by Dale Mayer
Damn. She settled back to wait when a third vehicle, exactly the same color and model as the second one, came up behind her – too close behind her.
She grabbed her cell phone and sent a warning to Taz and gave him her location, and then she repeated the message out to her friends. She had no idea what was going on, but there was no room for error here. Not when she was carrying her precious baby.
And this baby was half vamp and half human. Something that many on both sides of that genetic marker might not like.
The driver’s door on the car in front of her opened and a huge vamp got out. She smiled, a feral sound coming from deep inside the back of her throat.
Let them come. They hadn’t met a wild Amazon vampire until they turned on a pregnant one. There were few pregnant vampires ever, and most hid away until the term was up. Not Sian. She’d done the same as Rhia. She’d walked around proudly. Screw her critics.
Now these assholes would see what happened when they threatened a baby vamp while the momma was still around to avenge the insult.
A second man got out of the truck in front on the other side. Then two men stepped out from the vehicle behind her. Her grin turned lethal.
“You’d better have sent more men than that or I’m going to be very insulted.” She glanced to the other vehicle parked beside her. Sure enough, there were two more men getting out of each vehicle.
Her cell phone beeped. She glanced down to see a text from Taz. We could use them alive to find out about Chelsea and Tobias.
Damn.
She frowned. Then a second one came in from him. They are after your DNA and that of the baby. Watch out for the drugs. I’m on the way.
Drugs. Her blood froze then shattered into icicles. That would hurt her child. And she’d kill both of them before she’d let them have her baby – or her baby’s DNA. She wasn’t sure how yet, but she knew this was likely the end of the line for her. She closed her eyes. Damn. She thought she’d have more time.
She quickly texted Taz. Just in case – I love you.
*
Jared waited impatiently for Taz to get off the damn phone and point them in a direction to move.
He stared out the window. Then heard shit.
He spun around, for the first time seeing the doctor’s face go sheer white and panic setting in. Instead of bolting out the door, he called someone else and immediately yelled into the phone, “Sian is a block away from the Council Hall. She’s been surrounded. Get help now.”
He’d hung up, but he was already halfway to the car. Jared raced to catch up, his own stomach churning. Jesus, was there no end to what these guys would do to one of their own? Sian was pregnant, for God’s sake. And then he considered how they’d view her baby in their eyes. As an abomination or a curiosity.
Taz jumped into the car. Jared threw himself into the passenger seat and was almost thrown out again as the powerful sports car took off. With his door flying open, Jared clicked the buckle in place. The door slammed shut as Taz ripped around the next corner.
His knuckles turned white as he clutched the seatbelt to his chest. He thought Taz had driven like a crazy man on the way to the hospital. Now he realized that had been Taz impersonating a senior on a Sunday sightseeing tour.
He swallowed as they screamed past a line of cars on the sidewalk.
“Holy shit,” he whispered, then he started a quiet prayer in his head.
Before he’d finished it, Taz had run two red lights, jumped the sidewalk again to pass someone going too slow, and came to an earsplitting stop in the middle of the road.
He was also out of the vehicle, his tracks a blank whirr of moving energy. Shaking and so damn glad to be alive, Jared forced his fingers to unlock their grip on the one safety line he’d been able to grab – his seatbelt. Still shaky, he made it out of the car, realizing more and more vehicles were screaming around them. Great, he was surrounded by vamps again. Shit. The only place he felt safe was with Taz. He didn’t know any of these vampires. And worse, it was nighttime. Nothing quite like it to make one feel more vulnerable.
He managed to make his way to the center of the vehicles and stopped.
Sian, the most ferocious look on her face, completely covered in blood, stood, spinning in a slow circle as if looking for more enemies. Jesus. Vamps were down and disabled around her, some dead and some still moving sluggishly.
Taz’s voice cut through the night, a caring, soothing sound that Jared had never heard. “Sian, it’s me, Taz. Take it easy, sweetheart. You’re safe. The baby is safe. Easy.”
A howl slid out of the back of Sian’s throat. Jared caught the blind look in her eyes. She didn’t know where she was or who was here. She’d gone into some animalistic mode and wasn’t hearing or seeing anything but danger.
Taz kept up the same soothing tone as he talked to her calmly and lovingly. As he walked toward his wife, Jared had to wonder how he could trust her in this space. From the heap of vamps – dead ones, maybe – he knew she’d been on a killing spree.
He’d known she was capable, but to see this kind of evidence in bloody clarity…yeah, that was a visual he’d be a long time forgetting.
“Sian,” Taz said, his tone sharper now, “It’s over. Come down from battle mode. Please.”
As if she’d been dipped in ice water and pulled back out, the shift in her demeanor was as startling as the shift in her circumstances. She dropped her head and closed her eyes. The crowd around him all sighed and the tension in the air cut back. It was over.
She was going to be okay.
“Taz,” Sian’s trembling voice said. “They wanted our baby to do experiments on.”
An angry murmur whistled through the place, and tension immediately spiked as everyone understood what this had been about.
“Maybe,” Taz said, his voice hard, edgy. “And they might have just said that to torment you.”
