aren’t where Beau or I can protect—”
    Megan
turned to Aaron, cutting him off. “So what? I offered to die for him. Why
should that be any concern of either of you? Back the fuck off. I live and die by my own choice.” She opened the door and went out. She wanted to slam it,
but didn’t want to break the glass. It would be just like the Dingdong to make
her pay for that too. She moved down the drive and toward the gate. She kept
moving at her fast pace and didn’t even break stride when she leapt over it
without a thought to what she was doing. Megan was nearly a mile from the gate
when she stopped and looked back. It was just one more thing she wasn’t going
to think about. Not today and just maybe not ever.
    Master
MacManus was going to drive her insane, she knew it. He seemed to think that
she belonged to him in a way that scared her. For a few minutes back there she
actually found herself wanting…no, needing, to do just what he’d said. In one
of the many books she’d read on vampires she’d come across the word compulsion.
Now she wondered if that was more fact than fiction. Before she knew it she was
at the cave.
    She
had a few clothes. She was grateful that there were a few stores open on her
schedule. She had gotten some things, most of them actually, from her apartment
before they had kicked her out