Finding Lily

by Emma Shade

  “F-f-fuck y-you,” the Enforcer croaked.

  “Fine,” Ashton sighed, “have it your way. I’m thirsty anyway.”

  Ashton replaced his foot over the man’s throat with his fingers and went to his knees next to the Enforcer. Lips pulled back to display sharp fangs, Ashton lifted the man’s wrist to his mouth.

  The moment Ashton’s fangs penetrated the man’s skin, the Enforcer cursed and called Ashton everything but his actual name. I turned my head and closed my eyes, unable to watch the scene unfold.

  “Okay, okay!” the Enforcer screamed. “Just don’t do it, man. Anything but that.”

  I crept my eyes open and gaped in horror. Ashton, held his own bloody wrist near the man’s lips. Whatever torture Ashton had in mind, the Enforcer would rather die than taste the blood of their enemy. Even giving up everything he knew.

  Prattled, the man rattled his confession as though Ashton was a Priest. “I got called earlier today and told Lily was holed up inside the cabin. My instructions were to kill the girl and escape. They didn’t tell me a vampire was protecting her. And believe it or not, that was the first time I’d ever missed.”

  “Is there anyone with you?”

  “No. I’m alone.” Ashton lifted his bloody wrist again, and the man squealed, “I swear! I swear!”

  “Who’s the informant?” Ashton asked, shaking him forcefully.

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Only the leaders know who this guy is. I don’t talk to him directly.”

  “Him?”

  The man swallowed, Adams apple bobbing in fear. “Yeah, I know it’s a man. But I swear that’s it. My boss called me with the location after the location was leaked. I’m just the shooter guy.”

  “So were you the man who shot Lily in Mystique?” Ashton asked, unnervingly calm.

  “Yes,” he said after a few seconds of hesitation.

  Removing his fingers from around the Enforcer’s neck, Ashton hissed, “Get up.”

  The man slowly got up and scanned the room for his gun. And then he moved for it, which was a mistake.

  Quicker than I could bat an eyelash, Ashton dashed forward and snapped the man’s neck with a sickening crack. The limp body spun from the force and then fell to the ground with a thud.

  Hand fluttering at my throat, I gaped at the dead Enforcer on the floor in shock. “Y-you k-k-killed him,” I stammered.

  “Yeah, well he tried to kill you,” Ashton offered, and kicked the body for good measure. “Let’s get our belongings and get the hell out of here before more of these cocksuckers make an appearance.”

  A few minutes later, we headed outside towards Ashton’s SUV. In stunned silence, I plunked my purse in the passenger floorboard and one of the gift bags in the back seat. Ashton loaded the paintings for me, and helped me inside the vehicle before making his way to the driver’s seat.

  As he sped away from the log cabin, I wasn’t able to push past the fact that one; Ashton killed a man without breaking a sweat. Two; these assassins followed me everywhere I went. And lastly; I now knew where my heart was and who I was going to choose in the end.

  I pulled my phone from my purse and bounced it in my hand in thought. With everything going on, I forgot the fact that our cell phones had tracking devices. Surely Alistair or Jeremy wasn’t involved.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  ASHTON

  The SUV careened down the highway and the tires rumbled with the awkward silence inside the vehicle. As we closed in on Revive, almost forty minutes of obstinate quiet was much more than a man can take. Undecided how to broach the subject that I had just killed a man in cold blood, I glimpsed at Lily to gauge her emotional stability.

  Even though I slaughtered the man, he had it coming. After all he’d attempted to murder Liliana in cold blood himself the night at Mystique and then again at the cabin. I was just thankful I was there to administer my blood at Mystique. If she had went alone, she wouldn’t be sitting with me now.

  Then I had to factor in Gary, my head of security and great friend. Surely Liliana’s suspicions were wrong. How could the man I trusted to keep the people I care about and my club safe, actually be involved in destroying it all.

  I shook those thoughts from my head, and asked, “Liliana, are you okay?”

  “Not sure. The body count is starting to pile up around me at an astronomical rate. Whether they deserved it or not, I can’t help but question if I’m a walking disaster,” she muttered.

