Caleb

by McCarty, Sarah

  Bastards like him always did. Caleb was still there. Figures were all around him. No one was moving.

  Vincent again caught her chin in his grip, squeezing hard enough to bring on the burn of tears as he easily forced her back up onto her toes. “I will succeed.”

  The shake he gave her head snapped her gaze to his. Red swirls moved in the depths of his gray eyes. Emotion she didn’t want to define moved right alongside. “I’ve been waiting too long for you. I won’t fail.”

  Now there were words to give a woman pause. The man was practically salivating. Over her. Which absolutely made no sense. She wasn’t a woman men anticipated meeting. “Any chance you need glasses?”

  It took a minute for her reference to connect, but then he blinked and shook his head.

  “Your value has nothing to do with your appearance.”

  “How . . . flattering.” Through the thick haze she saw the figures converge on Caleb. Hopeless panic surged. She couldn’t give in to it, couldn’t collapse. She had to stay strong. Think. She took a breath, turning her focus inward, pushing that annoying buzz aside, channeling her panic to mental energy. There had to be a way out of this, an angle she could play. All she had to do was find it.

  She made it as far as the count of six before the figures blended to a lump. A lump with flailing appendages, all driving downward to one point. Her inner vampire screamed in outrage. Her human soul vowed revenge. Amid the raging emotion, her brain started clicking, her thought processes riding the ensuing adrenaline, rushed toward higher function. Everything she’d heard from Caleb and the weres clicked through her brain, sorting through Vincent’s comments until a picture began to take shape. A plan began to form.

  She looked up at Vincent. He wasn’t looking at her. His attention was on the scene beyond the archway. From the smile on his lips, Caleb’s demise was obviously another thing for which he’d been waiting a long time. The last piece of the puzzle fell into place. “You can’t let them kill him.”

  Vincent didn’t even glance her way. “He’s no longer your concern.”

  Another breath and she managed a reasonable semblance of calm. “If you need me alive, you need him alive.”

  Please let them need me alive.

  His gray eyes deepened to a harsh slate color as he glanced down at her. The red swirls multiplied until they dominated the irises. “Why?”

  “I can’t accept blood from anyone but him.”

  “You’re lying.”

  The lump of bodies on the other side of the haze shifted to an irregular shadow. She met his gaze directly. “No, I’m not.”

  His pupils narrowed and then expanded. She didn’t even attempt to try and block his probe. Sometimes it was just easier to let people find out for themselves what was true. When he pulled back, she reinforced his deduction. “Without him, I die.”

  He frowned. She followed the direction of his gaze. The lump separated into six shadows. One still lay on the ground. C’mon, Caleb. Move.

  No response from Caleb, but Vincent smirked. “You can’t use your telepathy here.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I will not allow it.”

  “And who are you to tell me what I can or cannot do?”

  “Your future husband, soon to be father of your children.”

  What was it with everyone wanting to marry her? He stared at the archway again. A sensation of mental energy stretched outward from him. The shadows moved, picking up Caleb. He exploded into action. Two of the shadows went down under his attack. For a brief second his silhouette stood out against the haze, broad-shouldered, proud, and deadly. The other four converged on him. The cry was instinctive. It came from her soul.

  Fight!

  He did. With a fury and skill that awed, but he couldn’t win. Not with the numbers that came at him. So many shadows that they looked like one, only the occasional profile proving that he wasn’t up against some huge, monstrous alien life-form. The ferocity of the attacker’s retaliation didn’t give her much hope. She whimpered when he went down again. It seemed an eternity before the shadows separated, stood.

  They stretched out in a line, some forming individual silhouettes. The ones in the middle converged to one long shadow. The middle of that long shadow dipped and then straightened. The middle of that long shadow had to be Caleb. He wasn’t moving. She bit her lip on the agony of what that might mean. As if sensing her thoughts, his head lifted. He was alive. But for how long? She clenched her hands into fists, one finger at a time, not looking away from the archway until Vincent forced her to.

