Revelations in Blood

by Patricia D. Eddy

  “A few. Perhaps one in twenty. Rome is a popular city with many resources. Such a wealth of blood donors. Some vampires prefer a certain blood type. Even an age range. Blood from an older man tastes different than blood from a young woman.”

  Evangeline’s brows arched as she glanced up at him. “And mine? What do I taste like?”

  “Like the finest wine. Rich, a bit sweet.”

  “You taste like home.” Pressing closer, Evangeline wrapped her free hand around his bicep. The touch raised a lump in his throat, as did the way she clung to him, as if he was her lifeline. She was his. The only reason he’d survived eighteen years of torture.

  He couldn’t see Sylvie, but Bayard walked just ahead of them, his gaze constantly sliding left and right. Hands at his sides, the bodyguard moved easily, but every few steps, his jacket shifted to highlight the bulge of the pistol at his waist.

  Both guards carried guns loaded with silver bullets coated with lead. Easily handled, but still lethal to both humans and vampires alike.

  The warm, tender glow he’d felt over their bond faded, replaced by worry. “Nic?” Evangeline squeezed his hand as they stopped at a busy intersection. “That man across the street…I-I’ve seen him before. He was outside the hotel last night.”

  “What?” Nic scanned the half dozen men waiting opposite them. “Which one? And when?”

  “Tall. Blond hair. Jeans and a black t-shirt.” Her fear infused each word, her voice cracking. “When we got back from dinner. He was walking the other way down the street, talking on his phone. You were telling me about the Colosseum.”

  Nic replayed the walk in his mind, but he’d been so focused on Evangeline, he hadn’t seen anyone else. “He is a stranger to me.” Clearing his throat, Nic called quietly for Bayard. The bodyguard took a step back so he was even with the two of them. “The blond man across the street. Evangeline says she recognizes him.”

  “I do recognize him,” she snapped. “He was talking on the phone in Italian right before we entered the hotel. There were maybe ten people on the sidewalk.”

  Bayard held Evangeline’s gaze. “I entered the hotel before you. I did not see him, but that does not mean he was not there.” He cupped his hand over his ear and spoke quietly in French for a moment before nodding. “Come with me,” he said, gesturing to the right. “We will take an alternate route back to the hotel. Sylvie is going to see if he follows. Move. Now.”

  Nic wrapped his arm around Evangeline’s waist and hurried her along after Bayard. The three of them rushed down the narrow sidewalk, turned back towards the Pantheon, and continued along several more blocks before crossing the street and changing directions towards the hotel.

  “Sylvie says the man gave no outward signs of alarm when we left, and he did not follow. She will meet us at Piazza San Giovessi.” Bayard glanced down at his phone, checking their position on his GPS. “Only two blocks west.”

  Staring up at Nic, Evangeline frowned. “In a city this large, I shouldn’t recognize anyone. This feels…wrong, Nic.”

  “I have seen no one following us, cara. And trust me. I have been watching.” Nic forced himself to relax and brought Evangeline’s pale hand to his lips as they set off again, just ahead of Bayard. “We are safe,” he said as he pressed a kiss to the bonding mark on the inside of her wrist.

  “But…” She shuddered as the marks flared, and a blush spread across her chest. “I can’t think when you do that.”

  “Neither can I.” As they crossed the small piazza, the arousal thrumming through Nic’s body made it hard to focus on anything but Evangeline. After such a tense morning, he ached to bury himself inside her, hear her moans as he sunk his fangs into her neck. “You drive me mad, belezza. I never understood the pull of the bond. When others spoke of the insatiable need, I scoffed. Now I feel as if I should apologize to every vampire I did not believe.”

  She laughed, her earlier worry fading away as Sylvie emerged from a small alley on the far side of the square. A fountain burbled in the center of the piazza, this one in obvious disrepair. They slowed their pace as Evangeline looked up at the ornate sculptures of cherubs that watched from the tops of the tall buildings. “Is there anywhere in Rome that’s…plain?”

  Pressing a hand to his heart, Nic pasted a slain expression on his face. “Plain? Italians? Never.”

