“Lost his temper?” I barked.
“Brought the building down around us,” Dean growled.
“Did she hurt you?” Patrick asked, sitting up slowly and meeting my eyes in the rearview mirror.
“Nothing permanent. I’ll be fine.”
“And the Chalice? Did you get the Chalice from her?”
Reaching across the console, I raised the gleaming golden cup high enough so he could see it. “I got it. I fucking earned it too. But she’s going to keep coming. She wants me for something bigger and I have a feeling I’m not ripe yet.” As much as I hated to admit it, she let me go too easily. We had no bargain between us. She could’ve tortured me forever or until I died. Whichever came first.
“We were afraid of this. Let’s deal with Konyam and Varick first. Then we can plan for that bitch of a witch,” Patrick hissed.
“Let’s get Brit and high-tail our asses over to Konyam’s compound. I want Ev back before he has a chance to kill him.”
As I drove around, under the portico, Brit was already waiting, her hands wringing in front of her.
I rolled to a stop in front of the house and she hopped in the passenger seat, slamming the door. “Let’s go.” No one asked questions as I hit the gas, squealing tires as I went.
Behind me, three more SUV’s pulled out from the fleet, following behind us.
“How’d you know?” I asked.
“Dean texted a few minutes ago. I’m ready to get Everett back. We can do this. I know we can. We have to.”
Glancing back in the rearview mirror, I met his bright Caribbean blue gaze. “Thank you,” I whispered.
He nodded, knowing me better than I probably knew myself. He accepted me. Liked me as a friend. Loved me. They both did and for that I would risk anything. And because of that, I wasn’t afraid anymore. We were strong. Powerful. Determined. Yes, Baba Yaga was playing with me but I would figure out her game. We would figure out her game. I had complete confidence in them, and in us. We’d proven ourselves too many times to fail now.
It took fifteen tense and silent minutes to reach Konyam’s compound. I parked on the street outside, taking a deep breath before opening the door and stepping out from the SUV. The other three trucks in our party parked haphazardly around me and our people poured out of them, thirteen in all. I circled around the SUV and stepped up beside Brittany. She stared at the house beyond the wall as if she could burn it down to the ground with a mere thought. I’d never really seen her sneer before and it was . . . cute.
“You ready?” I whispered. We hadn’t had time to practice and what we were going to attempt was dangerous to say the least. I patted the Chalice sticking out of the back of my jeans just to make myself feel better. Sometime between dragging Patrick from the rubble and our drive to Konyam’s compound, the magic had come alive again and the strong hum emanating from it was comforting.
Brittany turned to me, her lips disappearing into a hard line of determination. “Let’s get him out.”
Patrick and Dean stepped up to flank Brittany and me. Patrick still moved gingerly from being buried beneath a building less than thirty minutes ago. Without a word, Dean motioned with two fingers in a very military-esque fashion for Garrett, Tag, and Booker to move out. Niyati stood at his right. The three men scaled the twelve-foot-high cement wall surrounding the property. Before I could blink, they were over and out of sight. A few groans and a yelp echoed from the other side but within two minutes, the gates were sliding open.
Booker stood at the entrance, his arm out in invitation. “My ladies.”
Brittany and I strode down the driveway side by side, the rest following us.
“It’s now or never,” I murmured.
She nodded and stopped in her tracks. Taking a deep breath through her nose, she exhaled through her mouth like she was preparing for the long jump. One more deep breath, and I felt it. The simmering, swirling rush of her magic as it swept over me, a wave crashing on the sand. It tugged at me, drawing me closer, both physically and mentally to her. It was almost like falling through space but cradled against a warm feather pillow. Brittany’s hands clenched into fists at her sides and she closed her eyes as her magic bound us together.
“Oh,” she shivered. “You’ve had a boost. That Chalice is some wicked stuff.”
“Yeah?”
She turned her gaze to me, her irises a swirling kaleidoscope of colors as the full impact of her magic bloomed. “This is going to be fun.”