  “You will forget about him.”

  “I don’t think so. He’s my husband.”

  “That can be changed.” He dragged her across the room, proceeding as if her struggles meant nothing.

  “Not according to Caleb.”

  “Your cowboy, as you might have discovered, isn’t exactly an authority on vampire reality.”

  She grabbed for the doorjamb, planted her feet, and held on. “And whose fault is that?”

  “His.”

  With a jerk he wrenched her free. She hissed in pain as her talons ripped, but took a certain amount of satisfaction in the deep grooves left in the ornately carved wood. Vincent jerked her up against his chest, glancing over her shoulder at the damage and then back down. “You’ll pay for that.”

  “And so will you.”

  “For what?”

  “For every mark your cronies put on Caleb.”

  “That cowboy won’t be in a position to do anything.”

  The way he sneered the word “cowboy” hit her last nerve wrong, breeding determination in the spot she’d thought reserved for fear. She used Vincent’s grip on her arm as leverage and pushed her face closer to his. Caleb might be difficult, and she might not have known him long, but he was her damn cowboy, and no one got to threaten his life but her. “But I will be.”

  His scoffing laugh didn’t surprise her or even offend her. People always underestimated her. She stood there, memorizing his expression, his energy, every line in his face. She wanted to remember him beyond anyone’s ability to erase. She waited, letting the anger feed her determination. Remembered the horror when Caleb went down. Imagined his pain as they beat him at this man’s command. Oh yes, Vincent would pay for that. For all of it.

  She stared long after his burst of laughter faded to nothing. Vincent’s lids flickered. An almost imperceptible betrayal of unease. It was enough. She pushed herself a fraction closer, keeping her voice as even and as calm as his. “And I never forget.”

  There was another telling hesitation before he said, with all the smooth nonchalance of before, “I’ll take my chances.”

  She smiled, held his gaze, and flicked his energy with hers. “You do that.”

  And when her chance came, she would take it.

  He snarled and yanked her forward. The hall he dragged her into was long and wide. Expensive pieces of art lined each side. Unfortunately, he kept her to the middle where she was unable to reach anything valuable. She bet ripping those canvases would really hit a hot button. Vincent seemed the type to put a lot of stock in his image and all the accoutrements that supported it.

  “What exactly is the point of this society you’re so proud of?”

  “Quite simply, those of us with the power have banded together to create a world that meets our needs.”

  “You’re kidding me, right? You actually found a way for a bunch of arrogant asses to coexist through eternity?”

  “There is always unrest, but in the end, the strong triumph.”

  “And you are?”

  “The strongest.”

  “In your opinion.”

  “As proven by time, conflict, and intellect.”

  “Over whom?” He yanked her through the next doorway too fast for her to make her mark. “The bimbettes you collect as a food source?”

  “Over all vampires, weres, and humans. And, soon, my dear, you.”

  He dragged her over to
a long spiral staircase. She grabbed the banister. “It’s really too soon in our relationship for you to be obsessed with me.”

  She scanned for Caleb. There was no sign of his energy. She mentally called his name. Still nothing. Panic began to blend with hunger and anger, churning in a frustrated knot. She so did not do frustration well.

  Vincent reached over and pressed a point on her wrist. Her fingers went numb. With another of those superior smiles, he lifted her hand free, locked both her wrists in his grip, and started up the stairs. Two tugs proved she was trapped. Why did vampire men have to be so strong?

  “Because we were meant to be superior.”

  He honestly believed that. He really was loony tunes. “Smugness is such an unattractive quality in a man.”

  “Is it?”

  She eyed the distance from her foot to his butt as he preceded her up the stairs. Too far. “Yes.”

  “I find that hard to believe, seeing as your former lover is one of the most unreasonably arrogant men ever born.”

  “To some, maybe.”

  He stopped, the smile on his lips a perverted twist that didn’t bode well, talons growing, pressing into her skin with the promise of pain. “There’s a difference between confidence and arrogance.”