  Evangeline’s reply caught in her throat as her eyes widened and her terror punched Nic in the chest. Before he could turn, half a dozen gunshots rang out, piercing the calm of the afternoon.

  Across the square, Sylvie crumpled, her light gray jacket turning dark crimson as blood bloomed on her chest. Bayard threw himself at Nic and Evangeline and used his body as a shield, trying to rush them back the way they’d come.

  Nic felt the threat a split second before rough hands grabbed him, spinning him away from Evangeline as she screamed his name. Bayard grunted in his periphery, and as Nic doubled over and threw his attacker to the ground, he caught sight of his bodyguard wrestling with another black-clad vampire a few feet away.

  A punch sent pain radiating from his liver, and he stumbled. Evangeline elbowed a third vampire in the gut, broke his hold, and then kneed him in the groin. Nic leapt for her, but a fourth vampire burst from a side street at a full out run and tackled her, sending them both flying.

  “Evangeline!” Nic’s world shrank down to his life mate as the vampire held her down. She fought like a hellion, butting her head against his, freeing one arm and trying to scratch his eyes. “Let her go!”

  Raw fury consumed him so completely, he didn’t see his attacker stagger to his feet. The vampire snaked an arm around his neck and tried to cut off his air, but Nic grabbed the male’s wrist and squeezed so hard, several bones cracked in his grip. The vampire let out a strangled cry as his hold loosened.

  Spinning, Nic sent a quick jab to the man’s jaw. He pivoted and followed with a crushing right cross that sent the man to his knees. Weaving to escape a punch, he tucked and rolled, leaping to his feet and racing for Evangeline as her attacker grabbed her by the hair and slammed her head against the flagstones close to the fountain, then hauled her off her feet.

  “Do not touch her again,” he roared as he caught the scent of her blood. A shot to his left had him ducking, a quick glance confirming Bayard was on the offensive. Nic cut the distance between them to mere feet, but before he could reach her, electricity shot through his body.

  A second blast sent him into convulsions, his arms and legs refusing to obey his commands. The edges of his vision darkened, and through the black-rimmed tunnel of sight slowly closing in on him, he had to watch, helpless, as a tall, burly vampire jabbed a needle into Evangeline’s neck.

  Pure terror flooded over their bond as her eyes unfocused. As if in slow motion, she went limp, another vampire catching her before she hit the ground and throwing her over his shoulder.

  Sirens blared around him, and as his body trembled, the two sets of twin prongs sticking out of his neck sending fiery pain licking over his skin, a shadow fell, cutting off his view of his life mate being carried away.

  “Nicola Angliatti,” a deep voice said as he was flipped over, his arms were pinned behind his back, and silver cuffs snapped around his wrists. “You are under arrest.”

  “Evangeline,” he whispered, struggling against the cuffs. “Where are…you taking…?”

  “He is resisting,” the voice said. Before Nic could protest, someone kicked him in the ribs, and he could do nothing but watch as one of the vampires pressed a taser to his throat and pulled the trigger.

  22

  Sylvie’s first gulp of air tasted like copper. Coughing, she rolled onto her side, spitting up her own blood.

  “Drink.”

  Bayard. She couldn’t open her eyes, too weak to do more than part her lips as something small and hard pressed against her mouth.

  The sweetest taste she could imagine flowed over her tongue, and she swallowed, surged upwards, and grabbed onto hands holding a
glass vial.

  “Slowly. Do not choke.” Bayard’s refined voice irritated her. She wanted more. Needed more. Right fucking now.

  Slowly my ass.

  After her second swallow, she could open her eyes. A third, and she focused on his worried face, the fangs that rested on his plump bottom lip as he tried to breathe through his mouth, probably to stop himself from licking the vial clean. Briefly, Sylvie eyed the small glass tube and debated whether she should try.

  “It was enough?”

  “Yeah,” she rasped as she shuddered, the sensation of her body closing a bullet wound one she’d never get used to. “How’d you get E’s blood?”

  Bayard gestured over his shoulder. Vittoria stood with her hands clasped in front of her, dark circles under her eyes, clothes mussed. “He called me. I live outside of Rome.”

