“Go to hell,” Jake growled as guilt assaulted him, but he couldn’t let it tear him apart. If he allowed the vampire controlling Nyla to kill him, he’d never be able to save her from its clutches, and he knew she’d never forgive herself for killing him while being controlled. If he had to hurt her to save her, he would just have to deal with it and beg forgiveness later. “I’m not killing you until you’re out of her body. I lost Bobby to you. I’m not going to lose Nyla too.”
“You stupid, love-struck fool!” She threw her head back and the vampire’s laughter poured out of her. “You don’t even know what she—Jake!”
Jake started for her as the sound of Nyla’s true voice called his name, sounding so scared and desperate. He halted when her eyes once more returned to dark, soulless black pits. “Nyla, I know you can hear me in there! Fight this son of a bitch!”
“She can’t fight me. I made her.”
“You sick motherfucker!” Jake threw himself at the creature inhabiting Nyla’s body, the knife in his hand tightly enclosed within his fist. He grabbed her by the shoulders, holding her down on the bed, aching to drive the knife into her chest, if only to take the smug grin off her face. He raised the knife in the air, ready to plunge it into her heart, then realized what he was doing.
“No!” He threw the knife down, desperate to keep himself from hurting Nyla. “I won’t kill her just to hurt you, no matter what lies you spew.”
“Lies? She’s the liar. You don’t even know what she—” Her body bucked beneath him, cries of rage coming from her mouth as her eyes seemed to flicker, black and purple swimming in her irises. “Jake, please don’t listen . . . help . . . help . . .”
She let out a painful cry, and the voice changed back to the deep, menacing tone of his tormentor, as black eyes glared up at him. “She was there, too, that night. She is how I found you again,” the vampire said through Nyla’s mouth as he used her body to shove Jake to the floor.
Jake rolled as she rose from the bed, careful to put space between them before he stood. “I don’t believe you. You’ve hunted me down because not only did I escape you that night, but I’ve killed two of the vamps who were with you. You knew it was only a matter of time before I got to you and the other one.”
“The other one is already dead. This bitch killed him.”
Jake’s mouth dropped open, surprised by the news. He’d been on the trail of Niles eight years earlier, had closed in on him when all of a sudden the trail just stopped. It was as though the vampire had vanished into thin air. Assuming what the monster said was true, Nyla had beaten him to the killing. “I’ll have to remember to thank her for that.”
“I guess you’ll want to thank her for saving your life that night too.”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but it’s not going to work. She had nothing to do with anything that happened that night.”
“Jacob, Jacob, why do you refuse to see what is so clearly in front of you? How do you think I’ve gained control of her body? She’s mine.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Jake’s body shook with denial as he let the vampire’s comment sink in. He knew a person couldn’t be possessed unless there was some sort of entrance to their mind. They either let the host in willingly, or there was some sort of link. Nyla wouldn’t let this monster inside her, he knew she wouldn’t . . . but the alternative couldn’t be true either. “You work for Satan. He has a hell of a bag of tricks.”
“And that’s what you think this is?” the vampire asked, laughing as he forced Nyla’s body to walk toward Jake with a look of murderous intent in his eyes. “This is all a trick?”
“Yes,” Jake answered, taking a step back for every step she took forward.
“I actually tried to do you a favor by giving you the opportunity to kill this woman. You’ve wanted to kill me more than you’ve ever wanted to do anything else. She protected me from you, Jacob. She could have found me for you at any time.”
“No,” Jake said, his voice barely audible as he struggled to contain his emotions. There were too many thoughts racing through his mind, too many doubts. He loved Nyla. He’d do anything for her, and she loved him. She wouldn’t lie to him, or hurt him. She wouldn’t. But how did this thing get inside her? How did it find entrance? What connection could there be? “What’s your name?”
He laughed before answering. “Knowing my name makes it easier to hunt me, doesn’t it?”