A magical wind, a warm maelstrom, rose up from her feet, encircling us both until my hair was lifted from my sweat-drenched neck and floated around my head. The wind blew out, searching and circling the compound as the scent of burnt sugar filled my nose. Ev was right, her casting smelled like cotton candy left in the drum too long.
“There you are,” she whispered, and I felt her magic tug on me.
My stomach turned and tightened at the feeling of her piggybacking my power. Swallowing hard, I clenched my fists as I turned to glance at her. Sweat beaded across her upper lip and she’d raised her hands in front of her at some point. They were shaking.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yes,” she hissed. “So much. So much power.” She glanced at me from the corner of her eye. “We need to talk about this later.”
“Just don’t kill us,” I hissed. “Can you poke a hole in the ward?”
“I’m working on it.” Sweat drenched her. Her light gray T-shirt showing the effects of her efforts. “Hi,” she whispered, and a small smile crept across her lips.
I peered over her shoulder to Dean. He shrugged but didn’t comment.
“Stop fussing. We’re coming to get you.”
“Oh,” I said turning to Patrick. “She’s not talking to us.”
“I was unaware she could do that,” he said hesitantly.
“Well, I guess she can. One thing at a time.”
“Shh,” Brittany snapped. “I’m working.”
I wasn’t sure if she was talking to us or to Ev but I shut my mouth just the same. Her breath quickened and her hands shook harder. “I think I can break it.” She nodded and turned to me again. “I don’t need to give you a hole. I can break it.” Her voice faltered as her body vibrated from head to toe with the pressure of the magic she wielded.
For a heartbeat, I considered telling her no. All I could imagine was the entire city going up in a poof of smoke and fire. But I nodded, she wouldn’t endanger Ev or any of us on purpose. I had to trust her and her abilities. She smiled back at me and Patrick grabbed my hand, squeezing almost tight enough to hurt.
Brittany took a step forward and pushed out using her entire body to force the magic out. The tug on my power became a full yank and I stumbled forward only remaining on my feet because of Patrick’s tight grip on my hand. Suddenly, every window in the house exploded and blew out in a roar of shattering glass. Ducking, I shielded my face from any more damage.
Brittany sank to her knees, heaving in deep breaths of hot Louisiana air. “It’s . . . done,” she whispered.
“Go get him,” I ordered. Without question, our people moved into action. I tugged the Chalice from my back pocket and held it before Patrick. “You first.” He bit into his wrist and let the blood flow. I felt the uptick in power as his blood drained. Dean extended his wrist to Patrick and the vampire sliced across his wrist with a sharp fang. I can’t say that some part of me wasn’t turned on by the sight. A soft growl reverberated from Dean’s chest as he met my gaze. I extended a sharp silver claw and cut across my own wrist. Once the blood of the three of us were combined, the Chalice’s power rippled out.
“O . . . M . . . G,” Brit shivered as magic rushed over her from our combined blood and the Chalice.
“What now?” Dean asked.
“It’s a cup. We drin
k,” I answered.
“Chalice, sweetheart. It’s a chalice,” Patrick teased with a quick upturn of his full kissable lips.
“Shut up and drink before Konyam’s vampires start filing out.”
Without hesitation or fear of melting and with full faith in us, he sipped. When Patrick didn’t turn into a pile of goo, my heart stopped racing. He handed the Chalice to Dean who turned the cup up and drank. And with each gulp, I could feel the change in us as the Cleopatra’s Fertiri magic spread out and intensified. Thankfully, Dean also managed to survive without becoming a puddle. Taking the Chalice form him, I opened my mouth and gulped down the remaining mixture of our blood. Inside my head, it was like a bomb going off and the soft blush of my power exploded from me in a sonic wave rippling out and knocking all of us on our asses.
Slowly, I propped myself up on my elbows and shook off the shock. I tingled from head to toe as my heart echoed in my ears and my skin felt like it was glowing. “I don’t know what just happened, but I feel really good. I don’t hurt anymore.”
