She frowned at his reaction. “I’ll be fine,” she told Owen.
Jared glanced around, his brown eyes narrowing at the empty dark street. He glanced at Rose. “Are you sure? Because I don’t think you should take any chances,” he said, his attitude strangely opposite from what it had been before.
Rose blinked. That was the most she’d ever heard Jared say. “I’m sure.”
Owen and Jared exchanged a strange look.
Just as she started to ask them to explain what the heck was going on, Owen turned toward her and pulled her into a bear hug that took her breath. With her face crushed against his chest, Rose felt less like her friend was telling her goodbye for the night and more like he was telling her goodbye for good.
“You’ll text me as soon as you get home, right?” Owen asked worriedly.
Rose pushed back on his chest, extracting herself from his arms so that she could breathe. She stared at him, her brows furrowing. “Yeah, of course.”
Jared glanced around the street suspiciously. “We need to go, Owen.”
Owen glared at him. “I’m coming,” he muttered. He stepped closer to Jared and leaned in close, whispering something too quietly for Rose to hear.
“Well, what are we supposed to do? Force her?” Jared snarled back.
Rose pursed her lips. “Guys, is there something I should know?”
They both turned toward her. Owen looked startled, but Jared mostly just looked irritated. Jared grabbed Owen’s arm. “Goodnight, Rose,” Jared said curtly as he began to drag a reluctant Owen in the direction of their apartment.
Rose just stood there for a while, under the streetlight, frowning after them as she tried to figure out what had just happened. Deciding their lover’s quarrel was none of her business, even if it did possibly have something to do with her, she finally decided to head home. But as she started off in the direction of her apartment building, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was being followed.
—
As Rose turned the corner onto a dark alley, someone suddenly grabbed her. Her back collided with the tall, muscular body behind her as a man’s arm wrapped around her chest and shoulders, effectively restraining her arms. She opened her mouth to scream, but a large rough hand quickly covered her mouth to muffle the sound. She fought and kicked, but her strength just didn’t compare to the person who held her. His grip tightened as he tried to force her to be still.
“Damn it, woman, I don’t want to hurt you! Stop fighting!” he hissed.
Rose froze as she recognized his voice. Even though he’d spoken quietly, she still recognized that slight accent, that melodic tone. Since he’d rendered her unable to voice her anger, she settled for biting his palm as hard as she could.
To her surprise, he didn’t remove his hand from her mouth. As a matter of fact, he didn’t even flinch. He just laughed. She shivered as his breath warmed her ear. “That’s cute,” he growled in her ear, “but my bite is a lot harder.”
She realized that the only way to get him to loosen his grasp was to temporarily stop fighting. So, she relaxed, letting her body fall limply against him.
Kallias shoved her against the wall of the alley and pinned both of her hands above her head with just one of his. He leaned against her to hold her still.
Now that she could see him, Rose glared at him with the most murderous glare he had ever seen. He raised his eyebrow, amused by her boldness. He could smell the adrenaline pumping through her bloodstream, but she hid her fear well.
His hand still pressed harshly against her lips, Kallias leaned closer to her, his face nearly touching hers, and spoke in that same quiet and dangerously low tone. “I’ll take my hand off of your mouth now, but only if you don’t scream.”
Rose’s bright blue eyes darkened angrily. She looked as defiant as ever.
Kallias sighed tiredly, already sure that this wouldn’t end well. “Do not scream,” he warned her again before he pulled his hand off of her mouth.
“I knew it was you,” Rose snarled.
His brows furrowed. “You knew what was me?”
“Let me go, or I swear you will regret it,” she warned.
Kallias laughed, “Oh, I will? What are you going to do to me?”
Rose narrowed her eyes at his mocking tone. “I am not afraid of you.”
“You should be,” Kallias said simply.
“Well, I’m not,” she said, as she attempted to pull her hands free. Her wrists twisted in his grasp, and she whimpered at the pressure of his rough hands.
His eyes darted toward her hands. “Stop. You’ll bruise your wrists.”
“Why do you care?” Rose snapped as she jerked at her wrists again.
“I told you. I don’t want to hurt you,” he sighed. “I just want to talk.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” she snarled. “You attacked me just to talk.”
“Attack is a bit of an exaggeration, don’t you think?” Kallias grumbled.
“If you wanted to talk,” she grunted as she fought against him, causing her body to press against his, “why didn’t you just talk to me in the restaurant?”
“Because I needed to talk to you alone,” he said. “Damn it. Stop fighting.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Let go of me.”
“If I knew you wouldn’t run, I would,” Kallias growled, trying his best to hold her still without harming her. “But considering your track record of stubborn insanity, I’m almost positive that letting you go wouldn’t be a good idea.”
“I am insane?” she yelled. “You’re the one attacking women in alleys!”
His eyes widened. “Would you shut the hell up?” he growled.
“No,” she snarled at him. “Now, let me go, you creepy drug dealer.”
He started laughing. “That’s your brilliant conclusion? I’m a drug dealer?”
“That’s just the nicest accusation I could think of,” she told him, wincing at the pain as she continued to pull at her hands. “I’m leaning more toward rapist.”