  Placing my hand on her knee, I gave it a reassuring squeeze, and said, “You’re not a walking disaster. Don’t think that way. You’re just going through a rough time right now with everyone out to kill you.”

  She snorted, “Nice. I’m glad you put ‘going through a rough time’ in the same sentence as ‘everyone out to kill you’. I used to consider a hard time as being sick or going through a horrible period. Not dodging and darting bullets.”

  I smiled, and replied, “Yeah, well, welcome to the supernatural world, darling.”

  “Yay, lucky me,” Liliana mumbled under her breath.

  “Once we find out who the informant is, then we can move forward without somebody in the middle and spreading lies.”

  “You don’t think it’s Gary?” She asked, eyebrow in the air.

  “I don’t accuse somebody without finding proof. If it’s Gary, well, he’s a dead man.”

  “I hope for your sake it’s not, but something’s up with him either way.”

  “I know,” I admitted, sighing in frustration. “But whoever is giving away information is as good as dead anyway. Even without our interference.”

  She frowned. “Why do you say that?”

  “This doesn’t go past the two of us, okay?” I cautioned, and when Liliana nodded, I continued. “The snitch is double-dealing. Working both the Enforcers and the Contingent. They weren’t very smart about it because the Contingent knows.”

  “So, they are aware of the deceit? Why aren’t they doing anything about it?”

  I shrugged. “My guess? They are playing into the lies and playing the man at his own game. Wouldn’t you do the same?”

  She nodded her assent, and mumbled, “Were you really going to feed that guy your blood?”

  At that, I laughed and shook my head. “Nah. It’s an old trick to scare people like him. After I bit his wrist, I took just enough to fill the back of my mouth. God knows I wasn’t going to drink that filthy man’s blood. Anyway, what we do is pretend to bite our own wrist and allow their own blood dribble down, letting them think it’s ours.”

  “You’ve had to do this more than once?” she asked incredulously.

  “Liliana, this isn’t the first time I’ve encountered the Enforcer.” I said, and had a flashback memory as soon as we parked in front of the club.

  The first time I’d ever encountered a band of Enforcers was after I healed Blake during World War II. At first I assumed they were part of his weird friends with odd star tattoos, but the more they acted around me, the more I realized they weren’t who they seemed.

  Following Blake and I around like an odd entourage, they watched me from afar as though they expected me to pounce on an unexpected victim.

  Blake, sitting in the pub beside me, nodded his head at them, and whispered, “Watch your back around them.”

  “Who are they?” I asked on a soft voice.

  “Enforcers, or the conjurer version of the royal guard,” Blake muttered. “They’ve been following me around for weeks. Like I’ve done something wrong.”

  “Did you?”

  He shook his head in denial. “Nah, I’m nothing but an ordinary person. Who knows what they want with me.”

  I frowned at Blake as he sipped his ale. Blake very well could have done something unscrupulous. I hadn’t known him all that well, and after he filled me in on how to avoid their attacks by pretending to feed them my blood, I narrowed my eyes. How would he know this? It was as if he knew their inner workings.

  I shrugged it off, be
lieving that he possibly knew other vampires who performed the act as protection. We downed our ale and then headed back to the base for our next mission, enforcers observing us with their uncanny stares the whole time.

  Blinking back out of the memory, the blood drained from my face. Why had I never thought about this until now? It was so long ago that the memory escaped me. Until now.

  “What’s wrong, Ashton?” Liliana questioned, noticing my sudden unease.

  I shook my head, and said, “I’m fine. Just a little worn out after our night of love making and then killing a man hours later.”

  “You’re impossible,” she admonished and opened the car door as Blake strolled across the parking lot.

  I observed him through the windshield and pondered my recollection when Blake and I were actually good friends. The conversation so fresh on my mind, I thought about the first time I’d met Enforcers. Which was within days after I restored him.

  Blake was much more than an ordinary conjurer, wasn’t he? Who else would have sway with the Enforcers, aka the conjurer royal guard and assassins, while they chased after Liliana? Nobody, unless you were a member of the royal conjurer family. Son of a bitch!