“Neither do I,” Patrick added with a pleased and devious grin turning up the corner of his mouth.
“Here they come,” Dean growled as vampires poured from the house.
Booker had Ev’s arm draped across his shoulders and practically carried the shifter from the house. The vampire stumbled and collapsed to his knees as Brittany rushed to Ev’s side, sliding in to clutch him to her. Booker’s deep brown eyes met Patrick’s.
“My heart,” he rasped. “It’s beating.”
Chapter 42
As vampires from each colony stumbled out from every door, Patrick stepped forward and placed a comforting hand on Booker’s shoulder. “You are well. It seems my gift is spreading. Rise and stand with us.”
Booker didn’t hesitate. Getting to his feet, the centuries old vampire fell in behind us.
Isidro stepped over the threshold of the entry, eyeing the front door hanging lopsided from its hinges. His steps crunched beneath a coating of glass shards from the demolished windows.
“Where is he?” Patrick called.
“He’s most likely gone by now. He left for the airport twenty minutes ago.”
I had no idea how long I’d been in the Outer Realm but it couldn’t have been that long. The police hadn’t even arrived at the scene of the crumbled building before I’d made it back from Baba Yaga’s torture chamber. Evidently, it had been long enough. Through the crowd, Varick shoved his way to the front, snarling and snapping his fangs.
“You murdered her!” he bellowed, grief clear in his voice.
“I found her guilty,” I said without a hint of regret in my tone.
“So, you are judge, jury, and executioner now?” Varick spat at me.
“She always has been.” Patrick stepped forward, lashing his power out to permeate through the crowd of vampires.
Some of them cringed, others gasped in shock, and others just fell to their knees. Patrick’s dominance and superiority was like a whip in my mind, strong and solid as it wrapped around Varick and yanked him forward. The board member tumbled down the stairs, sliding on his knees across the pavement until he knelt alone between the vampires of the old guard and us.
“You are responsible for the death of a board member. Raine’s blood is on your hands. Do you have anything to say for yourself?” “You are not my Master, Cavanaugh. I do not answer to you,” Varick shouted, still fighting against the hold Patrick’s power had on him.
“If not me? If not us? Then who?” Patrick shifted his gaze outward to the vampires behind Varick. Meeting Isidro’s gaze, Patrick continued to Varick. “Your Master has abandoned you and I cannot let the acts of your progeny lie. Reparations are required.” “Konyam must be the one to issue my sentence. Not this upstart and his whore.”
Patrick was silent for a long moment. As I glanced at him, his gaze was focused on Isidro Grimaldi. The man stood stark still but I could almost see the wheels turning in his mind as she watched Varick kneel at Patrick’s feet.
After a long moment, Isidro answered Patrick’s unspoken question. “He is yours, Cavanaugh. I will not stand in your way.”
“Grimaldi!” Varick bellowed. “You will pay for this treachery.”
“Perhaps but I’m willing to risk it.”
I held out my hand and Miguel slid Gladi’s sheath into my grasp. I wasn’t sure how Dean or Patrick had found her in the rubble but I was thankful they had. Clutching her hilt in my right hand and the sheath in my left, the soft slide of her blade on leather dimmed all the noise around me as vampires of every age and background fell silent. The Chalice in Dean’s grasp and the gladius in mine, hummed in unison as if happy to have found each other. Patrick laid a gentle hand on my forearm, staying my hand.
“Isidro, the kill is yours if you would prefer. I would not dare impede your vengeance.” Patrick’s voice was soft and understanding to a man I knew he didn’t care for on a personal level.
Isidro met Patrick’s gaze as if startled by the offer and then turned his attention to me. His eyes vacant and hard with the understanding that one of his own had betrayed him. I knew that feeling well. It had been Isidro’s progeny that betrayed us. I’d executed Nova. A pretty word for murder but it had been necessary. I didn’t doubt that fact . . . ever. Understanding lit his irises with a familiar fire as we stood still, worlds apart, and evaluated each other.
