Rose frowned at her. “Now, nothing. You have me. You win.”
“Think, Rose,” Kara urged. “Your hands aren’t your only weapons.”
Rose looked down between them. She hooked her ankle around Kara’s ankle and pulled Kara’s legs out from under her. Kara fell backward, still holding Rose’s wrists, taking Rose with her. Unable to catch herself, Rose landed clumsily on top of Kara. And then, before she could react, Kara wrapped her legs around Rose’s waist and flipped them over. Kara leaned over Rose, her legs straddling Rose’s hips, and she pinned Rose’s wrists to the ground above her head.
“Good try,” Kara said, her lips curving into a smirk, “but I still won.”
Rose smiled. “Are you sure about that?”
Kara froze as the blade of a dagger suddenly pressed against her throat, held suspended in the air by an unseen force. A huge smile spread across her face as she looked down at Rose. “Yes! Yes!” she praised. “That was perfect!”
Rose laughed at her excitement, warmed by the pride she heard in Kara’s voice. Still using her telekinetic abilities, she pulled the dagger away from Kara’s throat and allowed it to float safely to the ground. Kara’s body shielded her face from the snow, but she could still hear the soft patter as the snow fell around them. Despite the bitter, cold weather, Kara’s body still felt warm against hers.
Kara released Rose’s wrists and climbed off of her. She offered her hand to Rose, and when Rose placed her hand in Kara’s, Kara jerked her up with so much force that Rose collided with her. “That was brilliant,” Kara praised.
Rose blushed. “Not really,” she argued. “And it’s not something I can count on being able to do all of the time. I’m not always in control of my power.”
Kara’s smile faded. “Don’t doubt yourself like that,” she said quietly. An emotion—empathy, affection, or concern, maybe…or maybe even all three—flickered in her light blue eyes, but she quickly hid it. “Insecurity is a weakness that you can’t afford to have, Rose. Alana won’t hesitate to use that against you.”
Rose stepped back. “I can’t help it,” she sighed. “I’m not like you.”
Kara tilted her head, studying Rose curiously. “What do you mean?”
Rose waved her hand at Kara, gesturing at the casual, easy way that Kara held herself. “You’re basically the picture of confidence, and I’m just…not.”
Kara stared at her for a moment, as if she were considering that. “I know who I am. I always have,” she said finally. “And I refuse to apologize for it.”
“Is that what you think I do?” Rose asked. “Apologize for who I am?”
“Yes,” Kara said bluntly. Her intense, blue gaze bore into Rose, piercing her to the core. “You apologize for everything about yourself, Rose. Except your intelligence, of course. That’s the only thing you have any real confidence in.”
Rose pursed her lips. She hated the fact that Kara could see through her so easily. “There are so many things that people don’t like about me,” she sighed.
“Who cares what they think?” Kara scoffed. She reached out and placed her hands on Rose’s arms, her touch light and gentle. “There is nothing wrong with who you are. I know you’ve been hurt, but you’re so much stronger than the ones who hurt you. No one can change who you are, Rose. Not even you.”
Rose looked away. “That’s easy for you to say,” she muttered bitterly.
Kara’s eyebrows lifted in disbelief. “You think so?” she laughed.
“I just mean,” Rose sighed, “you’re not awkward. You’re gorgeous. You’re completely in control of yourself. What is there not to like about you?”
“A lot,” Kara said. She shook her head in disbelief, a strand of wet, blue hair falling into her face. “You know…my father used to call me the daughter of Loki.” She laughed at the memory. “Because I caused so much chaos. I broke every rule, challenged every norm. My father would get so frustrated with me. He would say that Loki must have impregnated his wife…because I couldn’t possibly be his daughter. His daughter wouldn’t be such a troublemaker.”
Rose scowled. “That’s not a very nice thing to say.”
Kara shrugged nonchalantly. “I was a handful. He did his best.”
“You seem to have turned out all right,” Rose said, her brows furrowing.
Kara snorted at that. “I’m a female warrior. I’m crude and vulgar. And I like women,” she laughed, her eyebrows lifting. “None of those things were okay during that time period. People hated everything about me. And I didn’t care.”
Rose frowned. “I figured all Viking warriors were crude and vulgar.”
