by Mandy Rosko
As though confirming his thoughts, a low-sounding rattle echoed from just behind the bathroom door.
Silus snarled. He didn’t care what their reasons were. No one was to touch Cedric until Silus gave the order.
With his muscles bunched up, Silus stormed toward the door. It opened just as he reached out to snatch the handle, which was a good thing, as he’d have likely ripped it out in his anger.
Whatever anger he felt and whatever frustrations that had been building and building since Cedric died in his arms that morning completely vanished, as it was Cedric who opened the bathroom door, and they both stared at each other.
Apart from being naked and wet, the first thing Silus became aware of was the distinct color of ruby red that had taken the place of Cedric’s once blue irises.
* * * * They needed no flashlights for the search. Werewolves might not necessarily be known as creatures of the night, but seeing in the dark and sniffing out whatever they couldn’t see was hardly ever a problem.
Damon ’s main concern was Jackson and Joey. Neither had been accounted for yet. Either one or both of them were dead. Or Joey had been taken—seeing as he was an omega—and Jackson was dead, or Jackson had been injured and left behind while Joey had been mistaken for an alpha and also been injured.
None of those three options were favorable. All became a possibility when the scent of blood permeated the air.
“Over here!” a voice shouted.
Dread lodged in Damon’s stomach like a heavy rock. He almost didn’t want to know, or see, what it was his men had found.
He ran to the sound of the voices anyway, pushing through stray branches and jumping over any obstacle in his way.
It was a small clearing, made smaller by the group of male bodies standing around and filling it up, but the alphas were mostly clustered around a single space, looking down at their find. Some were on their knees, attempting to administer first aid.
“Stand aside,” Damon barked.
The heads of his alphas jerked up at the command, and all but two of his alphas, the ones who’d been tending to the wounded, did as they were told.
Jackson. He’s definitely seen better days, but better days he will see, Damon thought, noting the barely there rise and fall of his chest. There was blood on the ground and speckles along the bark of the tree he lay in front of, as well as on the leaves of a nearby shrub.
Damon knelt at his side. “What happened?”
“Nasty gash to the head, but it’s not spurting,” said the alpha, barely taking his eyes off of Jackson to address Damon. The alpha gently pried around the back of Jackson’s head, his fingers coming back bloody but nearly soaked in the stuff. “I think he’ll be okay.”
“Think” was not the word Damon wanted to hear, but he could hardly snap at the other man or demand specifics. While they’d all had basic training in first aid, no one here was a healer. Now that the vampire bitch who’d caused all of this was finally exiled from the house, they had no access to a healer either.
Damon looked around, noting the lack of another body. His scent was still here, and strong, but that could be just because he and Jackson had been paired up. “Anyone find Joey?”
“Not yet,” someone said.
Optimistic, that one.
“Is anything on him broken?” Damon asked.
The alpha continued to poke and prod around ever so gently. “Not that I can tell,” he answered with a shake of his head, sitting back on his haunches and looking at Damon. “What should we do?”
“Help me carry him. Take his legs.”
Jackson was not, as far as the alpha wolves went, a heavy man. He was big, but nothing Damon couldn’t handle on his own. Despite this, he didn’t want to risk letting any arms or legs dangle just in case there was something wrong that they couldn’t see.
Damon took hold of Jackson’s shoulders. Mitch arrived to take his legs while another alpha kept his hands under Jackson’s mid-section. It was as straight as they were ever going to keep his spine during the move. The three of them lifted.
It was only then, with Damon’s head bent down nearer to Jackson’s face, that he understood where the majority of that strong scent was coming from.
Joey. His scent was all over Jackson.
“Christ.”
“What is it?” Mitch asked, he and the other alpha halting as Damon cursed.
He shook his head, motioning for them to keep going back to the house. “Nothing. Hurry up, before the rains come.”
As though his words were the signal, a bang of thunder sounded as though it had gone off directly above their heads.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. As if this wasn’t bad enough. More than half the omegas had been taken, the coming rains were going to wash away the scent of those wild werewolves, and now there was no doubt in Damon’s mind that Joey was among those who had been kidnapped.
Right when this heavy-ass idiot finally decided to mate with him.
Chapter Twelve
Silus could hardly believe his eyes, and for a moment, he fancied he was having a horrible sort of teasing dream.
It certainly looked like an image out of one of the many fantasies Silus had had about his lover before.
Cedric pushed the bathroom door open until it gently banged against the wall. A cloud of gray steam wafted up behind him, appearing almost ghostlike as the lights of the mirror behind him illuminated his body.
He looked like a sopping wet God. Silus wanted to fall onto his knees at Cedric’s feet to worship.
And be thankful.
He took the first step. Cedric ran the rest of the way until they collided in the center of their room. Silus readied himself for the bruising kiss, but the only place Cedric’s lips touched was his neck, and then the familiar pain of piercing fangs stabbed him as Cedric latched his teeth into Silus’s artery and drank.
“Nnggh!” Silus bit down on his bottom lip as Cedric fed. Silus was not used to allowing others to feed from him, and Cedric was being more forceful than anything he’d ever before experienced. The pain was damn near unbearable.
