by M. Leighton
“I don’t know. Maybe it will appear soon.”
“Do you think this has anything to do with Devon since it was him that they took?”
“I think we have to assume that it does.”
“Could he be one of the people listed?”
Bo looked thoughtfully at the things only he could decipher from the beautiful markings on my skin.
“I guess he could be the Reluctant Vampire. He refuses to feed, which means that it should only be a matter of time before he dies. I guess you could say that death follows him.”
“How could Sebastian have known that he’d find just such a person here, in this town where both of us live? Isn’t that too much of a coincidence?”
Bo straightened, his eyes burning into mine.
“It’s no coincidence. This is fate,” he said intensely. “None of this is an accident.”
“So what do we do now?”
Bo took the tee shirt that dangled from my fingers, turned it right-side out and held it out to me.
“After you get dressed, we’ll go get Lucius and see if we can find Devon before morning.”
“But what if they come looking for him?”
“There’s no reason for them to go back there again, unless they have to keep another prisoner down there. Besides, he’s invisible. Maybe they won’t know he’s gone if I put all the stakes back where they were.”
Although I worried about Sebastian coming after Devon, I had to trust Bo. This was his God-given job to do, his birthright and sole purpose for existence. He had to have a wisdom that no one else could understand.
So, after slipping my shirt back over my head, Bo and I headed back through the house toward the door. Annika emerged from the den just as we were passing.
“I see Cade must’ve gotten a little taste of our fair Ridley, or rather she got a taste of him,” she said smugly. “Looks like he’ll be sleeping it off for a while. Did you find out anything useful?”
“Ridley saw that they were keeping a friend of ours in a mine shaft.”
“Where is it?”
“We don’t know the exact location, but we know someone who can probably help us. We’re going to go start looking now.”
“Mind if I come? I’m going to need to feed before too long and I can help you search. You might need an extra hand.”
She couldn’t have been more casual, but I could see intent in her eyes that was anything but. As usual, though, Bo was oblivious to what I believed were Annika’s conniving ways.
“That would be great. We can use all the help we can get.”
“It’ll be just like the night we had to go find Scabs when he tried to run away.”
Bo looked confused for a few seconds before his faulty memory gave way to a clear recollection.
“Yeah, I remember that. Poor kid didn’t expect it to snow so much, did he?”
Annika laughed. It was a dainty, feminine sound that set my teeth on edge. Her eyes twinkled merrily as she watched Bo.
“Poor Scabs was almost frozen solid so we had to stop at that old cabin and spend the night. He slept on the floor in front of the fire and we had to share that rickety bed.”
Although Bo continued to smile in reminiscence, I saw his eyes dart nervously toward me and then back to Annika. He looked guilty in a way that left me wondering how he and Annika had spent the night.
He cleared his throat and tugged my hand.
“We’d better get going then. Are you ready?”
Annika’s smile was vaguely predatory.
“Very.”
The three of us made our way through the cooling night toward woods that seemed to hold a lifetime of memories already. I ran on one side of Bo, Annika on the other. Repeatedly, she tried to engage him in conversation, bringing up tantalizing tidbits of their history, tidbits that seemed designed to make him remember her in a more romantic light. I had no idea how well it was working, but if his evasiveness was any indication, I thought pretty well.
When we arrived at Lucius’s cabin, the three of us mounted the steps. Before Bo’s knuckles could even make contact with the door, it swung open to reveal a smiling Lucius standing on the other side, wearing nothing but blue jeans and a big smile.
“Well, well, well. To what do I owe this glorious pleasure?” he teased in his thick brogue. His jewel-like eyes flitted from me to Bo and on to Annika who stood at Bo’s other side. There, they stopped and immediately began to sparkle with masculine appreciation. “Sweet Lord, lad, where do you find ‘em?”
Bo smoothly ignored Lucius’s question, choosing instead to state the reason for our visit.