Kara laughed. “Right. Most of the warriors were,” she agreed. “But they were men. I was a woman. I was supposed to be a maiden.” She rolled her eyes at the ridiculous stereotype. “Women were supposed to be gentle and soft-spoken. We weren’t supposed to fight or speak crudely. We certainly weren’t supposed to love other women. Like I said, people hated everything about me.”
“They shouldn’t have,” Rose heard herself say.
Kara straightened, her eyes widening in surprise at the statement that had slipped out of Rose’s mouth. A soft, surprised smile curled at the corners of her thin, pink lips. She stepped forward, closing the space between them in one single step. Her cornflower-blue eyes softened affectionately. “Well, I don’t think anyone should hate anything about you. I think you’re perfect the way you are.”
Rose swallowed uneasily. “You don’t know me well enough to say that.”
“Yes, I do,” Kara stated assuredly.
The crackle of sticks breaking and rocks shifting beneath someone’s feet suddenly echoed through the cold, night air. Rose straightened, sweeping her gaze around the dark, moonlit cemetery, searching for the source of the sound.
“It’s just some vampires returning to the Tomb of Blood,” Kara assured her. “There will be vampires coming in and out all night. There always are.”
“Oh,” Rose said, relieved to know that’s all it was. “Right.”
Kara peered past Rose, as a group of vampires entered through the front gates. “You’re back awfully early tonight,” she called. “Is something wrong?”
Rose turned around, watching as three vampires approached—two men and a woman. All of them were gorgeous, of course, like all vampires were. The two men were dressed warmly, wearing heavy, fur coats and blue jeans. Clearly, they were better prepared for this weather than Rose was in her thin, black hoodie. The woman wore a thick coat, too, but it was merely draped over a short, red dress that showed off her ridiculously long legs. Rose’s nostrils flared as a faint, appealing, salty scent prickled at her senses. Human blood, she realized.
“Everything’s fine,” the woman said, her voice thickly accented.
“We just slipped out for a snack,” one of the men added.
“You have blood on your face,” Rose said to the man who had spoken.
The man dragged his hand across his face, wiping the blood from his lips. “Leftovers,” he chuckled as he licked the smudge of blood off of his hand.
Rose wrinkled her nose at the morbid joke.
“Did you see anything out of the ordinary?” Kara asked the vampires.
“No,” the third man said, shaking the snow out of his long, black hair.
“We should get inside,” the woman said suddenly. She shivered and pulled her coat tighter around her shoulders. “This weather is getting terrible.” She scowled at Kara’s thin clothing. “I don’t know how you can stand it in that.”
Kara shrugged dismissively. “I’m thick-skinned.”
Rose giggled at the unexpected word play.
As the three vampires walked past Rose and Kara, heading toward the entrance to the Tomb of Blood, Rose heard the woman speaking to the two male vampires, but the woman spoke in a language that Rose didn’t understand.
Kara turned to look at them, her eyes narrowing suspiciously.
“What language was she speaking?” Ro
se asked after they were inside.
“Swedish,” Kara said as she pulled her phone out of her pocket. “She must have assumed that I wouldn’t understand, but I can speak Swedish, too.”
Rose frowned at that. “What did she say?”
Kara looked at her. “She said that you’re the one with the red eyes.”
The blood drained from Rose’s face. “How does she know?”
Kara placed her phone against her ear. “My guess? Alana,” she said as she listened to the phone’s dial tone. She looked away when she heard Aaron answer. “Check the cameras,” she said into the phone. “The three vampires that are coming down right now. Vincent, William, and Isabelle. Do you see them?”
“Yes,” Aaron said on the other side of the line. “What about them?”
“Keep an eye on them,” Kara said. “I think they’re spies.”
“Okay,” Aaron grunted. A click echoed through the line as he hung up.
Kara slid the phone into her pocket and turned back toward Rose. “Alana knows about your abilities, doesn’t she?” she asked, her brows creased.
“Yeah,” Rose said uneasily, “and she’s seen my eyes turn red, too.”
Kara sighed and nodded. “She has people watching you,” she muttered. “Either she still hopes to sway you to her side, or she just considers you a threat.”