  Sylvie shoved away from Bayard and staggered to her feet, balling her fists. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

  “Saving your life,” Bayard said as he stepped between the two women. “I could not stop the bleeding. May I suggest we put any potential violence on hold until we find Nicola and Evangeline?”

  Willing her fangs to retract, Sylvie blew out a measured breath. “Fine,” she said sharply, taking a step back and tugging at her blood-soaked jacket and unbuttoned shirt. Fuck. Even her bra was red, wet, and squishy. Four bullet wounds—three in her chest and one in her side—now looked more like mosquito bites, and even the swelling was going down rapidly.

  “Where are we?” Fluorescent lights flickered overhead, and the industrial space was mostly empty. Dark gray concrete floors, a couple of windows with privacy shades towards the ceiling. Boxes of wine and grappa against one wall. She sniffed. Underground.

  Bayard ran a hand through his light brown hair. “The basement of a bar not far from the square. They are closed until 5:00 p.m. We should leave before then.”

  “How long was I out? I’ve been shot half a dozen times. Even silver bullets shouldn’t have taken me down that quickly.” Sylvie staggered over to the wall and braced her hand against the cool stone, angling a gaze out the window.

  “Almost an hour.”

  An hour? Shite. Given the weakness in her limbs, she’d been close to death, and Evangeline’s blood had probably saved her life. That, and Vittoria’s medical skills. A pile of blood-soaked gauze, a pair of forceps, and bullet fragments littered the ground where Sylvie had been only moments before. Snatches of whispered conversation, pain, and fear jumbled together in her mind as she rubbed one of the still-aching wounds.

  Returning her focus to the job, she huffed. “Do we know where Nic and Evangeline are? I thought I heard one of the big guys with guns say something about being with the Conclave before I passed out.” She rubbed the back of her head, finding blood in her hair, and wrinkled her nose. “Shite. I need a shower and a change of clothes before I can go anywhere.”

  Bayard rolled his eyes as if she’d just told him the sky was blue. “Nicola was arrested. From what my contact told me, he is—or will soon be—in the Conclave’s prison. They have already sentenced him to death.”

  “Fuck me. Why so bloody fast?” Sylvie patted her pockets. “And where the fuck is my phone?”

  “I do not know. But the sentence will be carried out in two weeks. They are,” Bayard shook his head, “studying him.” Passing Sylvie her phone, which now sported a giant crack across the screen, he glanced over at Vittoria. “If they take too much of his blood, he will be unable to avoid feeding.”

  “Merda,” Vittoria said quietly. “He could shatter the bond. I do not even know if he can survive on human blood any longer.”

  Sylvie stopped mid-text. “Explain.”

  Stripping off her leather jacket, Vittoria held it out to Sylvie. “Put this on. We must go. We cannot leave him there.”

  With a grimace, Sylvie stripped off her bloody clothes, including her bra, shrugged back into her shoulder holster, and tugged on the jacket. Bayard, who’d turned the second she’d pulled off her blouse, cursed under his breath. “You are scandaleux.”

  “I’m expedient. And bloody pissed off. Come on. We’re going back to the hotel. If we’re not compromised there, I need two minutes in the shower, a bag of blood, and the rest of my guns. Then I think we need to see about orchestrating a little jail break.”

  “There’s something else you should know,” Vittoria said as she followed Sylvie up the stairs, Bayard trailing behind them.

  Sylvie paused at the top, meeting Vittoria’s gaze. If the bitch tried anything, Sylvie would knock her on her ass faster than Vittoria could say “traitor.” But the woman’s bloodshot purple eyes reflected the pain of betrayal and loss. No one was that good of an actor. “Unless we’re walking into an ambush, tell me on the way.”

  23

  The silver cuffs bit into his wrists, sending sparks of pain racing up his arms. Nic struggled in the guards’ hold as they dragged him down the cold, stone steps of the Conclave’s prison. Terror coursed through him, Evangeline’s face…frightened, dazed, confused burned on the inside of his eyelids.

  He fought with all of his strength, but between the silver and the lingering effects of the taser blasts they’d used to subdue him, his struggles couldn’t have been more than a nuisance to the guards manhandling him.