His eyes narrowed. “I’m not a rapist.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Murderer, then?”
He didn’t answer that question. “What I am is a dangerous and impatient person who happens to be trying to help you,” he growled, “and you’re making that very difficult.” His brows furrowed as she whimpered in pain again. He suddenly grabbed her face and forced her to meet his gaze. He entered her mind with his telepathic abilities and commanded, “Be still, and stop fighting me.”
Rose felt a strange wave of dizziness fall over her mind, but she suddenly realized that Kallias had loosened his grip on her. She took advantage of the wider range of motion and stomped on his foot as hard as she could. A sharp pain shot through her head at the same time that he released her with a grunted curse, but she ignored the pain and fled from him as fast as she could, stumbling as she ran.
“What the hell?” Kallias muttered under his breath, bewildered by her defiance of his command. No one had ever resisted his telepathic control before. No one. He narrowed his eyes at the woman fleeing from him, and yelled, “Fine! If you want to die, go ahead and run! Just remember I tried to warn you!”
She froze. She turned back toward him, surprised to find that he hadn’t moved. She’d halfway expected him to come and snatch her up again, but he didn’t. He just stood there, glaring at her. “Warn me about what?” she asked.
Holding his hands out on either side of him, he stepped toward her slowly, like someone afraid of spooking a wild animal. “You’re in danger.”
Rose snatched out the first thing she felt in her pocket and held it out toward him as he neared her. “If you grab me again, I swear I’ll use this.”
He glanced down at her hand and laughed, “You’ll see me to death?”
She grimaced as she realized that she was threatening him with her reading glasses. “I will stab you with them,” she improvised, “in the eye.”
He raised an eyebrow and grinned. “I would love to
see you try.”
She glared at him. “What do you want?”
Kallias sighed. “Someone is looking for you, Rose Foster.”
Rose frowned. “How do you know my last name? I never mentioned it.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Kallias said dismissively. “You were being watched by someone while you were at the café. Did you notice?”
“What? No,” she sputtered. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Which is it?” he asked irritably.
“Who was watching me?” she asked.
Kallias shrugged, as if the question bored him. “No one important. It’s the one who sent him to watch you that you should be worried about.”
She stepped back as he took another step toward her. “Who sent him?”
“An extremely dangerous person,” Kallias answered as he continued to slowly approach her, “and when he finds you, Rose, he will kill you.”
She glanced behind her, preparing to run. She wanted to believe him, for some reason, perhaps because his warning fit with Audrey’s dream, and yet, every bone in her body told her not to trust him. She could feel that he was dangerous. She could see it even. On top of all of that, he also fit the description of the killer in Audrey’s dream. “Who is he? Because you seem pretty dangerous to me.”
“I am,” he said. “But luckily for you, I have no interest in killing you.”
“Lucky me,” Rose sneered. “So, who does have an interest in killing me?”
“Someone just as dangerous as I am but far more insane,” he answered.
She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “And how would you know this?”
“That’s none of your business,” he said as he took another step toward her. “All you need to know is that if you want to survive, you will need my help.”
“I’ll scream if you come one step closer to me,” Rose warned.
He froze, his eyes flashing with frustration. “I’m trying to help you, but I’m losing patience. If you walk away from me, your death is on your own hands.”
“I think I’ll take my chances,” she said, lifting her chin defiantly.
“Fine. Go. Die,” he growled. “I don’t give a shit what happens to you.”
Rose watched him warily for a moment, and then she turned and ran.
Kallias raked his hand through his hair as he watched her flee down the alley. “Stupid human,” he muttered bitterly. “You deserve to die.” He stood there for several moments, trying to talk himself into going back to his hotel room and forgetting about her. She hadn’t wanted his help, and that was fine with him. He didn’t care about that stupid, frustrating, stubborn human. His mind kept darting back to that moment after he’d used his telepathic control on her, the way she’d just ignored it. He wondered how she could have resisted mind-control, and he wondered if that had something to do with why Theron was looking for her.
She certainly smelled unusual for a human.
Kallias sighed and decided to return to his hotel room and resume his search for Theron later. He refused to waste another minute on that human.
But just as he turned to leave, he noticed Theron’s scent.
And immediately after he noticed it, he heard a woman scream.
Kallias rolled his eyes. “Damn it.”
The Vampire
An involuntary scream escaped Rose’s mouth as someone stepped out from the shadows of an alley and grabbed her…again…except this time, the person didn’t seem to be trying not to hurt her. His hands gripped her arms roughly, and his fingernails dug deep into her skin. Up until that point, Rose would’ve assumed that no one could break someone’s arms just by grabbing them, but she began to doubt that as she felt the ripping pain shooting through her arms that reached down into her bones. She cried out, but he made no move to cover her mouth. He didn’t seem to care whether or not anyone heard her.
Instead of grabbing her from behind as the other man had, this man grabbed her from the front, giving her a clear view of him. Although darkness cloaked the rest of the alley from her, the streetlight behind her cast enough light on his face for her to make out his appearance. Her eyes widened in fear as she noticed his tawny skin, just a shade darker than the golden skin of the man from the restaurant, his dark brown eyes that seemed cold and black, his short, choppy brown hair that set neatly on top of his head, his stern jaw, his tall, broad-shouldered body, and the way that his features seemed perfect in every way. Her stomach turned with dread as she realized this was the man from Audrey’s dream.