“As much as I appreciate the gift, it would be better if this death was not mine,” he answered finally.
I stepped forward, close enough to smell the fear on Varick. I crooked my finger and slid it under his chin, tilting his face up to meet my eyes. A single, blood-red tear ran down the inside of his cheek. “I’m not ready to die,” he whispered. The words not loud enough for anyone beyond the two of us to hear him.
“If it makes you feel better,” I began and I’m not sure why I felt the need to comfort him. There was a part of me that knew if I had been in his place, I would’ve wanted to know. “She died well. She didn’t whimper or beg.”
His gaze hardened. His shoulders stiffened and his back straightened.
“I will not disappoint her. She would expect no less from me.”
I took a step back and before he or I could think too much about it, I brought Gladi around, slicing through his neck in a clean easy stroke. His head, covered in thick blond hair, fell to the ground. His violet eyes, once shimmering and full of intellect, now stared up at me, a dull purple with no light or life of any kind. Empty. His bulky body collapsed in a limp pile on the ground before exploding into a cloud of ash and bone.
Patrick stepped forward, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder as he forced me back behind him. It was subtle but I felt the protective wave in the pit of his stomach. The other vampires had moved in closer. Perhaps in surprise, fear, or anger. I couldn’t tell which but Patrick wasn’t about to take that chance and neither was Dean.
Dean stepped up beside Patrick in a unified front. Power, thick and forceful, ranging the spectrum from icy to scorching in a single wave spread out through all present. Everyone who had come with us, stood at our backs, preparing an exit to safety.
“You will soon have a choice to make. Side with us or against us. There are no other options.” Patrick scanned the crowd before he added in a soft, but determined tone, “Choose wisely.”
Booker, Niyati, and Garrett watched our backs as we left and filed into the SUV’s. I hopped in the back with Brittany and EV while Dean drove.
“Are you okay?” I asked Ev, my voice a bit too shrill for the small space of the cabin.
“I don’t know what you guys did but I feel great. Everything is pretty much healed.”
Brittany had a tight hold on Ev’s hand, clasping his in both of hers and I knew she was waiting until we were home and she was alone before she lost her
shit. Maybe they hadn’t told each other yet, but it was clear to me—and probably everyone else—that they had a thing for one another. They’d work it out. I was pretty sure they would, anyway.
“Can we go home now?” Brittany asked, slowly stroking her hand down Ev’s forearm.
“I’m excited to sleep in my own bed,” Patrick said on a heavy exhale. “Tomorrow. We can return home, tomorrow.”
“Good. I’m tired of New Orleans,” she said with enough hostility that I thought she wouldn’t come back unless forced.
Chapter 43
Isidro strode into the conference room of the Lebensblut New York offices with a chip on his shoulder. He knew the game he had to play. Originally he’d planned to wait out both parties to see which one came out on top. Now, he knew Konyam couldn’t remain in power. Cavanaugh was the better choice. The right choice.
“Varick is dead,” Isidro blurted with a lack of finesse that was uncharacteristic of him.
“I heard. Did she behead him without a blink as some have relayed to me?” Konyam asked.
“She did. It was brutal but quick.”
“We are down two board members.” Konyam stepped from the window and moved to the conference table, sitting at the apex.
“What of the vote?”
“The vote is immaterial,” Konyam snapped. “Cavanaugh is gaining ground and we have to think strategically.”
“Then I would suggest Diego. He is cunning and knows the benefit of a board seat,” Isidro offered, knowing full well that Diego was planning on siding with Cavanaugh. Let Cavanaugh make of that what he would.
“I’d thought he was one Cavanaugh’s intimates,” Konyam said, and Isidro saw the first signs of strain on the ancient vampire’s face.
Violet Abyss (A Blushing Death Novel Book 7) Page 25