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  LILY

  Once parked in front of Revive, I ignored Ashton’s glare out the windshield and hopped out of the passenger seat. Slinging my purse over my shoulder, I grinned at Blake.

  Blake slung his arms around me in a hug, and said, “Don’t ever disappear on me again. I was worried you’d were kidnapped or worse.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered against his chest, “luckily it wasn’t the worse condition. An Enforcer found us and luckily I ducked in time before I was shot again. Ashton killed him, though.”

  “What?” Blake gasped, and pulled away to inspect my face. “How did they find you? None of us knew where you went, only that Ashton took off with you.”

  “You thought Ashton kidnapped me?” I questioned with a smile, ignoring his inquiry about how they located me. Because, hell, I hadn’t known myself...although I had a sneaking suspicion.

  “Well,” Blake stated, “you never know with Ashton, Lily. He’s known to act irrational when it comes to you.”

  I laughed. “And you don’t?”

  All I got in response was a shrug with Blake’s signature smirk.

  “Blake,” Ashton sneered in greeting.

  “Ashton,” Blake replied, still smirking.

  Gary, the body guard, strolled out the front entrance and headed in our direction. If Ashton’s mood floated on the air with copious anger before, it was nothing compared to the malice suffocating me as he spotted Gary.

  “Sir?” Gary asked, frowning at Ashton’s wrath.

  “Gary, assemble everyone in the VIP area. We all need to have a little chat,” Ashton ordered through gritted teeth.

  I almost felt guilty as Gary’s eyes swerved between me, Ashton, and Blake. As though he was confused by the less than friendly greeting. Gary offered a quick nod and rotated on his heals to go back to the entrance to Revive.

  “I pray he’s not the one involved in this mess,” Ashton sighed after Gary was back inside the building. “I don’t want to kill one of the few friends I have.”

  I hoped not either, and even though I had my doubts as well, we’d find out soon enough. Either way, this shit wasn’t going to end until we found the informant, a.k.a. “Abaddon”.

  *****

  We sat around a table, the same one we had many times before, and I shuffled uncomfortably in my seat. Jeremy Morrow made an appearance at the club moments before the meeting, so he was in attendance to my chagrin.

  The only people were missing was Carlotta and Jeffery, who were still out of town. A meeting of the minds felt so odd without them and I missed Carlotta’s friendship.

  “What’s this meeting about?” Jeremy asked, his chin resting on steepled fingers.

  “Well,” Ashton said, “there’s a mole that’s feeding information about Liliana to the Enforcers. At first I thought it may have been somebody following us, but now I think it’s somebody close. Potentially somebody in this very room.”

  The silence that followed was deafening. Ashton’s words hit home and each individual glanced between every single person at the table.

  My eyes hesitated on Gary, and he narrowed his eyes at me in understanding.

  “Sir? If I may speak,” Gary offered, spreading his hands out on the table.

  Ashton nodded, most likely giving Gary the benefit of the doubt.

  With his eyes situated on Ashton, Gary said, “I understand that you may suspect me, but let me assure you that I am nothing but honest. I’ve been your head sentinel for a very long time, and in that time have you ever doubted me once?”

  “No,” Ashton admitted with a sigh.

  “Okay. So why do you doubt me now? I think I know why, but let me assure you that it’s not what it seems,” Gary offered, glancing in my direction.

  “Go on...” Ashton said, his stony indifference in place.

  “The morning I ventured in to VIP and spotted Lily, I received a threat that I couldn’t ignore. The text message Lily saw was from the guard situated at your home, Ashton,” Gary insisted.

  “Let me have your phone, Gary,” Ashton commanded, and held out his hand. “I’ll find out soon enough.”

  Without complaint, his security guard handed over his phone. Ashton tucked it in his jeans pocket, and asked, “Anyone else have anything to say on this matter?”

  “Yeah,” Alistair piped up, “are you saying that you suspect all of us of treason?”

  “Well, what else am I supposed to believe? Every time we travel to any location, the assassins locate her.”