Ironically, he didn’t look much like a killer, not like the man from the restaurant who seemed to dress to look dangerous. No, this man wore neat black slacks and a gray sweater. In any other situation, Rose might’ve assumed he was a harmless guy that worked in an office somewhere, but she could feel in the way he gripped her and see in the coldness of his eyes that there was nothing harmless about him. And his smile…that smile sent horrible, icy chills down her spine.
“Let me go,” Rose demanded as she fought against him.
His fingernails dug deeper into her arms as she struggled, and she could feel the bruises beginning to form along her arms. But he didn’t seem to care. He just held her easily as she struggled and fought unsuccessfully against him.
The man’s head tilted to the side, and his dark eyes studied her curiously, as if seeing something for the first time that he’d waited a long time to see. His eyes held a hint of disappointment. She apparently wasn’t what he’d expected. “You don’t look like much of a threat, do you?” he murmured, a Greek accent coloring his voice. “You smell amazing, but your appearance is…lacking.”
“Thanks a lot,” Rose muttered sarcastically as she continued to try to pull her arms from his grasp, only succeeding in hurting herself worse. “Let me go.”
“You’ll only make this more painful, if you fight,” he said, smiling cruelly.
“What do you want with me?” she said, twisting in his grasp.
“I should be asking you that question,” he said.
She stopped briefly to cast a puzzled glance at him, but then, she pulled back and kicked him in the leg as hard as she could. She heard him make a low, terrifying sound in his throat that sounded like the growl of a large, wild animal, and then, she cried out in agony as he twisted her arm behind her until she could no longer stand. She fought back tears as he held her in that painful position.
“If you were smart, human, you would stop fighting and save yourself some pain,” he growled in her ear. “Because I can make this very, very painful.”
“Human?” she gasped, practically kneeling on the pavement.
“Well, that is what you are, isn’t it?” the man asked.
“No, I’m a fish,” Rose snarled sarcastically. “Don’t you see the fins?”
The man squeezed her arm tighter. “I do not like your attitude, human.”
Her entire body shook from the force he applied to her arm, and she was sure it could break at any moment. “Well, I don’t like being attacked.”
She cried as he used the hand not twisting her arm to grasp her hair and pulled her back toward him. She felt his breath on her neck as he snarled into her ear, “Do you want me to kill you in the most painful way possible?”
“I want you to let me go,” Rose corrected. She tried to pull herself from his grasp again and cried out as it caused the pain to worsen in her arms.
“Your fragile little human bones will snap if you keep fighting me,” the man told her. “I have to admit, for a human, you have a lot of fight in you.”
“Why do you keep saying that?!” she asked. “You’re a human, too, idiot!”
He suddenly released her arm, sending her sprawling face-first onto the pavement, but before she could scramble away from him, his hand was already on her arm, dragging her back to her feet. He pulled her against him so that his face was near hers. “Do not insult me!” he growled, his metallic-scented breath hitting her face. “And no, I’m not human, but you already kno
w that, don’t you?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Rose said, frowning at him.
He smiled at her. “You were looking for me. Well, here I am.”
“I think you have the wrong person,” she snarled. “I don’t make a habit of looking for sick, creepy murderers that attack women in dark alleys.”
He flashed her a mocking smile. “You didn’t ask anyone about me?”
“I don’t even know who you are!” Rose exclaimed.
“Theron,” the man said. “My name is Theron.”
She froze. Her eyes widened. He couldn’t be the same person from the scrolls. She refused to believe it. Vampires didn’t exist. The scrolls were possibly thousands of years old. The Theron from the scrolls, if he ever existed, would be long dead by now, wouldn’t he? And yet, the possibility that this man just happened to share the same name as the vampire was too coincidental to believe.
His smile grew as he noticed the recognition lighting her eyes. “That’s it. You recognize me now, don’t you?” he murmured. He leaned closer, causing her to cringe. “You have something I want, Rose Foster. Tell me where it is.”
She frowned, confused again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Theron suddenly dipped his head and pressed his face against her neck. He sniffed her neck, ignoring her as she cringed and shoved back at him, trying to push him away from her. “Why do you smell so powerful, human?”
Rose kicked his shin again, which only caused him to growl at her and grip her harder. “Stop sniffing me, you sick creep! And let me go!” she yelled.
“No,” Theron said simply. His words vibrated against her throat, making her stomach turn. “Actually, I’m hungry now, and your scent is very appetizing.”
Rose started to ask what he meant, but her breath caught as she felt two incredibly sharp teeth press against her neck. Her eyes widened in horror.
Before his fangs could pierce her skin, Theron suddenly froze. He kept his mouth pressed to her skin for a moment, frowning, and then, finally, he straightened and looked up. He peered into the shadows at the end of the alley. “I recognize that scent,” he said quietly. “Kallias. What a pleasant surprise.”
The Stone of the Eklektos Page 9
