by Rye Brewer
Allonic’s eyes glowed with rage, and his dark skin was covered in bruises. There was a metal headband on his head, and metal shackles on his wrists.
Tears stung behind my eyes, but I held them back and pretended not to care even as I screamed inside. When did they get him? How?
It was all my fault.
The girl next to me jumped up, along with a few of the others.
“He’s a shade!” one of them screamed as they pushed away from the table. “He’s dangerous! Get him out of here!”
Lucian never flinched. “There is no problem,” he said, holding up a hand to silence them. “He’s no danger. That headband, those shackles? They are created from cold-forged iron. He cannot cast a portal or send out one of his spiritwalkers to possess any of us. He’s harmless—even the strongest shade cannot fight cold-forged iron.”
Allonic stopped glaring at Lucian and looked the rest of us over, one by one.
I held my breath.
Would he let them know he recognized me? What would happen if he did?
His eyes traveled over Landon before falling on me.
We stared at each other for the briefest of moments before he glanced at the girl next to me. His face never indicated he knew me.
I felt weak with relief for myself, and fear for him.
“What are you doing here?” Lucian asked. “How did my men capture you?”
Allonic didn’t flinch. It was like he never heard the question.
I was proud of him on the one hand. I knew he wouldn’t break down or give Lucian the satisfaction he craved.
On the other hand, I didn’t want to imagine what Lucian would do to him if he didn’t answer. He was cruel.
Only I knew how cruel he could be. No, not just me. Valerius knew, too.
“You don’t like to speak,” Lucian observed, studying the remaining blood in his goblet. “Perhaps you could be coaxed into giving me the answers I desire?”
He turned toward Allonic again, but Allonic kept his eyes trained on the wall above Lucian’s head. He didn’t flinch.
Lucian’s smile faded as he gave a short, quick nod to one of his men.
Suddenly, an iron blade appeared and cut through the air. It cut through Allonic, too, slicing into his shoulder.
He let out a roar of pain that made my heart seize—and revealed his fangs.
The entire room gasped almost in unison.
Lucian sputtered. “A vampire?” he gasped.
26
Gage
It took a whole week, but she came back. I reminded myself I wasn’t waiting for her—I was supposed to be staking out the club to learn whatever I could about the Euro-shifters—but it was still a rush, seeing her again.
She was as beautiful as I remembered.
I struggled to keep from warning her against the club. If I ran across the street and told her not to go inside, I would blow my cover.
No way the shifters who called it home would let me get away with a second encounter—I was lucky the guy who had threatened me hadn’t come after me for taking away his toy. I hadn’t been watching them for a week to blow the whole thing because a girl was walking into a stupid situation.
Okay, truth be told, she wasn’t just any girl. But still… I was on assignment.
Why was she going in there again? I couldn’t figure it out. She knew it was bad news. She knew that shifter would’ve hurt her if I hadn’t been there to save the night. Why would she put herself in that situation, then? And alone? Her friends weren’t forcing her to join them anymore.
I didn’t want to go out on a limb and think she might be looking for me, but it was a possibility. I wished I could’ve told her there was no way I would ever go inside.
It would be my fault if anything happened to her. My heart was in my throat as she climbed the steps and went inside.
The usual shifters walked in and out. I had gotten used to seeing them every night. They were with a different human girl every time, too. Never the same girl twice.
I wondered what happened to the girls they slept with once it was all over. My skin crawled at the thought of what that had to be like—I didn’t care how suave they appeared on the surface. They were still animals underneath.
Carissa. She was in there with them, and they were checking her out and probably plotting ways to use her. I should’ve gotten her number. I could’ve texted her, asked her to go somewhere else with me. I could give up a night of watching the club if it meant keeping her safe. I could only stand here and hope everything went well inside. Nothing would happen to her in there, I decided—not around so many people.
When she came out, I would go to her.
I was surprised when two hours passed before she came out. What had she been doing in there all that time?
She stumbled a little as she came down the steps, too. Had she been she drinking? Did somebody give her something?
I decided to get her attention—but then, somebody followed her.
It was him. The one from the other night.
I clenched my teeth and decided to watch instead of taking a chance right in front of the club. Across the street was one thing, but I would be tempting fate if I started trouble outside the entrance.
I couldn’t hear them, but I could read her body language—the way she shrank back as he moved closer. She was scared to death.
What was he saying to her?
A group of girls walked past on their way into the club, and she slipped away from him, following them inside like she was one of them.
“No! Wrong direction,” I whispered from my spot in the shadows. If she had crossed the street, the way she did the first night, I could’ve helped her without risking a bloodbath.
The shifter, meanwhile, walked down the alley next to the club and disappeared. I guessed he was going in through the rear entrance.
I wished again I could send her a message, tell her to leave then and there while he was at the back of the club. I would take her anywhere she wanted to go. I would even apologize for disappearing on her the way I did and promise to make it up to her. Instead, I stood there with my eyes glued to the door, barely breathing as I waited.
