by L.H. Cosway
I pushed past the crowds to the door she just went through, but before I stepped outside, I peered out cautiously. The girl was pacing back and forth when a sleek black town car pulled up to the side of the club. She barely had time to react when several people emerged at once. First Ethan, then Eliza, followed by Whitfield and his guards. Eye-patch girl’s expression dropped, and stark, undiluted fear covered her face.
She definitely knew who they were.
She turned and began to walk away, but a second later Whitfield was right in front of her. He’d moved so quickly, tightly grabbing her arm. He tossed her to the ground while his guards surrounded her. Fear caught in my throat.
Ethan stood off to the side, watching Whitfield intimidate the poor girl. He didn’t move to help her, and there was no expression on his face. What the hell?
Whitfield peered down at her, his gaze sharp. “What are you doing on my territory, witch?”
“I can help you,” she offered weakly, holding herself with trembling arms that betrayed her fear.
Whitfield laughed, and it brought back memories of the dream I had last night, where I’d been helpless and tied to a chair. The helplessness of the girl with the eye patch was so similar to what I’d felt that it took so much willpower to not run to her aid. How much help would I be against a vampire as old as Whitfield?
I couldn’t believe she was a witch. Did that mean the magical families had something to do with my dad’s disappearance?
“I don’t need help from the likes of you. Now tell me who sent you here?”
She made a move to run, but this time Eliza got in her way. “You have two choices,” she said, a threat in her voice. “You can either tell us what you’re doing here and we’ll kill you quickly and painlessly, or you can continue to refuse and we will torture you until you give us the information we seek. Quite frankly, it would be much more pleasant for all involved if you were forthcoming.”
“Nobody sent me. I came to give you important information,” the witch answered. “Please don’t kill me.”
“Information about what?” Whitfield questioned, ignoring her plea.
The witch swallowed tightly. “I’ll tell you, but you have to promise to let me go after,” she begged, and Whitfield’s eyes practically glittered.
“I’m not in the habit of making promises,” he said as he slid his hand inside his dark designer coat and retrieved a beautiful antique knife. My heart stuttered when he lifted the blade and lowered it to the witch’s throat, pressing into her skin. I wondered why he didn’t just use his fangs. Then again, the knife had something of a dramatic effect. Air caught in my lungs. I couldn’t let him kill her. She had information about my dad.
“Any final words?” Whitfield whispered in her ear as he pressed his knife in deeper, drawing a small drop of blood.
The witch vehemently shook her head, a single tear rolling down her cheek. “Please don’t do this. I really am here to help.”
“I don’t believe you. I think you’re a spy.”
“At least give her a chance to tell us what she knows,” Ethan cut in, and I spotted a hint of worry in his eyes. He didn’t want Whitfield to kill the witch, but he obviously couldn’t order him not to since the governor outranked him.
“She doesn’t know anything. Witches are adept at lying,” Whitfield shot back, again pressing his blade into her neck.
Okay, that was it. I couldn’t just stand there and do nothing. Against my better judgement, I stepped outside.
“What’s going on?” I asked, trying to sound dumb and surprised and not like I’d been spying on them this whole time. All eyes darted to me, but then, before the vampires could react to my sudden appearance, something else happened.
A white mist seeped from the sewer drains lining the alleyway. My eyes were drawn to it as it took a human shape. A moment later two tall men and a woman stood before the vampires. They all looked sort of bedraggled, as though they’d been sleeping rough for a while. The woman’s deep brown eyes landed on me immediately, and there was a strange questioning look in them that I couldn’t quite decipher. Then strong arms were dragging me back, closing in around me.
Ethan.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he said in a low, hard voice.
“I didn’t know—"
“You’ll regret this move,” Whitfield declared, speaking to the magical mist folk who’d just appeared out of nowhere. He still had his knife pressed to the throat of the witch with the eye patch. One of the men threw a bolt of mist at Whitfield’s hand, perhaps to loosen his grip on the knife, but it didn’t work. All it did was make him angrier. Without hesitation, he slit the witch’s throat, and a shocked gasp escaped me.