  “Right.”

  “Something I fully intend to teach you.” He delivered on the promise, extending his talons past her flesh into the muscle beneath, scraping the bone. There was no containing the scream. It hurt too much for pride. She dropped, striking out with her mind, hitting a solid wall. Oh God, she was helpless. He let her fall to her knees, keeping her wrists above her head, punctuating the lesson he wanted her to learn with a flex of his knuckles.

  “It’ll be up to you which way it goes, pleasure or pain.”

  He twisted her wrist, bringing her to the position he wanted, which was kneeling at his feet, looking up at him.

  With his free hand he stroked her cheek, making the statement into a question. “Which will it be, Allie? Pleasure or pain?”

  Her skin crawled at the parody of a caress. She closed her eyes, remembering Caleb’s touch, how different it was. She might drive him nuts, but even at his most furious, he’d always had respect for her. Vincent did not. The truth just popped out along with her revulsion.

  “You don’t please me.”

  “It isn’t your pleasure that matters.”

  “I know.”

  Tell me what you want, Allie girl.

  Caleb or Vincent. Pleasure or pain. Heaven or hell. There was no comparison.

  “You’re nothing to me,” she ground out through the agony.

  She never saw him move, but suddenly he was squatting in front of her, his fingers a painful bruise on her chin, his face just inches from hers, his eyes writhing with red lights. “I’m God to you.”

  She swallowed, logic definitely called for retreat but everything in her responded to his aggression. “You’re nothing.”

  The lights in his eyes burst into flame. Her head snapped to the side. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth, and the right side of her face exploded in pain. It took her a good fifteen seconds to gather her addled wits and figure out what had happened. He’d hit her. The bastard had hit her. Through the buzzing in her brain, she heard a cry of rage. The roar swelled and grew, reverberating with anger, taking shape. Her name.

  Allie!

  Caleb. He was still alive. She shook her head to clear it of the buzzing. She glared up at Vincent. Wiping the blood off her cheek with her shoulder, feeling it smear more than absorb on the waterproof coat. She got to her feet. “And of course, that was a display of your superior intellect.”

  “Shut up.”

  Damn, she needed to shut up, but she couldn’t. Shutting up meant giving up, and she wasn’t going there. “You’re just another egomaniac throwing a tantrum when the world sees him for what he is.”

  “Bitch.”

  “Well, duh!” She arched her eyebrows in her best Caleb imitation. “I’ve even got the T-shirt to prove it.”

  He leaned in, his face taking on that half-morphed vampire state she just hated. His lips thinned, parted. She caught the gleam of his fangs.

  “I think I’ll let your lover—”

  “Husband.”

  He kept right on going, as if she hadn’t interrupted. “Watch as I drink from you.”

  She leaned back as those teeth closed the distance between them. She turned her head aside. His breath hit her cheek.

  “He’s not into the whole threesome thing.”

  “I imagine he’ll quite hate it.”

  He cut the tiny distance between them by half. She pulled as hard as she could, everything in her rebelling at the thought of any man but Caleb taking her blood. But especially this man. Desperation had her grasping at straws. “I thought you said you wanted him to watch.”

  “He is.”

  Mentally, he meant mentally. Did that mean the barriers were down? She called to Caleb. Nothing.

  “Do you want to talk to him?” The words were a fetid breath against her skin. “I don’t mind letting him hear you scream this time.” He pulled her hands up, lifting her into the press of his tongue. Revulsion tore through her as he lapped at the corner of her mouth. “I enjoy it when a woman screams.”

  She didn’t want to give him his wish, but the minute his mouth touched hers, the scream wrenched from her soul, a bone-deep protest. A totally unfair plea. For Caleb. To help her.

  Caleb’s snarl wound through her soul, his anger bled into hers, and in the middle, a strange flicker of energy, foreign and foul. Vincent. The doorway through which all this was happening. She clamped down on her bile. Focus. She needed to focus. She needed to remember this path. And hell, she also needed to shield. None of which were possible as Vincent pried her jaws apart with a squeeze of his fingers and thrust his tongue into her mouth. She couldn’t bite, would not scream, and couldn’t make him stop. There was only one thing left to do.