Rose shivered as an icy gust of wind blew around her. “I told her no.”
“Alana’s used to getting her way. She won’t give up that easily,” Kara said. She offered Rose a gentle smile. “Don’t worry. I won’t let her get to you.”
Rose scowled. “I already told you that I’m not holding you to that oath.”
Kara just grinned. “It’s getting cold. We should keep practicing your fighting skills. Unless, of course, you’d rather use our body heat to keep warm.”
Rose rolled her eyes at Kara’s relentless teasing. “Let’s keep practicing.”
—
Rose landed on her back, rocks and sticks digging painfully into her skin. All of the air rushed out of her lungs the moment she hit the ground, and for several moments, her lungs refused to inflate again. The snow-and-frost-covered ground felt cold and wet beneath her, but Kara’s body felt warm above her. Kara lay on top of Rose, one hand around Rose’s throat, and the other hand clutching Rose’s wrists. Her long body pressed hard against Rose, pinning Rose to the ground. Despite the pain and coldness that ached throughout her body, Rose was embarrassingly aware of how Kara’s body felt against hers, of how Kara’s thighs felt around her soft hips, of how Kara’s breasts felt against her breasts.
“I win,” Kara whispered, her breath warm against Rose’s face, “again.”
Rose laughed breathlessly. “Well, in my defense,” she said, wrinkling her nose at the snow that poured down around them, blanketing the cemetery, “I’m from the Land of Palm Trees. I’m not used to this mysterious, white stuff.”
The sound of Kara’s soft, breathy laugh caused a strange warmth to unfurl in Rose’s chest and flutter in her stomach. “Of course,” Kara chuckled. She climbed off of Rose. “I’m sure it has nothing to do with your mediocre skills.”
Rose sat up slowly, wincing at the pain and tenderness in her back. “You really don’t know how to go easy on someone, do you?” she complained.
Kara flashed a playful smile. “Vikings never show mercy.”
Rose allowed Kara to help her to her feet, shivering as an icy gust rushed around her, chilling her wet clothing. Rose’s hair had fallen out of its ponytail holder while they fought, and it hung around her face, drenched from the snow.
Kara placed her hands on Rose’s arms, feeling the cold, wet fabric of Rose’s jacket beneath her palms. “Your clothes are soaked,” she said worriedly.
“Yeah, that’s what happens when snow melts,” Rose said dryly.
Kara’s lips twitched at Rose’s sassy remark. She stepped back and tilted her head toward a small crypt beside them. “Let’s get you out of this wind.”
Rose crossed her arms tightly around herself, trying to keep warm. She followed Kara down the slippery, ice-covered steps into a small, concrete crypt. Kara held the heavy, unsteady door open as Rose stepped into the dark, dusty building. The inside of the crypt felt cramped, barely big enough to house the stone coffin in the center of the floor. The air inside felt cold and thick with dust, but as Kara closed them inside, the whistling of the brutally cold wind quietened.
Kara’s body bumped against hers, and Rose felt an instant warmth rush through her. “If you want to warm up, you’ll have to take off those wet clothes.”
Rose turned toward her, blushing at their closeness. “Nice try.”
Kara grinned. She squeezed past Rose, causing Rose to blush even more as their bodies pressed together. She shoved the stone slab off of the coffin, and leaned over, pulling out a few thick, wool blankets. She turned and draped the blankets around Rose’s shoulders as Rose leaned over and looked into the coffin.
Rose blinked in shock at the blankets and clothes inside. “Am I the only vampire around here who thinks that using a coffin for storage is a little morbid?”
“You really should take off the wet clothes,” Kara stated, her lips lifting into a flirty smirk, “and my intentions are only partially bad when I say that.”
“Partially,” Rose repeated, her lips twitching. She glanced down at Kara’s clothing. “What about you? Shouldn’t you take off your wet clothes, too?”
Kara raised an eyebrow. “Are you flirting with me, Rose?”
“You’d know if I was,” Rose said, blushing. “I’m very bad at it.”
Kara laughed at that. She patted her thighs, feeling the mostly dry leather beneath her palms. “The good thing about leather,” she said, smiling. “It doesn’t soak through.” She moved her hands to the bottom of her drenched, black tank top. “This, on the other hand, will have to go.” She took off her shirt.
