Amelia Elias - [Guardian's League 02] - Outcast
Page 30
The Slayer spun in place and slashed down with one sword. There was a ringing impact and Caen shook with fury as the bolt ricocheted harmlessly away.
The fledgling didn’t even flinch.
Gunshots shattered the night as the woman with them fired in his direction, tracking his roar and the course of the bolt. The Slayer’s head snapped his way and Caen ran as one of the bullets nicked his hip. He ignored the pain and kept a wary eye on his nemesis.
And suddenly, impossibly, the Slayer vanished.
Caen stumbled, certain his eyes had played a trick on him. No one could vanish. Vampires altered their form or flew or moved with inhuman speed, but they did not vanish. He didn’t dare look away, trying desperately to figure out the puzzle before it was too late.
He looked up just in time to see the Slayer shimmer out of nothing right in his path. Caen threw himself to the side, dropping the crossbow and narrowly avoiding the first vicious swing of those swords. He rolled and came up with his own sword in his hands even though he knew he had lost every advantage. “Damn you!” he shouted, charging in furiously.
The Slayer only smiled. “I am not the one who is damned.”
He deflected Caen’s first flurry and slashed back with a vicious assault of his own. Caen parried with more difficulty than he liked, constantly looking for another opening.
Finding none.
“I am not the one who kills for the temporary pleasure of the sun on my face,” the Slayer went on in the same calm, emotionless voice, and Caen snarled at him. The bastard wasn’t even out of breath as he drove Caen back, forcing him closer to the building and cutting off his retreat. He swung down with all his might, hitting one of the Slayer’s swords right at the crosspiece, but he didn’t even seem to notice the blow which should have numbed his hand and forced him to drop the weapon.
“I am not the one who hides behind a woman,” the Slayer taunted, and suddenly the pace of his attacks sped up. Caen parried desperately but the blades found his flesh again and again, small wounds that weakened him as he bled and let him know the Slayer was just playing with him now.
“You killed my Clan!” Caen growled, enraged by the Slayer’s calm while he methodically cut him again and again.
“You attacked my mate,” the Slayer shot back, and now there was emotion in his voice. Fury. The promise of death shimmered in his black eyes. “She is my Clan, and three times now you have tried to kill her. Do you honestly think I would let you live?”
Caen never saw the final strike. A piercing agony stabbed through his chest. He looked down in disbelief at the Slayer’s sword buried in his flesh as his own dropped from his suddenly nerveless fingers. “No,” he whispered.
Eli planted his foot in the Outcast’s stomach and wrenched the sword free as Caen’s life bled away. He closed his eyes, unable to feel any triumph as he remembered Renee’s horror the last time she’d seen him kill. He wasn’t as emotionless as she’d thought that night. Every time he was forced to destroy another vampire, he ached. They were all his children, even the dark ones.
But then he heard Renee’s footstep behind him and felt her arm slide around his waist. “It’s all right,” she whispered, her other hand encircling his around the hilt of the sword and not flinching away from the blood staining the blade. “It’s over now, Eli. Let it go. He isn’t worth your pain.”
He turned and wrapped his arms around her, grateful beyond measure for her understanding. “I’m sorry you had to see me kill again, little one.”
“Don’t be,” she replied at once. “You saved me. I love everything you are, Eli.”
He kissed her softly before looking up to find Sian watching them. “Are you all right?”
She shrugged and glared down at the gun still in her hand. “I think I need to get back to the firing range. My aim stinks. I didn’t even wing him and I was shooting to kill.”
“You winged him,” Eli reassured her. “And you shouldn’t have to kill.”
Sian narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t you dare go getting all macho on me like Diego. I still have several rounds left and you know I’ll use them.”
Renee raised her head and looked up at him. “You know if she shoots you again I’ll have to kill her, and Diego would probably get upset. How about laying off the machismo for a few minutes?”
Eli raised an eyebrow as Sian laughed. “Yeah, that could happen. The weather report said nothing about hell freezing over, Renee.” Then she grinned at Eli. “Before you whisk your woman away and lock her in the house, she bought a prime distraction you wouldn’t want her to forget.” She raised her hand and Eli’s eyebrows rose when Renee blushed scarlet at the sight of the bag hanging from Sian’s fingers. Eli reached for it but Renee snatched it first.
“Thank you, Sian,” Renee said, glaring and red-cheeked.
Sian’s grin didn’t waver as she glanced back up at Eli. He held Renee close to his heart, swords still out, and if she saw how his hands shook at the close call, she didn’t comment on it. “She humanizes you a bit, you know. You needed it. Big time.”
He laughed in spite of himself. “Thank you, Sian.”
She holstered her gun and dusted off her hands. “My work here is done. Now I need to go shock Diego with the credit card bill. Later.”
Eli bent to nuzzle Renee’s ear as Sian walked back to her Ferrari with a wave. “I could use some distracting,” he said, remembering the last store he’d watched them go into and very much hoping the little bag held what he thought it did.
She clutched it closer but arched her neck, leaning in to his caress. “Take me home and I’ll see what I can do.”
Amelia Elias
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