Free Spellbound by Sylvia Day

trembling violently from an orgasm more fierce than anything she’d ever experienced before.
    His climax followed hers, his cum spurting in scorching skeins, his cock jerking inside her with every wrenching pulse. Their combined magic swelled, shaking every item in the loft. The windows creaked, whined, barely able to contain the power they created as one. On this night.
    Victoria clung to Max, crying. She wouldn’t lose him. She couldn’t.
    If the end approached, it would be her life for his.
    She would ensure it.

Three
    Midnight, the witching hour
    H e was going to die.
    The hot trickle of blood from Max’s nostril assured him of that fact. His veins felt scorched by acid, his chest burned with every gasping breath, his skull felt as if it were being squeezed in a vise. Every blow to his warding spell felt like a physical one and they were incessant, coming from two sides.
    â€œVictoria!” Max yelled, his shields rippling sinuously in testament to their swiftly approaching collapse. She had to turn and flee, before his strength waned and left her vulnerable.
    Run!
    Just as his vision began to dim and he feared slipping into unconsciousness, a surge of power almost too potent to contain tore through him in a scalding rush.
    Victoria. So visceral it felt as if her very soul had entered his body. Her augmentation whipped around and through him, strengthening and protecting him from harm.
    As his target sank to his knees and victory was at hand, an invasive chill spread outward from the center of Max’s chest and gripped his heart. The icy fist tightened, then spread insidiously through his veins. The sudden dearth of Victoria in his mind was like a scream in silence, piercing and terrifying.
    Turning his head, he looked for her and found her sprawled on the pavement, a smoldering hole in her beautiful chest.
    â€œVictoria, NO!”
    Her beloved voice with its soft, throaty purr whispered through his mind. I love you.
    Max roared into the storm. His hands began to lower, his need to be with her a driving impulse that he couldn’t deny.
    But she wouldn’t allow him to give up.
    Her strength of will straightened his arms and increased the flow of gray magic he sent into the falling brother. His quivering arms shot forward and magic poured from the tips of his fingers in white-hot streams, arcing through the air like lightning, sinking deep into the collapsing body of the middle Triumvirate brother. The wards around him thickened, shielding him from the blows that pelted his frontal perimeter.
    His body and magic were no longer his own. They were possessed by a force greater than himself. Something strange and new penetrated deep into his bones, embracing his grief and fury. Magnifying them and sending them outward in a shockwave of power so destructive it shattered his wards and sliced through the center of the Triumvirate brethren like a guillotine blade.
    Their screams echoed through the alley, rising like banshees’ cries, ripping apart the sky in a thunderous boom. As one, the Triumvirate exploded in a blinding flash, rocking Max back on his heels and quaking the very ground beneath him. The buildings shook with such violence they threatened to topple, and animals across the city protested in a sudden cacophony. Dogs whined and howled. Cats screeched. Birds fled their warm nests in a riot of flapping wings and caws.
    Then the alley fell silent. The only sounds that broke the stillness were the jingling of distant sleigh bells and Max’s own tortured sobbing.
    He dropped to the snow on his knees, the emptiness inside him a gaping, yawning hole he knew he couldn’t survive. He needed Victoria. Couldn’t live without her.
    Centuries he’d spent alone, focused on his primary mission—enforcing the will of the Council by death. Victoria had brought light into his life, warmth with the heat of her passion, and love into the emptiness of his heart.
    â€œDamn you,”