by Marata Eros
But Murphy appears to have taken a personal interest in me that goes beyond just acquisition and transfer.
He healed my small scratch from the box cut. I felt his sexual power swirl around me, my body responding. The best thing was my headache and nausea pulled away so I could think. Not that I was doing a lot of that.
Now he's leading me out of here, making our way to the safehouse.
Murphy's hand binds me. Sealing our heartbeats, seamlessly matching them. I know, because the pulse in his neck keeps time with mine.
He takes me away from his side and puts me behind him.
His eyes tighten, body tensing. “Hold back, love,” he says as I plow into his broad back.
“Why hello, Enforcer Murphy,” I hear a deep voice rumble.
I glance over my shoulder. Toby's large eyes meet mine, and his thumb is jammed in his mouth.
“We're not acquainted, mate.” His grip on my hand tightens and he pulls me deeper behind his body.
The hard muscles along Murphy's spine stiffen under the grasp I keep on his shirt.
My heart batters wildly inside my chest.
“No need,” the melodic voice goes on, pulling something low in my center.
A soft moan escapes, and a ripe headache attacks my temples. I press my forehead into the enforcer's back, nausea rolling through my stomach and rising.
“I feel the female hiding behind you.” He adds softly, “Her suffering.”
Murphy is still. He's so still that if I weren't holding onto him, I wouldn't know he was present.
“And the sooner I get her to safety, the sooner she can be transitioned.”
“What the fuck is this?” Sondra says from behind me.
Fearless.
“Quiet,” Murphy rumbles, his voice traveling through my skullbones and reverberating in my body.
But I could have told him that'd never work. Sondra takes matters in her own hands. “Nope. This nitwit bigfoot is not touching Grace.”
My head clears. “Bigfoot?” I whisper, sliding my head around Murphy's back to take a cautious peek.
A huge ape-like man stands about two meters away, facing us. Two others flank him.
He bares his teeth at Murphy, and a hiss erupts.
Fangs.
“Oh-no, girlfriend. These,” she wags her finger between the three ape-shifter guys, “are not going to be transitioning you. No gorilla for you, girl.”
“Agreed,” Murphy says.
The leader's eyes find mine, then they go to his friends. “Get the boy and the life-bringer.”
“It's a death sentence to interfere with an enforcer's task,” Murphy states with quiet confidence. “You have been duly warned.”
The leader's slowly spinning amber eyes fix on Murphy. “You hold no jurisdiction over me, cousin.”
What? Murphy's somehow related to this guy? Besides being terrified, I'm now officially confused.
I take the leader in, head to toe. Nearly seven feet tall, his hulking brow ridge protrudes over glowing eyes and high, prominent cheekbones. Fierce intelligence and deadly intent radiate from his gaze as he rakes the assembled with deliberate calculation. Downy dark brown hair skates over the exposed flesh of his body. Heavily knuckled and long, dextrous fingers cinch and release. Thick ropes of muscle make up his legs and arms as they swing opposite each other, readying for an attack. The only garment he wears is some kind of soft black pants that hide nothing. My eyes scan his naked chest, see the muscle there and I grip Murphy tighter.
His flinty scrutiny departs as he makes a sharp ascending chirping whistle at the other two. The noise is nearly bird-like.
If birds could sound like menace.
“Toby, come here,” Sondra says.
I back away from Murphy and he lets me go, crouching protectively in front of us.
Two of the ape men come forward while the leader shifts his slowly revolving gaze back to me, like a gun sighted on a target.
Murphy's calm, acting as though he's waiting for a dance partner instead of an assault by ape shifter.
The first ape guy reaches him and I suck in a gasp.
He towers over Murphy, though I know the bounty enforcer is well over six feet.
The ape men are so much taller.
“Bring it, Murphy!” Sondra shouts and I back up further.
Murphy looks like he needs the room.
Ape number one stretches out with an impossibly long reach and Murphy captures his wrist, using the shifter's momentum, he twists, dumping him in a slow tumble over his outstretched leg.
The shifter spins into the fall, hitting his palms on the ground a split second before his face.
Number two hits Murphy in a dead run before he can fully right himself.
Murphy swings his arms up and slaps his palms together over the shifter's ears.
He howls and Murphy ducks as he sweeps toward him. The ape's arms catch air.
Murphy blurs to the leader, who stiff arms him, palm to nose.
Blood sprays from Murphy's face.
I scream, feeling his pain as if it were my own as tears begin to leak out of my eyes.
His head snaps back as the leader hits him again. Murphy's knee hits the ground.
I begin to move forward. I know I can't help but I can't watch the enforcer get hurt because of me.
Hand extended, Murphy seizes the leader's balls.
He bellows into the night.
I halt, cringing at the sound.
Pedestrian traffic begins to converge around us.
“Grace!” Murphy yells.