“Oh my word!” Rose said as she spun around to face the other direction.
Kara looked up at Rose as she tossed her wet shirt aside and grabbed another shirt from the coffin. “You’re so shy,” she laughed, clearly amused by Rose’s unusual behavior. She trailed her gaze down Rose’s back, down to the wet blue jeans that clung to her curvy hips. “You have a nice ass, by the way.”
Rose squeaked in shock and spun back around. “Kara!” she scolded.
Kara offered her a guilty smile. “What? You turned around. I thought I was allowed to look,” she said playfully as she pulled the dry shirt over her head.
“You’re absolutely terrible,” Rose laughed. Her gaze suddenly drifted down to Kara’s right hip, as if it had a mind of its own. The tight, black leather pants hung low around Kara’s lean hips, and the thin, long-sleeved, black shirt that Kara wore rode up her stomach, revealing just enough skin for Rose to see that strange, beautiful flower on Kara’s right hip. “Tell me about your tattoo.”
Kara froze, her smile fading. “Which one?”
“The one on your hip,” Rose said softly. “The flower.”
Kara glanced down at the tattoo that curled around her hip, and she hooked her thumb under the waistband of her leather pants, tugging the pants lower, revealing the entire multicolored flower and a hint of black lace beneath her pants. She smirked as she heard Rose’s pulse suddenly spike. “This one?”
Rose swallowed uneasily. Despite the freezing weather, she suddenly felt extremely overheated. “Yes,” she said nervously. “What kind of flower is that?”
“It’s a legend,” Kara said, smiling at the sight of Rose’s flushed cheeks.
Rose licked her lips, trying to soothe their sudden dryness. She silently assured herself that her lips were dry because of the cold and not because of the gorgeous woman in front of her. “I’ve never seen a flower like that,” she said.
“No one has,” Kara stated, “according to the legend.”
Rose pressed her back against the cold, concrete wall behind her, the blankets sliding down he
r arms. They still stood so close to each other, and the scents of violets, leather, wet skin, dust, and ice swirled around her head, intoxicating her. She watched as their breath turned white between them, like smoke. She listened to the steady beat of Kara’s heart. “What legend?” she asked.
Kara’s intense, piercing gaze shifted down toward Rose’s lips, and since her eyes were such a light shade of blue, it was glaringly obvious when her eyes dilated, growing wide and dark with desire. “Once, on a raid with my father and his men, I met a beautiful woman. She lived in the mountains, and she was the storyteller of her village. Each week, when their village would gather around a huge fire at the base of the mountains, she was the person who would tell their legends. It was a very important job.” She sighed pleasantly. “Sometimes, we would curl up in bed together, and she would tell me those stories. There was one story that meant more to her than any of the others, and she believed that story would mean a lot to me, too. Because she and I were both…different.”
“You both liked women,” Rose assumed, her voice breathless.
“Yes,” Kara confirmed. “Her favorite story was the story of a flower—the rarest and most beautiful flower to ever exist. It was said among her people that one look at this flower would lighten the darkest of souls, make the saddest of people smile, heal a broken heart, and give an outcast a sense of belonging.”
“That’s pretty impressive for a flower,” Rose commented.
“But this flower was different from the other plants,” Kara continued, “and the plants didn’t like the fact that it was different. The other plants didn’t see the beautiful uniqueness of the flower. They were blinded by its differences. They saw it as wrong. So, the plants began to grow over it and smother it until the flower was forced to either flee or die. The flower left, but everywhere it went, it encountered the same problems. It was hated by all, and its beauty was smothered. Until finally, in its last moments of desperation, the flower found a place on a high mountaintop, beneath a blanket of snow, in a miserable place that no one would survive, and it blossomed there. It blossomed in the harshest conditions, in conditions that no other plant was strong enough to handle. But you see, this flower had grown strong through its persecution, and because of that, it could survive anything. So, it blossomed all alone. No one would ever see its beauty again, but that didn’t matter to the flower. Because the flower was finally free to blossom. Free to thrive. According to the legend, that mysterious flower still blossoms somewhere today, all alone, in the harshest of places.”
The Tomb of Blood Page 37