“We need your help to find an abandoned mine shaft.”
“Don’t be rude. Introductions are in order first.”
Lucius stepped toward Annika and reached for her hand, bringing it to his lips. His eyes never left hers and I could tell by Annika’s expression that she was far from immune to Lucius’s considerable charm.
“Lucius, Annika. Annika, Lucius,” Bo obliged sharply.
“Annika. What a beautiful name. Swedish?”
Annika beamed at him.
“Yes.”
“And the voice of an angel to boot. The pleasure, lovely Annika, is all mine.”
Annika continued to smile at Lucius, clearly flattered and enchanted by him, as most any woman would be.
“Now, will you help us?” Bo asked.
Lucius smiled his most winsome smile, reluctantly dragging his eyes away from Annika.
“Of course I’ll help you. I’m always,” he said, sliding his eyes back to Annika, “at your service.”
“Do you want to put some clothes on?” Bo asked irritably.
Lucius winked at Bo and then returned his gaze to Annika.
“Nah. I might find a really tasty bite while I’m out and this will just leave me with less to take off.”
He grinned rakishly at Annika and she had the good grace to at least blush. As I watched color flood her cheeks becomingly, I thought wryly that at least she was good for something. She’d answered my question about whether or not a vampire could blush. Apparently, we could.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Bo and I followed Lucius through the woods. Annika was by his side, as he was determined to entertain her with stories of his long, full life as a vampire. To her credit, she managed to look as if she was hanging on his every word.
I wondered about her, about her motives and her true feelings for Bo. Was she just an opportunist, a girl who latched on to the nearest man? That didn’t really make sense because she’d searched furiously and diligently for Bo. Was she trying to make Bo jealous by showing Lucius some attention? That could be it.
As we made our way slowly through the woods, I watched Annika to see if she glanced at Bo for his reaction, but I didn’t see her do it even once. She laughed and responded to Lucius in what appeared to be a very genuine manner. It was then that it occurred to me that Annika might just have fallen under Lucius’s charismatic spell. It was easy to see how that could happen. Lucius was something else after all.
After what seemed like an eternity of walking, Lucius stopped at the foot of a small hill. He swept his arm out with a flourish and announced that we’d arrived.
“You stay here,” Bo said, directing his order to me. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“But you didn’t see what I saw. How will you know where to find him without light?”
“He should answer me if I call out, right?”
“Oh,” I said, feeling foolish. “I didn’t even think of that.”
Bo grinned, brushing a quick kiss across my lips.
“It’s okay. I did.”
With that, he turned and made his way into the darkened interior of the semi-hidden shaft.
Lucius and Annika continued to chatter, but I paid no attention to what they were saying, their flirting the furthest thing from my mind. With every minute that ticked by, I thought of more reasons why I shouldn’t have let Bo go in there al
one. In fact, I had all but decided I was going in after him when he finally emerged, brushing cobwebs from his hair and shirt as he walked away from the yawning mouth of the mine.
Relief flooded me and, on its heels, concern that he seemed to be alone.
“No Devon?”
“No Devon.”
Bo turned to Lucius.
“Are there any more mines that you know of in this area?”
“Just one, but I know of two more down in Southmoore.”
Bo sighed.
“Well, let’s start with this one and then we’ll make our way south if we can’t find him here.”
“Do you have any idea how close this particular mine is?” Lucius asked.
“No, but they only just took him, so I figure they couldn’t have gone far,” Bo surmised. “Unless, of course, your vision has yet to happen,” Bo said to me. “Maybe they’re still traveling.”
A hopeless, helpless feeling overwhelmed me at his words. We really were flying almost completely blind. Cade’s abilities wouldn’t do us much good if we had no way of putting them in context or ascertaining some kind of time line.
Bo sighed.
“Let’s just hope they decided to keep him close.” Bo turned to Lucius. “Lead the way to number two.”