“I’ll kill you either way. I’d just like to know the name of the demon I’m going to send back to hell.”
“That’s not going to happen,” he said, “but I’ll tell you my name since it’s only fair you know the name of your executioner. It’s Demarcus.”
Jake rolled the name around in his mind, trying to place it. “You’re very old, Demarcus. The few occasions I’ve come across your name, it was in tales of your death.”
“Widely exaggerated tales, as you now know.”
“They won’t be exaggerated for long.”
“You won’t live to know the difference.” Nyla’s arm raised, revealing the knife he’d thrown down earlier held firmly in her grasp.
Jake positioned himself for attack, expecting her to lunge toward him with the knife, ready to bury it in his chest, but she turned her wrist, directing the blade toward herself.
“What are you doing?”
“Killing you would be too easy, Jake. I want you to suffer the loss of the woman you claim to love first.”
“No!” Jake barreled into Nyla’s body as her arm swung in a downward arc, managing to knock her to the floor before any damage was done. He grabbed her wrist, beating it against the floor until she dropped the knife. Her knee jerked upward, smashing into his groin with enough force to dispel his breath from his lungs.
They rolled around on the floor, each grasping the other’s neck, struggling to choke them into submission. Jake didn’t want to hurt Nyla, but he couldn’t let Demarcus hurt her either. If Demarcus killed him now, he’d kill Nyla soon after, and she wouldn’t be able to stop it from happening.
They rammed into the legs of the small table his gym bag was resting on, sending it crashing to the floor beside him, and several items rolled out. He was on top now, able to pull back a little from his opponent’s grip, but she still held on tight. He increased the pressure of his hands around her throat until her eyes swam with color.
She struggled to speak, fear emanating from violet eyes and tears running down both sides of her face. Jake let out a cry of anguish, realizing he was killing Nyla, not the black-eyed bastard who’d possessed her. He immediately released his grip, and the black eyes returned as she raised the upper half of her body to attack him.
She fit her mouth to his neck, sinking all of her teeth into his flesh. Crying out in pain, he tried to push her off of him, but she wouldn’t budge. She was attached to him by her teeth.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a small bottle on the floor, which had rolled from his gym bag, highlighted by a ray of sunlight streaming through a crack in the window blinds. He grabbed for the sports bottle as Nyla continued to gnaw through his neck, and opened it with his thumb.
“Take this, you bloodsucking bastard,” he said from between teeth clenched in pain as he pulled himself as far away from Nyla’s mouth as he could get and raised the bottle above the spot where they were joined. He let the holy water pour between them, aiming to get as much as possible inside her mouth.
She hissed in pain, breaking away from his neck, a small chunk of his flesh still in her mouth. He fought down the bile threatening to escape him and poured the holy water down her open mouth, holding her body as she struggled against him.
Her cries changed from rage to agony, switching from masculine to feminine, as he effectively exorcised the beast from her body. She let out a howl of pain a
nd began to shiver on all fours, tears streaming down her face. Thankfully, Jake could no longer feel a trace of the evil darkness Demarcus had brought into the room with him.
“You’re all right now, baby. He’s gone,” Jake assured her as he grabbed the sheet from the bed and wrapped her in it, trying to ward off the tremors wracking her body.
Nyla gagged, spitting out the chunk of flesh she’d torn from his body, and looked at it in horror. Her face paled as she realized what she’d done, and she tore out of Jake’s embrace, running toward the bathroom with her hand over her mouth. The bathroom door slammed behind her and Jake gave her privacy as he heard her retching.
Warm blood dripped down his chest, but he didn’t want to barge in on her while she recuperated in the bathroom, so he grabbed the T-shirt he’d taken off of her earlier and used it to wipe away the blood, balling it up against his wound. He sat on the edge of the bed, a hundred questions running through his mind.