“Take all you need,” he said on a pained breath. Silus looped one hand around Cedric’s slick, muscular back, and the other took hold of that golden hair and gripped it tightly, ensuring Cedric could not pull away. “That’s it, drink.”
Cedric had died of blood loss. It was only natural that, as a vampire, his first instinct would be to feed upon the first body that he came across.
Silus released another small cry as Cedric’s new fangs sank deeper into his flesh, slicing more skin in an effort to increase the blood flow. Silus did not dare ask him to stop. If it meant Cedric would live, he would give every drop in his body.
A wave of dizziness took hold of him as the blood loss became great, but he was still of sound enough mind to take note of the firm pressure building between them, and of the way Cedric’s mouth became less attacking and more loving. The biting and sucking was no longer about feeding. It had transformed into a carnal hunger that resulted from so much intake of blood.
Silus knew because he himself had experienced this before.
Cedric’s hands gripped Silus’s silk button-down, nearly tearing it as he lifted Silus and hurled the both of them back inside the bathroom where they landed on the tiled floor, still slippery from the shower Cedric had taken. Then Cedric did rip his silk shirt, and the buttons popped off, flying in all directions like popcorn kernels.
Silus welcomed the touch of Cedric’s warm hands, warm and not deathly cold, against his skin. The desperate, roaming fingers that touched and stroked made Silus’s blood run hot until he, too, was able to pull and tear away at the clothing that separated them with an almost animalistic need to mate.
There was nothing gentle about this. This was not lovemaking. This was the sheer need of their bodies taking control.
Cedric grabbed Silus by the hips and flipped him over, exposing Silus’s naked back to him. He lifted himself onto his hands and knees only to be
pushed back down again by Cedric’s hand, palm down flat against his back. He was warned to stay put with a low and menacing growl.
Very well, he could stay in this position if it was what his lover desired.
And stay he did. Though there were many things that they could have made use for as far as lubrication was concerned, Silus’s body tensed in preparation for the pain when all he heard behind him was the sound of Cedric spitting into his hand.
With how far gone his mind was, he supposed he should feel grateful his lover was able to think of doing that much.
The intruding digit was painful, but the burn lasted only seconds, and then it returned again in a blasted inferno as Cedric pressed his cock into Silus’s asshole.
He released a sound that was a pained mix between a grunt and a gasp, but he did not move or attempt to pull away.
Cedric grunted and moaned low as he pumped his hips. He moved quickly, like an undisciplined virgin, and the force of it caused their flesh to smack together as Silus slid across the now-cold tiled floor.
The force of it—the sheer need for him that Cedric was consumed with—brought about a response in Silus’s body that damn near mirrored Cedric’s condition.
Silus’s cock swelled with lust as he was desperately fucked, and he found himself moaning long and loud in reply to each of Cedric’s thrusts. He reached his hand out to steady himself on something before his head banged against the glass of the shower stall, but all he could reach for were the little doors under the sink, and in the force of their coupling, he ripped them from their hinges.
Cedric did not stop. Silus pushed himself to his elbows and was able to prop himself up before they collided into the shower, despite Cedric’s animal growling. They took their activities to their knees, and Cedric’s teeth sank into the other side of Silus’s neck.
He moaned, even as the continued blood loss weakened him. Silus reached down and wrapped his hand around his engorged prick as his lack of attention to it had become near painful, and he stroked it in time with Cedric’s thrusts.
He knew he spoke but couldn’t for the life of him tell for sure what he had said. Whether they were endearments, words of praise to Cedric for doing such a damn good job back there, he could not say. All Silus could concentrate on was the mind-numbing pleasure he felt, and even that was difficult for him to focus on as Cedric drove home again and again and again, until Silus was coming even through the steel grip he kept on his cock.
Cedric continued to fuck him, and he came again within minutes, and then again. And though he was more than willing to continue with their tryst, his body was weak, and he could do no more than hold on for as long as he was able, until that, too, became impossible.
* * * * Silus awoke shivering. His skin was covered in gooseflesh, and his body ached in all the places expected for having lost consciousness on a cold bathroom floor. As well as some of the more delicate areas involved in Cedric’s feeding—as well as their aftereffects—from the night before.
The ventilation shaft must have been broken last night, as it emitted the most strange hiccoughing noise.
He slowly lifted himself up to lie on his side. Oddly, he’d been covered with some of the dry towels from under the sink, like makeshift blankets. He pushed them away, noting the shredded clothing and splintered cabinet doors as well as the broken bits of tile from where either he or Cedric had pierced the floor with their fingers. All were still where they had been discarded the night before.
Then his mind was finally able to work properly and process what that strange sound had been.
His eyes followed the sound to its source, and Cedric sat curled up beside the elaborate bathtub. He was still as naked as he’d been last night after they had finished with each other, and admittedly, Silus could not recall when that had been.
His knees were up, one arm wrapped protectively around them, whilst his other hand gripped his blond hair. In the way they were used to, their eyes seemed to meet as one became aware that the other was looking, and Silus noted the despair on Cedric’s face, as well as the welling tears in his eyes, just before Cedric turned away from him to continue his mourning.