Ethan’s hold on me tightened as he whispered, “I’m sorry you have to see this, but don’t interfere.”
Whitfield dropped the witch’s body to the ground and advanced on the three, but the woman made a swift hand gesture that knocked him back. Tears streamed down her face and her long, dark brown hair began to fizzle with electricity. The magic was clearly a manifestation of her grief at seeing her friend killed. She raised her palm at Whitfield, her words too fast to decipher.
A stream of white light burst from her open palm, and Whitfield appeared to think better of getting any closer to her. He nodded to his guards, who swiftly escorted him back to his town car, Eliza in tow. Ethan picked me up and, without any effort at all, carried me inside the car with him.
A moment later, we were speeding away from the club. Sitting on Ethan’s lap, I twisted to look out the back window and saw the three were right on our tail, gliding through the air like ghosts.
“Who are they?” I whispered and regretted it immediately when everyone’s attention came to me.
“That is none of your concern,” Ethan replied coldly. I didn’t like his attitude, but I suspected it was mostly for Whitfield’s benefit. Also, considering I was stuck in a car with a bunch of vampires, I decided to keep my mouth shut.
The car sped through the city until we came to a road blocked by traffic. I turned around again and saw our pursuers had gotten dangerously close. For a moment, I wondered if the people on the street could see them flying through the air, but then I remembered what Finn told me about glamour.
“What should I do, sir?” the driver asked, addressing Whitfield.
“Use the footpath,” he instructed, and the driver pulled the car up onto the path, causing pedestrians to move out of the way. Lots of cars honked their horns at us. My heart was in my throat because the vampires could probably walk away relatively unharmed if we got into an accident. I, on the other hand, wouldn’t be so lucky.
A loud bang sounded on the roof of the car. I looked out the window and saw the woman with the long brown hair peering in at me. Her mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear what she said as she ran her hand over the glass of the window. It began to sparkle and glitter, then right before my eyes the glass fizzled away to nothing. Cold air gushed in as she shouted at Whitfield.
“Why don’t you stand and fight, vampire?”
“I’m doing you a favour, witch,” Whitfield responded. “If we fought, you would not come out of it well, or alive.”
“Care to test that theory?” A male voice chimed in from above. One of the warlocks stood on the roof of the car. I wondered how he managed not to slip off at the speed we were going.
“If you do not refrain your pursuit, I will murder every person you ever loved while they sleep in their beds,” Whitfield threatened.
The witch laughed coldly, and I could see the fury in her eyes. “Too late for that, bloodsucker. That was my sister’s throat you slit back there, and I’m sure you know just how ruthless an enemy can be when they’ve got nothing left to lose.”
I felt her grief, and a part of me wished to be out there with them. I was certainly on the wrong side of this fight, even if I was grateful for Ethan’s protection.
The witch grabbed hold of the side of the glassless window, and Eliza’s fa
ngs extended with a gut curdling hiss that slithered past her lips.
“Get your hands off the vehicle,” she warned.
The witch grinned, clearly happy to have pissed Eliza off. We were outside the city now, speeding down a darkly lit, narrow road. Ethan’s hold on me tightened while Eliza and Whitfield’s attentions were focused on the witch, who was now reciting some sort of incantation. Whitfield slid closer to the window and grabbed the witch’s arm before immediately letting go. He roared in pain as his palm sizzled and burned. The witch laughed.
“Your little spells won’t protect you for long,” he threatened while Eliza screamed in outrage at the witch hurting her father.
“You should have left me at the club,” I whispered to Ethan. “If this car crashes, I’m a goner.”
“I won’t let anything happen to you,” he promised. “Besides, I couldn’t have just left you there. These three might’ve taken you hostage.”
I didn’t agree with that, especially since the witch Whitfield killed had been trying to tell me where my dad was. Or at the very least give me a clue on how to find him. My attention went to the witch who was still holding onto the car window. She said the dead witch was her sister. Hope seized me. Perhaps she knew something about Dad, too.