  She vomited.

  VINCENT flung her away. She spun and fell, his curses ringing in her ears. She stumbled down one step, caught herself on the railing, and continued to vomit. From the corner of her eye, she could see Vincent scrubbing at his mouth, a look of utter revulsion on his face.

  That would teach him to attack a woman with a weak stomach. After the next violent heave, she probed for Caleb. Nothing. All she could feel was Vincent’s total vulgarity that she’d vomited into his mouth. He was projecting so hard, she retched again in sympathy.

  Projecting.

  An idea nibbled at her mind. She hung over the stairs, pretending a level of nausea that didn’t exist as she explored back along Vincent’s energy, shielding as she went, probing until she found that thread of energy she’d marked. She tested. The shield around it was strong, but not solid. She knew Vincent wasn’t weak, which meant he just didn’t perceive her as a threat. She could use this. But not now. Now she needed to deal with the physical man who was advancing on her in full vamp morph, eyes completely red with rage, talons bared. Shit.

  “What?” She wiped at her mouth. “You don’t like the way I kiss?”

  His snarl sent every reflex into full get-your-ass-out-of-here alert. She vaulted over the rail and hit the smooth tile floor running. She made it three steps before he was on her, his weight slamming her down. She brought up her knees, protecting her stomach. His weight hit her like a ton of bricks, crushing her knees into her ribs. His hand slapped the floor beside her head, setting off a ringing in her ear. His other fastened in her hair, yanking her head back.

  “If you kill me you’ll never get what you want,” she gasped.

  “I don’t have to kill you to make you pay.”

  Damn, she wished he hadn’t thought of that. “You realize, of course, people don’t really say things like that outside of movies, right?”

  “Really?” His weight left her body. Pain flared through her scalp as he yanked her up. He held her high, her feet barely touching the floor. Tears p
oured down her cheeks. She held on to her bravado because it was all she had left. Vincent shifted his grip to her throat. “Then maybe you should just consider this your own personal movie set.”

  It was hard to breathe, let alone talk with his hand on her wind-pipe. “If this is my show, I want say over the script.”

  “No.” His head cocked to the side. “I don’t think so.” He tightened his grip.

  She couldn’t breathe and couldn’t escape. No matter how she kicked and clawed, he held on, choking the words from existence. Spots spun before her eyes. Blackness crept into the edges of her vision. In her mind she heard Caleb’s howl and Vincent’s laughter. Her world diminished to the voices in her head and the gleam of Vincent’s fangs.

  His lips moved with disjointed flashes of color over the white as he spoke words she couldn’t hear. He turned and slammed her against the wall. Her head smacked into the sheetrock. More stars joined the first.

  “You might as well give in. You can’t win.”

  Against him. That’s what he meant. She grabbed for his wrists. His flesh melted like butter under the rake of her talons, but not his intent. He didn’t let go. The scent of blood filled her nostrils. Hunger twisted in her gut. Vincent’s laugh filled the room. The buzzing disappeared.

  Give him what he wants, Allie. Caleb’s order came through strong and clear.

  No! She’d never give him what he wanted.

  Survive!

  “Yes, Allie, survive.” Vincent echoed the order in a seductive parody. He released her throat. He brought his wrist up. Blood, thick and rich, dripped onto her cheek, trailing inward, toward her mouth. She jerked her head to the left. He brought it back with a ruthless yank. “Feed.”

  A drop hit her tongue. Then another. Her stomach heaved.

  Caleb!

  She spat, but couldn’t get rid of the vile taste. Her fangs retracted. Her knees drew up. The buzzing was back. She shook her head violently from side to side. Vincent simply put his forearm across her throat. Caleb!

  “He can’t hear you.” He slashed his wrist with his thumbnail. “Now feed.”