Silus scrambled to his knees and then winced at the shock of pain to his lower backside. He cursed himself and moved slower, though no less eager, to his destination.
He wrapped his arms around Cedric’s shoulders and pulled the other man into his arms. Cedric fought him, but even with his new vampire strength, it was a mild sort of resistance before he finally gave in to the need for comfort and returned the embrace with every ounce of strength he possessed.
Silus petted his beautiful, golden hair, kissed the locks, and made soothing noises, as though Cedric were a child, ignoring the crushing feeling that built in his bones as Cedric squeezed too tightly.
“Do not cry, love. Shhh, all will be well.”
“Silus...I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to...”
“You did not,” Silus assured him, hoping to squash those thoughts with the finality in his voice.
Cedric would not be so easily persuaded. He brought his head up, scanned the wreckage before him, and then let his face fall back onto Silus’s shoulder as he continued to sob. “Oh God, I raped you. I’m so sorry, Silus. Christ, I’m so fucking sorry.”
“You did not.” Silus pulled back to give his lover a firm shake of the shoulders. “You did what I allowed you to do. I am still a vampire and am still perfectly capable of defending myself, had you truly been attacking.”
“But.”
“No.” Silus kissed him, a hard, but chaste press of their mouths. When he pulled back, he could do nothing else but smile at his lover, allowing the happiness he felt to fill within him until he thought he would burst with it. Silus pressed his hands against Cedric’s face, allowing his thumbs to caress those cheeks, wiping away the tears at his eyes.
“You are alive,” said Silus, and then he nearly laughed and burst into tears himself. Merely speaking those words aloud had that much of a powerful effect on him. “You are alive, and last night you had your first feeding. I knew what your body would require and was more than willing to give you everything, so long as you awoke here with me.
“You are alive,” Silus said again, and this time, when he pulled Cedric to him, there was no struggle as Cedric willingly allowed himself to be kissed and kiss in return.
Though Cedric was now willing to allow Silus to comfort him, that mourning look never fully left his eyes, and Silus knew he would be having this conversation again sometime in their future.
The fact that they had a future at all was a brilliant thing.
Silus eventually coaxed Cedric to his feet, the both of them carefully avoiding the shards of tile and splintered wood. When Silus asked about the towels, Cedric quietly responded that he had done it, having not wished to leave him on the floor, cold as he was, yet he’d been too ashamed to touch him, to pick him up and carry him to their bed.
Silus did not bother pointing out that their bed was ruined, or that Cedric could have easily brought the spare blankets to the bathroom. There was no telling what had been going through Cedric’s mind when he awoke to find Silus beneath him and their bathroom damaged as it was.
Their bedchamber continued to smell of Cedric’s death, which was not something Silus wished to deal with, not now, nor ever again. They each quickly grabbed a clean change of clothes from the mahogany dresser, and Silus summoned one of the few remaining omegas that had not been taken from the house. He requested that the chamber be thoroughly cleaned, and then he made a polite inquiry as to which spare bedchamber he might be able to use now that more than half of them would be empty.
The young omega nodded obediently, told him which chamber would be unoccupied, and vowed to have his master chamber cleaned out and ready for use by nightfall.
All the while, the omega could not take his frightened eyes away from Cedric.
Silus pushed past the startled servant before others could arrive and make the sa
me untoward stares, and he growled behind him that he wanted no disturbances. Silus wanted peace and silence for one morning with his lover, a chance to expel any demons Cedric might be carrying from his attack, to his death, to his miraculous transformation.
They would deal with the questions from the staff, and Ben and Seth, at a later time. The alphas could make the plans for rescuing the omegas at the moment.
“Did I die, Silus?” Cedric asked as they made their way down the dark hall. His voice was a quiet, timid thing that startled Silus, not used to hearing it like that at all.
He turned to face Cedric, just outside of one of their guest rooms that had been loaned out to the werewolves.
Cedric was still looking in the direction of the omega who had stared so peculiarly at him.
Silus could not lie. “Yes.” He opened the door a crack and peered inside. Ever since the werewolves had come to live here, not every bedchamber could be counted on to be free from natural sunlight. Sometimes the weres enjoyed leaving their windows open. Luckily, the ones inside here had already been shut, and Silus ushered Cedric inside, closing the door quickly and quietly behind them.
“How am I still alive, then?” Cedric asked. He moved into the center of the room. The werewolves didn’t keep many personal possessions, even now, months after their liberation from Silus’s father, so it was difficult to feel as though they were invading anyone’s privacy, considering the furnishings were mostly as sparse as they had been even before the wolves came here.
“I don’t know,” Silus admitted. “You are only the second person in my entire life that I made an attempt to transform. Seth was the first, and you know I did not stay to witness his transformation personally.”
It was very possible that the same thing had happened with Seth as what had happened to Cedric. Perhaps Seth had died, as well, for several hours before the vampire venom had finally taken over. Silus knew that to change a man into a vampire required waiting until the last heartbeats were sounding but had never imagined death would come before—
“Do not touch that!”