How in hell had Demarcus gotten inside Nyla? Possession was a very rare skill, and although many fictional accounts suggested it, not many vampires could play mind tricks. And when it came to mind tricks, possession was the biggest, baddest bitch of them all. He doubted that even Seta could pull off a possession, and she was a born witch.
Of all the possession cases he’d ever heard of, the possessor was invited inside the host or had some sort of mental or blood tie. A tie similar to the bond between a fledgling vampire and its sire. Extremely powerful vampires could get inside a person’s mind if they’d recently drank of their blood, but a full-on possession was stretching that theory a little thin. So what had just happened?
He glanced at the bathroom door, listening to the sound of running water, and nibbled on his bottom lip. He was probably bleeding heavily, but he needed to make sure Nyla was doing well before tending to himself.
“Nyla? Are you all right in there?” he called.
Her answer came in the form of a shaky, somewhat affirmative grunt, followed shortly after by more retching. He glanced at the glob of flesh still lying on the floor and quickly turned his head away before he vomited himself.
He needed to clean the wound, and judging by the size of the disgusting chunk of flesh lying on the floor, it was going to be one big, nasty bitch of a wound too. “Just what I need,” he muttered, rising from the bed. Figuring Nyla wouldn’t want to be barged in on while she heaved up what sounded like everything she’d eaten for the past week, he walked over to the spilled contents of his gym bag, looking inside to see what he had to work with. He grabbed a bottle of holy water and a package of antiseptic wipes and took them over to the dresser.
Standing before the mirror which hung over the dresser, he held the balled up T-shirt firmly against his wound, delaying the moment of truth. He wasn’t the type to faint at the sight of blood, or vomit at the sight of it, for that matter, but when a chunk of meat was bitten out of your neck, the damage couldn’t be anything but utterly disgusting. He had a feeling the wound, which didn’t hurt that much at the moment, was going to hurt like hell once he saw the actual damage.
Taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly, he removed the wadded-up shirt to inspect the damage . . . and felt his heart come to a screeching halt as he took in what he saw in the mirror.
NYLA CONTINUED TO heave, although she’d ejected the complete contents of her stomach several minutes before. She’d never gotten sick from human blood before, but she’d never ripped away flesh. She’d practically tried to eat Jake! She knew she’d been possessed and unable to control her body, but she still felt the horror of it, the shame of doing something so vile.
She rinsed her mouth with water from the tap, wondering how she was going to face Jake after what she’d done to him. Tearing his neck open wasn’t even the worst part. She’d brought Demarcus to him, and the bastard had nearly revealed her secrets to him. Jake wasn’t stupid. He knew about possessions, and, more damningly, he knew about the relationship between sire and fledgling. He had to be wondering if what Demarcus had said was true. The only thing saving her now was her ability to walk in daylight, but it wouldn’t take long for Jake to put two and two together and know she was really a vampire.
Maybe it would be for the best if he did, she conceded, thinking back over what had just happened. If Demarcus had gotten inside her once, there was a possibility he could do it again, even though she would work twice as hard to keep her mental blocks in place. She couldn’t take the chance of letting the psycho control her body again, using her to hurt Jake. Although it would break her heart, she’d rather Jake leave her than die trying to protect her. She was the one Demarcus wanted. Jake was just gravy.
She looked in the mirror, decided there wasn’t much she could do about her green pallor, and allowed herself a moment of meditation. Deciding her stomach was as calm as it was going to get, and knowing Jake was either worried sick or ready to fire away a dozen or more questions which she could only hope of having good answers for, she turned for the door. Nyla took a deep breath, knowing the next few minutes would either seal or destroy her relationship with Jake.
After opening the door, her eyes immediately fell to the spot on the floor where she had recently spit out a meaty chunk of Jake’s neck. She was relieved to find it had been cleaned up. The last thing she needed was a visual reminder of what she’d done to the man she loved.
Jake sat at the small table, staring at the screen of his laptop, a deep frown line bisecting the smooth skin of his forehead. When he raised his eyes to acknowledge her presence, they were filled with chilling accusation. “You feel better now?”