I grab Toby, with Sondra on the other side, and we jog past the two struggling ape men, half-carrying Toby. We rush toward Murphy as a hard rain boils down on top of us, obscuring my vision.
The leader writhes on the ground and fear sinks its talons deep.
Murphy stands, appearing completely unfazed. “Take my hand, love.”
I blink up at him, rain coating my eyelashes.
His voice is muffled, his nose cruelly lurching to the side.
I grab his palm, the immediate connection I noticed before reestablishing between us.
“Your nose,” I choke, feeling guilty for the gore of his face—knowing it was for my benefit.
His crooked smile is brief. “Nevermind love, it's a flesh wound—let's go.”
I catch a blur in my periphery vision and with a grunt, Murphy goes down, hitting the sidewalk hard.
I whirl. But as escapes go, it's not in the cards.
“Run!” Murphy hollers from the ground.
I don't move. I tighten my hold on Toby and turn. Sondra understands and releases him.
The huge figure of the leader looms over me and my vision dims further. His body forces the rain back, and it sheets off the side of his body, drops falling at my sides.
Toby's weight keeps me grounded in the now. I won't quit and leave him.
Sondra comes between the huge shifter and us, bringing her knee up almost to chest height in an attempt to nail his balls.
He shoves her without looking, a tightening of his eyes is the only indication she made contact with his injured crotch, as though it was a bee sting instead of a blow to the nuts.
Our eyes meet.
“I am taking you, life-bringer. You're far too rare for the vampires.”
I vehemently shake my head, squeezing Toby tight. “Don't hurt us,” I whisper.
“Ah!” he hisses whipping his head behind him.
Murphy's latched on to the back of his ankle with his fangs.
“Do not make me kill you, Enforcer.”
Their gazes lock. Talons burst from Murphy and he swipes a path at the back of the leader's hamstrings while tearing a chunk from the back of his leg.
Murphy spits out the piece of flesh, hissing. Venom drips and I back away.
The leader sinks and I launch Toby over my shoulder and jog in the opposite direction.
I pass Sondra but she's already getting to her feet.
Footsteps pound after me.
I don't turn to see who's behind me. Toby bounces on my back.
Oh no, oh no.
They grow closer.
“Grace!” his small voice shatters the air like broken glass.
I'm popped off my feet from behind and I instinctively stranglehold Toby's body against mine.
It's not Murphy, there is no connection as though the heat of my blood cools because of his touch.
The ground falls away and for a few seconds, we're weightless then I'm in a tree.
The leader growls, “Hold the boy—I cannot save you both.”
I smell woods and burnt cinnamon and fresh earth all around me—and realize it comes from my kidnapper.
He doesn't smell like an animal, or the bigfoot Sondra called him—but a man. Wild and untamed, but still male. My intellect tells me it's not possible, but my senses wouldn't lie. I'm petrified and scattered but that's the one truth my nose is telling me.
I grip Toby, because we're twenty feet above the ground. The shifter's long arm extends and the leader leaps.
I shut my eyes so hard they hurt. Air and rain slap my skin as we swing without a tether through the night.
“Grace,” Toby whispers against my chest, both arms around me.
“Shh.” My voice shakes, cooling sweat chills against my skin, rain washing the proof of my fear away.
“Grace!” Sondra yells from below us.
My eyelids snap open, a hot tear mixing with the cool rain as it makes a lonely path down my cheek.
The trees are a dark green smear behind us, cars appearing to crawl like metal ants below. People point upwards and the dots of their bodies grow smaller as, tree after tree, we sail further from Sioux Falls.
Grace, I hear in my head.
Vertigo assails me as we seem to float through the night then jar onto another branch before leaping again.
Enforcer Murphy? I squeeze my eyes more tightly shut, willing to hear him again.
Wind rushes past me and I feel the leader's warm, sure hands on my body, holding me like precious cargo.
I'm coming for you, blood of my blood.
I chance a glance behind us, the fingers that hold me prisoner tightening, Toby squished between me and the leader.
A blur of flesh, bone and speed bears down. Gaining.
Murphy.
THE END
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★★★Coming soon★★★
FINAL ENFORCEMENT
A Vampire Alpha Claim Bigger-Bite® Novella
Volume 8
*If you enjoyed VAC 7-Final Enforcement, please consider posting your thoughts HERE, and help another reader discover a new series. Thank you!
***Please read on for a sample of another TRB work....
THE REFLECTIVE
A Reflection Series Novel
Book 1
New York Times Bestselling Author
TAMARA ROSE BLODGETT
All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2013-14 Tamara Rose Blodgett
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system without the prior written permission of the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
www.tamararoseblodgett.com
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Cover art by Phatpuppyart.com
Editing suggestions provided by Red Adept Editing
Synopsis:
Those born Reflective are the only beings with the ability to jump between worlds. With The Cause firmly entrenched by years of highly stylized military-type training in combat of every kind, they use their natural born ability for inter-dimensional travel to police worlds where wrongdoing has overtaken civility.