She shuddered, a long, bone-wracking movement that left her slumped in place. Taz immediately walked through the blood and took her into his arms. He held her close.
Cheers erupted around them.
*
The noise directed Wendy to the scene. Ian’s hand in hers, they’d raced out as soon as they realized something major had happened. With all the yelling back and forth, they’d gotten the gist of the situation. Now as cheers rang loudly around them, they realized that something good must have happened too, but what?
They squeezed through the black-thronged crowd until they got to the center.
“Jesus,” Wendy whispered in shock. Sian, held tenderly in Taz’s arms, was covered in blood, and so was the scene around them. The cars, the cement, everything was dotted with the stuff. And the vamps on the ground were in one large heap. A couple still moaned as they were tugged free of the pile. Good. She hoped the bastards paid for what they’d tried to do.
Then she realized something. “Hey, everyone, one more thing.”
Ian at her side looked at her in surprise. “Huh, Wendy?”
“No,” she said in a loud voice, “this is important.”
The other vamps ignored her.
She put her fingers to her mouth and blew a hard, loud whistle. Everyone stopped talking and looked at her.
“Not only were they after Sian and possibly her baby, but they were also after her DNA. This entire area is covered in blood. I realize,” she said, raising her voice, “that most of it is going to come from these sorry ass vamps, but Sian likely left some of hers behind as well. It needs to be cleaned up. These vehicles need to be impounded and decontaminated. Those assholes have enough of our heritage. They. Don’t. Get. More.”
She glared at the shocked surprise in everyone’s faces. At the same time, there was an understanding and a growing respect.
In a louder voice, she continued. “Our numbers are dwindling. Theirs are growing through artificial means using our genetics. They don’t get any of hers today.”
She waited a beat, then added in a harsh voice, “Understood?
”
There were loud shouts of agreements as everyone got to work.
“Wow,” Ian said. “I didn’t know you had that in you.”
“I didn’t either,” she said with a sigh. “But when a cause is worth it…”
“Well, I for one am grateful to you for thinking of that, Wendy.” Taz half-supported an exhausted Sian in front of them.
“So am I,” Sian said in a faint voice, “But if you’ll excuse me, I think I need to go lie down.”
“And stay down this time,” Ian said in exasperation, coaxing a laugh out of all of them.
Her smile wan but valiant, she said, “I plan to, but one of the men said something before…” She stopped and swallowed heavily. Several of the vamps cleaning up around them stopped and gathered around.
In a heavy voice, she said, “He said something about a secret weapon within that would destroy us all. And he couldn’t wait.” A dark rumble filtered through the crowd. “I didn’t give him the satisfaction of staying around that long.”
And damn if that look on her face didn’t make Wendy want to back up. She was seriously scary.
“But he never said what that weapon was?” asked Taz, his face creasing with worry.
She shook her head. “No. Just that we wouldn’t know until it was too late and that one of the ancient lines was now bad news.” She shuddered. “The laugh he gave was horrible. He knew something but wasn’t prepared to share.”
“There are a few men left alive. We’ll get it out of them.”
With a nod and a grateful smile, she started limping toward her car. “I could use a chance to rest.”
As Wendy and Ian walked over with them, Wendy watched as Sian looked around furtively. Realizing they were alone, Sian said, “I’m afraid it’s either Rhia or Jewel, considering they’ve both been drugged.”
Chapter 12
That laughter was something Tessa didn’t think she’d forget ever in her life – presuming she had a chance to live again past this point. Snaky and sly and freakin’ scary, so not a reassuring sound. And from Deanna, in the situation they were both in, not confidence building.
But that blast of energy as it slammed into her body had her gasping in fear. For the first time, she realized she just might be up against something she couldn’t handle.
“Damn right you are.”
Shit. Another blast came out from nowhere and picked Tessa up, slamming her to ground. She groaned, rolled over, and got hit again.
Okay, this was enough of this shit. She mentally placed a buffer around herself in this weird space. She could make them all disappear – except for Deanna, apparently.
From the center of that buffer, she dragged her body upward, watching warily as bolt after bolt hit the protective layer. Like what the hell? This was her mind. Not Deanna’s. It was Tessa’s world, and Deanna could take a hike. And given all that, why could she not make Deanna disappear like she could all the others?
“Because I’m stronger than you.” Deanna’s voice reverberated through the safe hollow Tessa had created for herself. “Besides, you invited me in.”
“In that case,” Tessa shouted, “consider yourself uninvited.” At the silence around her, she wondered if Deanna had left.
Then that nasty cackle came again. She was playing with Tessa.
“Deanna, this is my body. You behave or I’m going to kick you out of here.”
That same laughter warbled free, the sound echoing throughout the hollow cavern in her mind. Wait, what? What cavern? Tessa spun around in a fast twirling motion. She was alone, standing in the center of some kind of arena.
She was in a huge cave with a ceiling so high she couldn’t tell where it started or stopped. The floor was rock and the place was dark. Empty.
She shifted her vision, wondering that it made no difference. Then she understood that in her mind there was no difference because she could already see everything she needed to see.
She could also switch this up. If this was Deanna playing games, Tessa didn’t have to play with her.