Ethan placed a hand on my knee, and even in this tense situation, a flicker of arousal ran through me. “I’m still mad at you.”
“The feeling is mutual.”
“Why are you protecting me then?”
“Because I don’t plan on being mad at you forever.”
I looked into his eyes and saw that he was telling the truth. Some of my iciness faded when the car suddenly swerved and I heard the sound of metal bending and crunching. One of the warlocks had torn the driver’s side door right off. Wow. I’d have to get Rita to teach me how to do a spell like that.
The warlock pulled the vampire driver out of the car and threw him onto the road. The car slid on the gravel and rammed through several bushes before crashing into a lake. My entire body filled with adrenaline as water began to flood the car. Whitfield, Eliza, and their remaining guards quickly swam out while Ethan wrapped his arms around me and hoisted me through the window.
I held firmly onto Ethan as he swam to the edge of the lake and deposited me onto the grass. Both of us were soaking wet. Ethan inspected me for injuries and decided I was unharmed. I pushed up to stand on wobbly legs. My coat was sopping wet and weighed a tonne, so I took it off, only to reveal my black dress clinging to every inch of my body while water droplets ran down my bare legs. Legs that Ethan was unmistakably ogling.
There was a groaning noise as Whitfield’s town car disappeared completely under the water. The witch and warlocks were nowhere to be seen. Whitfield leaned against the bark of a tree, while Eliza fussed over him. The two guards were scanning the area, ensuring our pursuers were gone. The other guard, the one who’d been driving the car but was pulled out, came running up to us, a gash on his forehead already healing
“Bastards,” he wheezed. “I think they got away.”
Whitfield’s cold gaze cut to him, as though reprimanding him for stating the obvious. Then, for some inexplicable reason, those caramel eyes landed on me. Goosebumps covered my arms as Whitfield’s attention ran over my body.
Finally, he said, “You’re all wet.”
A moment of silence fell before everyone started laughing, including Ethan. Jesus.
“I believe I just made a double entendre,” Whitfield declared happily, dabbing at his eyes like an elderly man who just cracked a joke. “My dear, you smell even better when you’re soaked,” he went on, and my stomach twisted with unease.
“You haven’t smelled her when she sleeps,” Ethan said quietly. “It’s truly something.”
“Perhaps you’d be willing to share her some time.” Whitfield arched an eyebrow.
Ethan glanced at me then, and I knew he was still pissed with me for walking off on him last night, even if he did just save me from drowning. Then his gaze softened, his eyes still on me when he answered, “You know I never liked to share, Jeremy.”
“No, a pity that,” Whitfield said before straightening up.
I got a weird popping feeling in the pit of my stomach, and somehow, I sensed it was my magic coming to life inside me, urging me to use it. I wondered what would happen if I hit Whitfield with some of those sparks I managed to create outside Rita’s house last night. He wouldn’t be so forthcoming with the double entendres then, I was sure. I actively held myself back though. No point in ruining all my hard work cosying up to the vampires to get to Rebecca. Not that I’d been doing such a stellar job of it anyway. And now I only had two and a half days left to get to her.
My gaze shifted to the lake a second before the water rose out of nowhere like a tidal wave. It swirled in loops and came down on us all at once. Ethan let out a loud curse in what I presumed was Romanian. Eliza squealed in anger, while Whitfield was unsettlingly silent and unmoving. I shook the water from my hair.
Over on the other side of the lake stood the witch and the two warlocks. Why the hell had they come back? Before I could blink, Ethan and Whitfield sped over to them. The three appeared shocked that the vampires had gotten to them so fast. Perhaps they didn’t have a lot of experience with vampire speed.
Whitfield seized the witch by her long hair, pulled her head back, and exposed her neck. One of the warlocks raised his hand to cast a spell, but Ethan grabbed a hold of his arm and snapped it. The warlock dropped to the ground in agony.