  “That’s bullshit and you know it, brother,” Alistair growled, crossing his arms across his chest. “You should know me better than that.”

  Blake hissed, “You’re a fool if you think that it’s me.”

  “First of all,” Jeremy said, “what would anyone in this room gain by betraying you or Lily?”

  I had wondered that myself. Sure, both leaders of the races thought I was a threat, but whoever was blabbing my information had to have a pretty good reason.

  “Money? Notoriety? Protection? Hatred? Fear?” Ashton offered, ticking each word off with his fingers. “There are a lot of motivators a pathetic person would accept without hesitation.”

  Jeremy rolled his eyes. “Somebody has to be pretty fucked up to give away information to both sides. The reproductions if they found out the person played both sides of the game would be substantial.”

  Though his eyes betrayed his reaction by the cool and confident air about him, Ashton stiffened beside me. I went ramrod straight as well.

  I opened my mind in a hurry, hoping Ashton had as well. Did you tell anyone about the double-crossing?

  Ashton’s voice reverberated through my thoughts. No, I didn’t.

  I projected my thought back to him. So that means...

  But Ashton spoke up, interrupting our internal divulgence, “Jeremy, I never said anyone was double-dipping.”

  Blake stiffened and his gaze swung in my direction. Surprise crossed his face at discovering the double-crossing. I gave him a shrug and returned my attention to Jeremy.

  Jeremy hesitated, his eyes swerved to Ashton and then to me. He finally said, “It only makes sense. How would both the Enforcers and the Contingent know where to find Lily?”

  Ashton smiled, and his demeanor resembled a viper ready to strike. Very quietly he said, “And how do you know that the vampires found her?”

  All eyes swerved to Jeremy Morrow, who tried to backpedal his way out of the predicament he was in. He shrugged, “I assumed they had. It was only a matter of time until they did.”

  Ashton stood, slow and calculating. His stony composure was dangerous, and my eyes swerved to Sam.

  Sam’s gaze was everywhere at once as he scrambled to keep up with the events, but once his gaze found mine, his wide eyes conveyed h
is nervousness. He mouthed, “Oh shit.”

  I nodded in agreement, my own nervousness apparent by electricity coursing through my veins. Blake’s eyes bored into me, but I ignored it for now.

  Taking his sweet time, Ashton strolled around the table while he glowered at Jeremy, eyes never wavering from his target. Jeremy, on the other hand, went slightly pale as if he suddenly realized his mistake.

  Abruptly standing, the chair crashed behind him and Jeremy held up his hands with his palms out. “It’s not what you think. Don’t do anything stupid, Ashton,” he cautioned, backing up a few steps.

  “And what should I think?” Ashton asked, deadly calm.

  “I would never hurt Lily. You know that,” he pleaded as Ashton closed in on him.

  “Do I?” Ashton tilted his head, nostrils flaring. “The last I checked, you put the woman I love up against another insane vampire. We all know how that worked out last time. And you were sure to interfere when she was at her worst.”

  “Look, I know how it looks, but I’m not the man you’re after,” Jeremy declared, edging his way around the table to keep his distance.

  They rounded the table at opposite ends, Ashton wound tighter than a string, and Jeremy as nervous as a fish out of water.

  Blake stood as well, electricity roaming his forearms. He barked, “You stupid son of a bitch.”

  Jeremy’s usual insolent character was gone, and in its place was utter fear. He was outrageously outnumbered, and he knew it.

  “Jeremy, after all these years,” Alistair growled, his gaze following Jeremy’s progress as well, “you ended up being just like the rest of the people I cared about. Lying mother fuckers.”

  “No, you don’t understand. I had no other choice,” Jeremy pleaded.

  And then at the most opportune moment, Jeremy ran for it. Vaulting over the table, Ashton caught him by the back of the neck and tossed him in the air.

  Once he landed, Jeremy’s head hit the ground with a sickening whack and his exposed skin squeaked on the finished concrete floor as he slid to a stop. But he remained conscious, albeit most likely a little light-headed.