This was Tessa’s mind. Her playground. She made the rules.
Deanna was the guest. And a shitty one at that.
She hated that sense of superiority Deanna wore whenever she brushed up against Tessa. As if she knew so much and Tessa would never get there. Yet Tessa owned all of Deanna’s memories, so in theory, she could absorb it at will, and that made her the superior one.
“Never.” The whisper was low and dark and purred forth on a growl.
Tessa’s back came up and she crouched down, ready for that insidious attack. She didn’t know if it was coming or not, but the sense of being hunted was inescapable. The predator and the prey. She hated it. She’d been there before and hadn’t planned to be there ever again, yet here she was. And worse, it was in the very core of her own soul.
How the hell did that work? And if Tessa worked energy, why was she feeling threatened?
Because Deanna worked energy too. And in a bigger, better way.
Bullshit.
That same laughter rippled around the cavern, scaring the crap out of Tessa, and that was half the problem. As long as Deanna had her on the run, she was winning this fight before it even started.
She need to put Deanna into defensive mode and get a little of her own back.
“Not going to happen, child.” The old voice was hard, brittle.
“There is no fight here, Deanna,” Tessa said as calmly as she could. “This is my space. You are about to get an eviction notice.”
She stepped out of her safe bubble.
A blast of white slammed into the side of Tessa’s body, picking her up and throwing her down several feet away. Sore but more pissed than hurt, Tessa bounded to her feet. She knew this was ridiculous. That damn bitch Deanna was attacking her in her own damn mind. How the hell could she? She still had so much power. Even though it was only residual energy, it had way more power when narrowed into a tightly focused stream than Tessa could ever hope to have.
Stop it, she screamed at herself. You’re thinking just the way she wants you to think. Don’t get sucked into that crap.
Besides, Deanna’s energy was in a limited amount and if she was too strong now, then Tessa could drain some of it.
Tessa didn’t know why she didn’t just turf Deanna out on her butt; maybe she cared about her vampire heritage more than she realized. And maybe she was terrified to discover she couldn’t turf the bitch out. Because really, how was she supposed to do that? Surely if that was easy it would have already happened. It wasn’t like Deanna disappeared when the others did.
Besides, there was information in there that was worth protecting. At least until she could download it onto something else.
Someone else.
That thought scared the crap out of her. Do to someone else what Deanna had done to her – no way. Not happening. She couldn’t physically or emotionally or ethically do that.
But there had to be a way to deal with Deanna. She raised the light inside the cavern. Instantly she could see the corners all around her. Deanna instantly lowered the lighting. Tessa grinned. That had to take up energy, too. Good. She raised the light again.
“We can do this all day if you want to,” Deanna smirked from the shadows.
Damn, really? She so hadn’t signed on for this. “What’s it going to take to have you disappear, Deanna?”
“Nothing you’ve got to give.”
Or did she?
How many times had she been put to the test and figured out the contest wasn’t about strength, or power even…but about inner strength, and as Tessa had found out – she had lots of that. And cunning. And a different way of looking at things. All things.
So if she couldn’t turf Deanna – and no, she didn’t know that she couldn’t – but it wasn’t her prime choice, but Deanna need to be stopped somehow. The filing system worked before for all Deanna’s knowledge, so maybe Deanna should have her own damn filing cabinet. A box all of her own. Made o
ut of something she couldn’t open or use power to put Tessa into her own damn box – one that Tessa could open if and when she cared to.
Would that work?
Hell yes it would. If she could create anything, then she wanted a prison to cage Deanna so she’d be there if Tessa needed her. Other than that, she’d be incapacitated.
Tessa built a steel box inside her mind, making it thick and strong and able to withstand Deanna’s blasts, and she kept it tucked out of sight in the back shadows of the cavern. Now if only she could coax Deanna inside and lock her up forever. Forget about coaxing her – that damn woman needed to be wrapped up in a tornado of Tessa and tossed inside.
As soon as she thought of it, a huge hurricane of energy whirled around her. Damn, that was good. She directed it toward Deanna, like a vacuum on steroids, and it sucked out everything in the cavern. Making sure it was a sealed unit, she proceeded to slam the vortex into the container and slammed the door shut.
She waited and listened. Nothing. Just lightness and a breath of fresh air. She grinned. It hadn’t been that bad. It just went to prove that Deanna was only a shadow of her former self and although her energy might still by feisty, she had little power to back up that attitude.
That should take care of the old bitch – forever.
*
Goran walked quietly through the hallways, realizing that these corridors were narrow and dark, resembling more of a passageway meant only for the maintenance guys who worked on the equipment rather than for actual patients or medical staff to navigate along. That gave him hope that Bart truly was heading for the other canister.
They needed both canisters. They should be able to test the contents at the Council Hall. And if he could ever catch a break and be able to slow down, he’d be able to send out a few text messages to catch up on some information.
Serus had already gone back to Cody and Tessa and had given regular updates as he made his way. The last thing anyone needed at this point was to get captured.
Now he was there – alive but busy. Or something like that. These last few weeks, there’d been more instances like that than anything he’d ever experienced before. It was like Serus had put him on hold.