The other lunged at Ethan, throwing a dart of light at him. He dodged it, kneed the man in the stomach, then put both hands on either side of his head and snapped his neck. Lovely. Bile rose in my throat. I didn’t think I’d ever get used to seeing Ethan kill people.
Whitfield sank his fangs deep into the witch’s neck, and only seconds passed before she went limp in his arms. He was looking directly at Ethan, and there was no mistaking the grin on his face as he drank from the witch. Oh, God! I couldn’t let him kill her. I started to run toward them, my legs moving slower than normal in my soaking wet dress and boots.
“Get back here!” Eliza demanded, but I didn’t listen to her.
The warlock whose arm Ethan broke pulled on some shrubs with his good arm, trying to raise himself to his feet. Ethan swore under his breath and shoved him back down.
“Don’t even think about it,” he warned. “Unless you want to end up like your friend.”
“You’ve no clue what you’ve done, bloodsucker,” the warlock spat.
Whitfield dropped the witch to the ground and wiped the blood from his mouth. “Oh, yes, and what would that be?” he asked.
The warlock turned his attention from Ethan. “We were going to warn you, but you went and killed Zara’s sister. Now I hope they are successful in bringing him back.”
“Bringing who back?” Whitfield questioned, his eyes sharpening.
My heart hammered as the warlock raised his head and spat on Whitfield’s leather shoes. “I have absolutely no intention of helping you now. You think you’ve won this war, but you have no idea what they’re planning.”
“I really am beginning to tire of you sewer rats,” Whitfield hissed, a bubble of anger rising in him. He lifted his leg and kicked the warlock in the ribs. I actually heard them crack. A whoosh of air left the warlock’s mouth and blood spilled out.
I eyed the witch named Zara, who now lay weakly on the grass. This was my chance to get to her. I slowly crept behind Ethan and Whitfield while their attentions were fixed on the warlock. Quickly, I knelt down beside her and pressed my fingers to the side of her neck that wasn’t bitten. Her pulse was there but it was very faint. Her eyes sprang open, and she stared at me intensely.
“I feel … dizzy,” she whispered.
“You’ve lost a lot of blood,” I told her, knowing exactly how she felt. My blood had been taken from me recently, too. Only I wasn’t certain whether or not it was a vampire who did it.
; “What are you doing, Tegan?” Ethan asked suddenly. Crap, I thought he might be too preoccupied with the warlock to notice me.
“She’s dying,” I answered feebly. “I need to do something to help her.”
“Humans, so compassionate,” Whitfield said dismissively, as though he couldn’t understand the emotion at all. Well, I guess life wasn’t that precious when you knew you could live for a thousand years.
The witch pulled me to her, her arms weak. “Your dad, they’re using him for the ritual,” she whispered, her voice faint.
My heart pounded. “Who’s using him?” I asked, but she was already gone. I wanted to cry because I’d never had someone die in my arms before. A cold, violent tremble ran through me as emotion swelled in my throat.
Then, what she said sank in and my panic built. Someone was using my dad for a ritual? What the hell?
“What did she say?” Whitfield came to stand before me, his cold eyes gazing down at the witch I was still holding onto. Slowly I let her go, lowering her body back down to the grass.
“Nothing, she was just asking me to help her. I don’t think she knew she was dying,” I lied.
Whitfield assessed me closely before he turned and called out to his guards, instructing them to get rid of the bodies and phone for transportation back to the city.
Silently, I said goodbye to the witch. I wasn’t sure if I believed in an afterlife, but seeing death happen right in front of me, I started to hope that there was one.
I stood and went over to Ethan, but he didn’t acknowledge my presence. Great. I needed him to warm up to me and fast. For Rebecca’s sake if nothing else. I placed my hand on his arm. He glanced down at me and looked almost wistful for a second. Then the emotion left his face, and I couldn’t read him at all.
“I just called Lucas,” he said. “He’s on his way to bring you and me back to the city.”
I nodded, feeling relieved that Whitfield and Eliza would be travelling back separately. I sent him a grateful look and got lost in his eyes for a second.