“Yes,” she answered weakly, wishing her voice didn’t shake so badly. It made her sound guilty, and that wasn’t the impression she needed to make.
“So what the hell just happened, Nyla?”
“Someone possessed me,” she answered, a ball of dread forming in her gut. Something was wrong, and she suspected she wouldn’t find out what until she stepped right into it. “The vampire who changed all these people.”
“The vampire who killed Bobby.”
“Yes. That’s what he said.” She chewed her bottom lip, wishing she knew words that could take away Jake’s pain from hearing the awful things Demarcus had told him. “I’m sorry.”
“You killed Niles,” he pressed on.
She shrugged, not wanting to reveal too much information. “Maybe so. I don’t always know the names of the vampires I kill.”
Jake sat back in the chair, one hand rotating a switchblade, the other holding a wadded up T-shirt to his neck. He’d gotten dressed while she was in the bathroom, right down to the black boots and leather shoulder holster, although the look in his eyes was far more dangerous than any weapon he could have holstered. It cut into her far deeper than the knife in his hand would have, and she had the feeling he was thinking of putting that comparison to the test. “When did you meet him?”
“Who?” she asked, knowing that playing stupid wouldn’t help, but she couldn’t think fast enough for a good answer. Fear kept her brain from functioning at full capacity, and standing before him in nothing but a thin bedsheet tied tightly under her arms made her feel extremely vulnerable, especially when he was dressed to kill. Literally.
“You know who, Nyla! When did you meet Demarcus?”
“I don’t—”
“Don’t do it, Nyla. Don’t lie to me,” he yelled, rising from his seat to stand before her. “You know him. He couldn’t have gotten inside you otherwise. You’ve been acting strange since we met, which means you’ve been fighting him off this whole time. When did he claim you?”
“Jake, I’m not what you think I am.”
“Oh, really? Explain this then!” He removed his makeshift bandage, throwing the T-shirt across the room to reveal smooth, unmarred skin where there should have been a deep wound. “And before you try to conjure up some excuse for
this, I know that the only physical changes which take place during a possession are voice, facial expression and eye color. You have healing properties in your saliva, and there’s only one way to get that. When we had sex in my car, I was sure you’d bitten me, but there were no teeth marks, so I decided it was my imagination. Now I know that I was right. You did bite me. You had the nerve to drink from me!”
“I didn’t drink from you! I know how you feel about that, and I would never—”
“Oh, that’s considerate of you. You lie to me, screw me in the ugliest sense of the word, and protect that evil son of a bitch.”
“I have never protected him! I’ve been protecting you all along!”
Jake threw his head back and laughed, a sound full of humorless anger. “By toying with me? I poured my heart out to you, trusted you in a way I’ve never trusted anyone, and you’re just a filthy bloodsucker! Tell me, how does it feel to be that big of a heartless bitch?”
“Jake . . .” Nyla fumbled for something to say, something that could make everything right, but couldn’t think of words and fight back tears at the same time. “I’m the same person I was an hour ago. Everything I’ve done, I’ve done to keep you safe.”
“Save the lies, Nyla. You’ve been hiding this monster from me, knowing that for the past sixteen years of my life I’ve wanted nothing more than to kill him. And you’re a . . . a . . . what the hell are you?”
“I’m not a vampire,” she said through a sob, as her tears broke free. “You’ve seen me walk in daylight for extended lengths of time without any sunscreen.”
He frowned, studying her. “That’s true, and that’s the only thing that’s thrown me off thus far, but you have a mind link to that sick freak, and your saliva heals. What are you? What connection do you have to that monster?”
“He bit me, years ago,” she admitted, no longer seeing any advantage in denying a connection. “I wasn’t changed over in the normal way. I never drank from him. He bit me one time and passed along some of his . . . traits.”
Slayer's Prey Page 26