  “My life mate was taken,” he growled. “Where is she? I demand to know why you arrested me. I have done nothing wrong.”

  “Murder,” one of the guards said as he cuffed Nic on the side of the head, sending him stumbling into one of the locked silver cells. “Now shut up.”

  “I’ve killed no one.”

  A swift punch to his solar plexus had him doubling over, but the guards didn’t stop, half-carrying him down the long, dark hallway past the cells and into the medical bay.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Nic asked as terror sank like a hard stone in his belly. He renewed his struggles, managing to catch on of the guards in the chin with the back of his heads, but two more vampires, dressed in the black uniform of the Conclave’s security force, rushed in and grabbed Nic’s legs.

  They hoisted him up on the exam table, strapping his ankles into leather cuffs infused with silver. He jerked at the restraints but couldn’t do more than rattle the chains that secured them to the table.

  Cursing in his native tongue, Nic tried to break free when they unlocked the handcuffs, but four against one, he quickly found his wrists clamped in similar restraints, and his shirt sleeve ripped up past his elbow.

  No. Not again.

  If they took his blood, he would soon be required to feed, and without…

  Merda. Evangeline.

  Where was she? What were they doing to her? He tried to sense her. If they’d brought her to the prison as well, he should be close enough. His heart thudded painfully in his chest as the bond flared, but he felt nothing but all-consuming emptiness. As empty as he’d felt when he’d been here just two days ago.

  “I demand to see my life mate,” he spat at the guards, but they ignored him.

  When Antonio entered the medical ward, followed closely by a vampire in a white lab coat, Nic snarled. “Vaffanculo. Sei un testa di cazzo, Antonio. You have no evidence against me. I did nothing wrong. Nothing but defend my own life and that of my life mate. I killed no one. Where is Evangeline? What have you done with her?”

  For a split second, Antonio’s eyebrow twitched, but then he turned to the doctor. “Take as much blood as you can. Feel free to sedate him if you need to.”

  “I know you have never liked me, stronzo, but I deserve an answer. Where is my life mate? I insist on speaking to Luigi. And a lawyer. Now.”

  “Luigi sent me to deal with you. He had other business. The Conclave met, and by unanimous vote, you have been sentenced to die by a silver blade to the heart. But as your unique genetic makeup is worthy of study, your sentence will not be carried out for another two weeks. We need to investigate the secrets Longo found in your blood.”

  Instin
ct had Nic straining, trying to keep his arm away from the needle as the doctor approached, but with four vampire guards in the room along with Antonio, whatever was left of his rational mind stilled his movements. He had to try to conserve his strength until he could call someone—anyone. Sylvie had gone down. Nic had seen the terror in her eyes and he feared she hadn’t survived.

  But Bayard…he might have lived.

  The needle slid into his vein, and within a few seconds, Nic started to feel the blood loss. “Please do not do this,” he managed. “We were never close, Antonio, but you are a reasonable man. Not one prone to…torture.”

  “This is necessary for the survival of our race.”

  “Are you bleeding Evangeline as well? She is human. Whatever her bastard of a father did to her, she is human.”

  “I know nothing about your life mate. Nor am I inclined to answer any more of your questions.” Antonio shook his head and pulled out his phone.

  “I saw her abducted,” Nic said, his voice fading as the blood loss took its toll. “Two vampires grabbed her, assaulted her, and dragged her away from me. They drugged her. Who else but your men? I know how much you wanted to study her blood.”

  Antonio snorted his disgust. “Her blood told us nothing. The secret apparently lies with you. We will find a way to replicate Longo’s research before your sentence is carried out. I am certain.”

  Nic watched helplessly as the doctor siphoned off two bags of his blood. The exam table leeched the heat from his body—or maybe that was merely the blood loss—and he started to shiver.

  Once the doctor pulled the needle from his vein, clamped the tube, and labeled the blood, Antonio moved to a small fridge. “Even prisoners have rights,” he muttered as he withdrew a sealed bottle of blood.

  “I will not take from a donor,” Nic said, hating the tremble in his voice as his fangs lengthened, the ache deep in his belly a hunger he could not ignore.