As an elite Reflective, Jeb Merrick finds himself partnered with a rare female Reflective. Merrick is convinced that she can do nothing but slow him down. Beth Jasper is small, in both stature and mindset. When they are thrust together as partners, Merrick vows that she will receive the same neutral treatment as a male. Merrick cannot allow the unlikely union of Beth Jasper to get in the way of finding his prophesied soulmate.
Beth discovers she is partnered with the cockiest of all pureblood Reflectives and struggles to maintain her composure with a hostile partner whose loyalty she doesn't possess.
Can the Reflectives uphold The Cause, reach a point of compromise and find their chosen soul mates?
THE CAUSE
First: Right the Wrong
Second: Bear No Injustice
Third: Change Not What Must Be
Prologue
twenty years before
The midwife made her way along ancient cobblestoned streets, her shoes catching in the crevices though Principle knew, her shoes were as sensible as they come.
As was her occupation.
She would arrive in the birthing ward at exactly eight a.m. for her twelve-hour shift. Of course, it would not be twelve hours—it would be for however long the woman labored.
And if a Reflective were born ....
Just the thought of the potential for that caused a nervous thrill to flutter deep within Florence, as it did each time she worked.
The Reflective newborns must be swaddled in special non-reflective blankets. A baby would not be lost on her shift because it was a prodigy who jumped at a mirror or other reflective surface left uncovered.
Dear Principle. She shuddered, thinking about what the punishment would be for that. As it was, midwives couldn't use any surgical instruments that were not brushed stainless steel, and since the last unfortunate incident, the midwives had since moved to an all-ceramic surgical unit.
Florence swept up the massive steps. The rise of the treads was so low the stairs felt more like a gentle slope than true steps.
The sparkling flakes of charcoal that clung to the thick white granite reminded her that the sun still shone brightly, though their version of autumn would soon be here.
A shadow fell over Florence, and she twisted to look at the sky, her foot on the top step, her hand on the solid brass door handle that opened to the birthing center.
A swarm of butterflies, so thick it blocked the cerulean of the sky, dropped false night all around her as they flew through the rectangular vents that fed the ventilation system in warmer months.
The ports were a deliberate architectural feature that allowed entry to the only creature in their world that could identify a Reflective
So many.
Florence stood in stunned wonder. She had witnessed butterflies come to mark the birth of a Reflective, but never in such a great number.
Their importance was such that her world was named in their honor: Papilio, Sector Ten.
Their path created a rainbow of iridescent color, which poured like water through the narrow vents that had been carved in the solid stone of the birthing center.
All who lived in their world were born in similar structures.
However, Florence was one of few birthing center workers who had seen the highest incidence of Reflective births. She had requested placement to this one. After a five-year waiting period, she’d been assigned to the most prestigious.
She snapped out of her reverie as the last of the mingling kaleidoscope of insects funneled through the slits underneath the eaves of a copper roof, now aged a deep verdigris.
Florence tore open the heavy door.
She didn't hear it clank behind her as she ran the length of the corridor to the floor that housed laboring mothers.
*
Florence burst through the swinging doors as a man and a woman stood over a cradle.
<
br /> Confused, Florence skidded to a stop.
What is this?
This... appeared to be the parents in front of a babe so new that some of the vernix still coated the wee one, her arms swinging as she howled.
Two nurses, one at the end of her shift and one in training, hung back.
Oh, for the love of all that is good. She stalked over to the newborn.
Florence halted as the sight overtook them all.
Their breath.
Their thoughts.
Everything but the scene itself melted away for those who witnessed the post-birth spectacle.
The butterflies descended, floating in a lazy spiral as the opalescent sunlight washed over their multicolored wings.
The chubby arms of the baby girl swirled and pumped, slowing as the butterflies drew nearer, and her echoing screams gradually grew quiet.
The insects lighted on the rails of the basinet in a portentous group, their wings moving in a steady sweep to maintain balance.
Their appearance froze the parents’ breath in their throats.
The moment swelled and grew in the stillness of the nursery, where rows upon rows of cradles pressed against the other. The parents watched the butterflies flutter precariously on the polished sides of the newborn's bed, landing only on hers and no other.
Their appearance was beautiful… final.
Florence strained to hear the mother's voice.
“She is Reflective,” she said in a sorrowful tone.
Her mate squeezed her hand so tightly her knuckles turned white.
“Yes,” he replied, just as gravely.
Their gaze met in perfect understanding of what the future held for their daughter: a life as mercenary, hunter and hunted.
This was an honor and privilege among their people.
Florence closed her eyes in sympathy. A female Reflective—every parents dream… and nightmare.
*