Lucius nodded and we struck out through the forest again, winding our way around hills, climbing slight inclines and weaving our way through trees.
Lucius had been in the midst of a lighthearted account of his adventures in Paris over one hundred years ago when he stopped suddenly.
“Did you hear that?” he asked Bo.
Bo cocked his head and listened, as did I.
The soft huff of heavy breathing teased my ears. I tried to locate the sound, but it seemed to be echoing on all sides, as if we were surrounded by it. I scanned the dark forest, but saw no movement, nothing that looked amiss.
But then, like a bark in the night, I heard one sharp grunt and then it seemed that all hell broke loose in the woods. The crunch of leaves and the snap of twigs erupted like a firestorm of activity, disturbing the stillness. Then there was thunderous stomping, as if a herd of cattle was stampeding toward us.
Instinctively, Bo and Lucius put their backs to one another, pulling Annika and me in close to them so that we had eyes on all sides. It was as I faced the black forest to the west that I saw the red eyes appear as tiny dots racing through the trees.
“Bo,” I whispered. “Something’s coming.”
“I know. I see it, too.”
I tore my eyes away from the ever-approaching red spots only to find that there were a dozen other pairs coming from all directions. The closer they got, the more I could hear.
Their hearts beat erratically, their breathing labored and excited. They growled—slobbering, vicious, mad sounds that made the hair on my arms stand up.
“Bo, what are they?”
“I don’t know, just be ready to tear their heads off.”
At his words, I felt the rise of fear innervate my muscles. They tensed, readying themselves for action, for a fight. I had no idea what kind of woodland creatures had glowing red eyes, but I felt sure it wasn’t anything that I should feel sorry about killing.
“Remember, Ridley, they can’t hurt you if they can’t get to your heart.”
Keep them away from my heart. They can’t hurt me. Keep them away from my heart. They can’t hurt me, I reminded myself over and over as the stomping grew louder. It echoed through my head like stilettoes in an empty library.
It was with those thoughts in mind that I caught the first one as it hurled itself toward me. Its mouth closed around my forearm and held on tight. I used that to my advantage and turned to throw it to the ground. It struggled and squealed, gnawing furiously at my flesh, trying to tear its way through my arm. I pulled my arm to one side, forcing its head in that direction, and I used my suddenly-extended fangs to rip its throat out.
When the movements of the creature had all but ceased, I lifted my head and, without a heartbeat of hesitation, grabbed its porcine mandible and twisted with all my might. I could see that I didn’t tear the mad bore’s head off, but it was close.
As I pushed myself to my feet, a heavy torpedo hit me between my shoulder blades and knocked me to the ground. I managed to catch myself on one elbow and one knee, using my free hand to reach behind me and drag the boar over my shoulder and fling it to the ground.
It was on its feet within a fraction of a second, facing off against me with all the fury of something possessed. As we stared at one another for the space of about two heartbeats, I tuned out the grunts and squeals and growls from around me and put all my focus onto the thing in front of me.
The huge boar’s tongue hung out of one side of its open mouth and its lips curled back over its tusks threateningly. Its barrel-like body heaved and twitched as if the creature was uncomfortable in its own skin. But it was the eyes that gave me pause.
The glowing red seemed to seep into the darkness around the pig’s head like blood spreading in a pool of water, and in them was an intelligence that made the hairs at my nape prickle uneasily. There was something ancient and evil about them, assuring me that this was no wild, mindless animal. This creature was very much aware of what it was doing and to whom it was doing it. It was on a mission to kill me and it would let nothing stand in its way.
The instant before I moved, I purposely bunched my muscles and reminded them that I could move with lightning speed. And so I did. Before the boar could even take its first step toward me, I had reached inside its open mouth and wrapped my fingers around its upper and lower jaw, pulling sharply and separating the pig’s head and snout from the rest of its body.