Maybe twenty minutes passed before she came out—only she wasn’t alone. There was a bouncer on either arm, and they were obviously shifters. She was fighting, trying to get somebody’s attention. They shoved her into a car with tinted windows and closed the door. Not a cab, I was sure.
Where were they taking her?
Only one way to find out.
I took off after the car, coursing when I needed to. I was even willing to do that in public if it meant keeping up with her. Not that the humans noticed—it was amazing how they could ignore what was happening right under their noses, especially when they were drunk.
The car left Manhattan and headed out to an industrial area. It was a sketchy part of town, trash-strewn and desolate. The smell of garbage and rot mingled together and dazed me a little.
I couldn’t afford to lose my focus on that car. It was the only car in the area, so it wasn’t hard to spot as it wound through narrow, broken streets bordered on either side by warehouses and abandoned factories.
When the car slowed, I stopped at a distance and watched as it pulled into the garage of what looked like a warehouse. The door slid closed once the car was inside,
I coursed the rest of the way to the warehouse and pressed myself against the wall, deep in shadow. I couldn’t hear much coming from inside.
There was a row of windows to my right with light coming from them—the glass was frosted to keep private what happened inside, but I still caught a glow filtering through. I slid along the wall and ducked under the first window then peered inside.
It was blurry thanks to the film over the glass, but I could make out bright lights hanging from the ceiling. Carts full of what appeared to be medical supplies. Test tubes, scales, computers. Beds. Monitors.
What the hell was going on in there? It resembled a lab or a
hospital. Maybe a cross between the two. Were they doing experiments in there? Why did they want Cari?
There was no movement inside, though the car Cari was in had just driven inside. Where had they gone?
I had a choice to make. Either leave to get help or go in on my own. There was a chance nobody would help me, at least not right away—Jonah would want to think things through, understand who ran the place and what they were doing and whether it was a good move for us to put our necks out.
By that time, Cari could be dead. I wouldn’t take that chance. I had to go in alone.
I snuck around the outside of the building, searching for a way in. There was a rusty door around back that looked like it hadn’t been used in years—and the hinges screamed in protest as I opened it.
I glanced around to see if anyone alerted to the noise, but nobody showed themselves. Like the place was deserted. How was that possible?
Inside, the warehouse seemed even more sterile and unsettling than it did through the window. Everything was unused, the beds were empty, but there were any number of things that could be done with all the equipment. I never would’ve guessed the Euro-shifters were up to something on that level. I thought they were screwing around, making money off their club, and scaring young girls.
I had to find her before it was too late.
The scent of shifters overwhelmed me much as the garbage had outside.
I was glad I didn’t have a particular odor, like they did. They wouldn’t be able to pick me up as easily as I picked them up. I tried to pinpoint her scent, but it went in and out, wrapped up in theirs. I focused as hard as I could while I tiptoed through the silent warehouse.
There were rooms off to the side, which I imagined had been offices at one point. They had to be in one of those, or all of them. I started with the one closest to me and worked my way down the line. Her scent wasn’t any stronger. Where had they taken her? What were they doing?
I came to a long, dark hallway with a door at the end, and, suddenly, her scent hit me like a truck. the same way it had the first time I sensed her nearby. She was there. At the end of the hall. I didn’t know if she was alone, but I had to take the chance. I walked to the door and reached for the knob, my heart nearly pounding through my chest.
Click!
I glanced around, turning to see what made the noise, but nothing happened.
Suddenly, a cage dropped over me, hitting the floor with a bone-jarring crash.
I threw myself against the bars, snarling, but it was no use. No matter how hard I fought, there was no getting out.
The door opened behind me. “Why is a vampire looking for a human?”
I knew that voice.
It was his voice. The one from the club.
And he had me trapped.
27
Jonah
“Anissa!”
I ran to her and sank to my knees to catch her before she collapsed onto the rooftop. Her clothes were soaked in blood, her eyes half-closed, her skin as white as a sheet of paper.
She was dying.
“No! No!” I searched for the wounds and didn’t have to look hard.
Her neck had been sliced open, down to her shoulder. Was it even possible to stop the bleeding at this point? She was so weak, barely able to keep her eyes open as I begged her to look at me, talk to me, keep breathing.
Please, keep breathing, Anissa, please. Stay with me.
I didn’t think she would be able to heal herself when she was so weak.
“What happened?” I pressed my hands over her wound to stop the bleeding.
I knew it was too little, too late—and it wasn’t an arterial cut, either, just a very deep cut that had bled for too long. I didn’t know if anything I did would work, but I had to do something. I couldn’t let her die without trying to help.
“One of… her seconds… he’s dead…” Her head fell back against my arm, like even whispering a handful of words had exhausted her.
She’d killed him.
He was back there, in the room. And he had almost killed her.
Vampires couldn’t bleed to death. Could we? She was half-fae. Would that help her? Or would it only hurt her? Maybe the fae didn’t heal the way vampires did.