The lifeless boar’s corpse had only just slipped from my fingertips when something hit me from the left and from behind at the same time. Face down in the leaves, I scrambled to get turned over, but it seemed as though there were too many mouths and hooves tearing at me to allow for me to move.
I kicked with my legs and made contact at least once with something firm, but my struggles didn’t seem to even slow the ravenous creatures that bit at me. I felt a slobbering mouth at my neck just before two thick tusks penetrated the skin there.
As if it were magnified a thousand times, I heard the hungry chomping and slopping as it enjoyed my flesh. And then, as quickly as they’d come upon me, with a roar, they were gone.
Dazedly, my blood still swimming with adrenaline and fear, I rolled over in time to see Bo tearing the boars into pieces, angrily dispatching limbs and heads this way and that. As the deafening throb of my pulse slowed in my ears, I watched with pride and appreciation as he quickly dominated the creatures.
Making my way to my feet, the four of us stood looking all around for more pigs, but there were none to be found. Bo turned to me, taking my face in his hands.
“Are you alright?”
His eyes searched mine, concern clouding the beauty of his face.
“I-I’m fine.”
Bo released my face and brushed the hair back away from my neck, gingerly checking my wound. I knew it was only one of many, but I was too frazzled to think about the rest, too frazzled to really think at all. I was still in survival mode.
His gaze finally returned to my face and he smiled, a small smile, but a smile nonetheless.
“You’re already starting to heal,” he said in relief. “I should thank Heather for making it harder for anything to take you from me.”
“Touching moment, lad, but I think we really need to move,” Lucius said, coming to a stop in front of us.
“We’re close to the second mine, aren’t we?” he asked Lucius.
“We are indeed,” Lucius said, turning to lead us on.
“How did you know?” I asked Bo as we followed Lucius as he darted through the trees.
“I’d bet my life that those were some sort of sentries that Sebastian put in the woods to keep us away.”
“He knew we’d come,” I breathed, a sinking f
eeling dragging at the pit of my stomach.
“So it would seem.”
I saw no reason to voice what I knew we were both thinking. Somehow Sebastian knew that we’d find Devon, which meant that he knew that we had a way of tracking him. Could he know about Cade? How much did he know about what my skin would tell Bo?
I had to put my ruminations aside as Lucius slowed. I became instantly hyper alert, as did Bo and Annika. Carefully, thoroughly, we scanned the forest around us, watching and listening.
When it seemed that there was no herd of wild, possessed boars launching an attack, Lucius moved forward to skirt yet another small hill. On its east-facing side, a huge opening was carved out, but the mouth was boarded up and littered with warning signs. It looked as if it had remained undisturbed for a couple of decades at least.
Disappointment and frustration burned in my gut.
“Obviously he’s not in this one. No one’s been in there in years,” I ground out through my tightly gritted teeth.
Bo ran a hand through his hair in a gesture that said he felt as irritated as I.
His sigh was a sharp hiss in the eerily quiet woods.
“Well, maybe I should check anyway. Maybe Sebastian found a way to get in there without disturbing the entrance.”
I wanted to tell him that I seriously doubted that, but I didn’t. No extra negativity was needed at this point.
As Bo approached the mouth of the mine a low rumble sounded. It trembled in the ground beneath my feet and made its way up my legs, tickling the nerves of my calves. Bo stopped mid-step, but the rumbling continued. We all watched and listened, and when it appeared that there was no imminent danger, Bo moved to resume his approach.
There was one spot of exposed earth right in front of the mine’s entrance. It was a fairly large patch of dirt, bare of leaves as if the area had been recently cleared of debris. And very purposefully, I might add.
The instant Bo’s foot touched the dirt, two hulking wolf-like animals appeared on the crest of the hill above his head. At least four times as big as the boars, these animals were clearly just as unnatural. Their heads, easily the size of a horse’s, were dominated by two eyes that glowed orange with a flame that licked at the air around them. Smoke arose from them in thin, curling tendrils and then disappeared above their enormous ears.