I had no idea what to do, and there was nobody to help me, nobody to stop the blood from seeping between my fingers, draining the life from her. My head was spinning with so many questions and so many horrible images of living life without her, while part of me screamed and raged and demanded she not leave me. I felt so helpless, so terrified.
She needed blood. She had to feed. But the blood was at the high-rise.
I couldn’t get her there, it was too far. I couldn’t even get her off the roof, and we couldn’t go through the hotel in the shape she was in.
We wouldn’t make it out of the elevator. But she needed it. I was losing her.
Her eyelids fluttered as she struggled to stay conscious.
“Come on. Keep breathing. Don’t let go,” I whispered, looking into her eyes. They were unfocused. Oh, no.
My blood.
It was the only way.
I shouldn’t. It would be against league law. We couldn’t feed off humans or each other.
But this was Anissa.
Damn them if they thought I should let her die just to uphold their laws.
Plus, the one thing no one seemed to ever talk about was how she’d violated league law by giving me her healing blood when we were in Sorrowswatch, after our scuffle with Valerius.
So, not only was this the woman I loved, it was also the woman who’d already broken that law to save my life.
There were special circumstances no treaty or laws could provide for. Like the one I was in as I held her and watched her dying in my arms.
If they didn’t like it… well, I had wondered about pulling the clan out of the league’s jurisdiction many times already. I wasn’t sure if it was possible, but I would do it if they gave me trouble over what I was about to do. But where would we be without their protection?
I couldn’t worry about it anymore as the shallow rise and fall of her chest slowed and almost stopped.
There was no time. I was losing her.
League or no league, I needed to keep her alive. I lifted my wrist to my mouth and extended my fangs to tear into my flesh.
Blood seeped out of the wound.
I lowered my bleeding wrist to her lips.
She was still.
“No!” I whispered, lifting her head and pressing my wrist hard against her mouth.
I leaned down to whisper in her ear. “Please, Anissa. Drink. I know you’re still in there. Drink. You have to. It’s the only way. Please, I love you, please, drink.”
Finally, she latched on. I wanted to let out a shout of joy as she started taking the blood she needed to survive. Each second, with each gulp, the drinking became stronger. She was coming back. I had to pull away before she drained me—she was that desperate.
She relaxed in my arms, and I watched, holding my breath, as the gash stretching from neck to shoulder began to close.
In less than a minute, I would hardly have known it was ever there if not for the dried blood that still covered her. Meanwhile, her complexion went from chalk-white to a normal shade of pale. She even had a little color in her cheeks.
Then, her eyes flew open and met mine. “What have you done?”
“What I had to do.” I ran my hand over the side of her face. “What you did for me.”
“But… you risked so much…” She sat up, still staring at me.
“It’s no different than what you risked for me,” I reminded her. “You went against Marcus’s orders to save my life, remember? You had to give up your clan for that. You defied the same laws in Sorrowswatch when you saved my life. You’re not the only one who gets to make grand gestures, you know.”
She smiled through the pink-tinged tears running down her cheeks. “But if anybody ever finds out, you know what the league w
ill do to you, right?”
“Sure. I know. I’m not worried about it. I had to make a decision, and I know it was the right one.”
“They’ll never find out from me,” she promised.
“I know.” I pried my eyes from hers and checked her over.
She was a mess. What were we supposed to do with her covered in blood? And I didn’t look much better, but I could zip my jacket and cover up.
She needed it more than I did. “You can wear this.” I pulled it off. “I can’t do anything about the jeans, but this will cover you up. You don’t have to wear your hoodie.”
“Good thinking.” She unzipped it and stripped down to her bra.
I told myself I shouldn’t stare at her creamy skin, the way she filled in the bra cups.
I only handed over the jacket reluctantly because I had to. She pulled it on and zipped it up and appeared more vulnerable than ever, standing there in a jacket that was way too big for her.
“I thought I lost you forever. I wasn’t sure you were going to make it.”
“I probably wouldn’t have, if not for…” She trailed off, and I wasn’t willing to finish her sentence. I couldn’t say it out loud, any of it.
We were bonded like we had never been before, by our blood and our secrets.
When she burst into tears, I took her in my arms and held her as tight as I dared.
We needed to leave before anybody else found us, but I couldn’t bear to let her go. Not when she had almost died.
“We have to go.” She pulled back and gazed up at me with anxious eyes. “When they find him, they’ll come looking for me. They won’t stop.”
“I know.” I glanced around, wondering how to maneuver our escape.
“Come on. We’ll go back the way we came. Hurry. There’s no time for harnessing up.” She tossed a line out to the building behind the hotel, coursing the steps we took to get to the top of the building, then sat on the edge of the roof.
“What are you doing?” My mouth hung open as she gripped the line then pulled her legs up to wrap around it.
She crossed her ankles then started a hand-over-hand crawl across the open space between buildings.
