Eternal Beast: Mark of the Vampire, page 12
Kate returned his grin. “Nor mine, Paven. Nor any other part of me.”
He chuckled, his expression tight, his nostrils flared. “’Tis wicked to send me off like this, Veana.”
“My poor Nicky,” she said gently, sweetly. “I promise I will pay the price when you return.”
“You will pay now,” he said with a growl, taking her in his arms and giving her a tender kiss.
Ladd made a face at Erion, stuck out his tongue in disgust.
Erion chuckled, but within him there was a thread of envy for what his twin possessed with this veana. He imagined it wasn’t in his future, romantic love, but he wondered at it all the same.
“Are we ready, Brother?” Erion said, moving away from the group and jumping up on the ledge, the cold air rushing his face.
“Let’s go hunting.” Nicholas gave Kate one last kiss and followed Erion out the window, their flashes two quick shots of lightning against the night sky.
After they were gone, after closing the window, Alexander turned and looked first at Kate, then at Ladd. “Never fear. They will be back soon.”
“We know,” Kate and Ladd said at the same time, then smiled at each other.
Behind them, something darted by in the hallway, then fell back, looking in the room. Evans. His face flushed, the servant entered with a breathless, “Excuse me, sir.”
“Something wrong?” Alexander asked, coming to stand beside Kate and the boy.
“I was looking for Dr. Donohue,” said the aged male. “There is a visitor just arrived.”
“Who?” Alexander demanded, his tone suddenly fierce and protective. “Who is it?”
The male’s eyes brightened. “Her mother.”
“Cellie?” Alexander said, stunned. “Cellie’s here?”
Evans nodded. “She says she must speak to Dr. Donohue immediately.”
Under the brilliant light of a thousand candles, Feeyan inhaled deeply and opened her eyes, a sensation of triumph moving through her. One pawn down in this chess match. “She is there, at the Romans’ compound.”
The Order member seated across from her looked concerned. “We cannot track her there.”
Several feet away, seated before an unmoving Impure male strapped to cold stone, another Order member lifted his head. “The Roman home is too secure, has too many enchantments protecting it.” The paven sniffed with derision. “We are able to send messages within their walls, but we can’t get inside. ’Tis very tiresome, indeed.” He lifted one pale eyebrow. “Perhaps we should see to removing that obstacle.”
Feeyan hesitated in answering the Order member’s final statement. Though she would like total access to the Romans as well, the Order’s relationship with them was a vital one, a tenuous one, and she did not want that unspoken truce compromised, not with something like this. Not yet.
“Access to the Romans’ home matters not at this time,” she said coolly. “The older veana will lead us to her Impure son—and to the mutore.”
“Both must be exterminated,” the paven across from her said. “The mutore for what she is and the male for what he has done here.”
They all ceased speaking for a moment as they gazed at the Impures within the cells surrounding the center of the Paleo. Feeyan could see the spirit in their eyes, the burgeoning hope. Gray Donohue’s rescue operation had given them all a belief that they too would escape their destiny and be liberated.
Feeyan had seen it in their blood—and she’d seen him in their blood.
First with the senator and now with the Impures. This male was growing dangerous.
“We must speed up castrations,” she said to the Order members surrounding her. “And when we have this rebel Impure in our grasp, we will bring him here, let them all watch their aspiring savior bleed out before them.”
Titus heard his leader’s words and knew it was only a matter of time before Gray Donohue lay on one of the stones before him. Not only was the male harboring a mutore, but he was attempting to bring about a revolt within the Impure population.
The Order would be swift with their justice.
Titus stood beside his fellow Order member, who was fang-deep within a male’s upper thigh. He despised performing castrations, and Impure blood made him even weaker than he already was, so he had, once again, offered himself up as seeker. The one who chose which Impures would lie on the stone table next.
As the Impure male below him cried out in pain, in misery over a future he could no longer see, Titus couldn’t help but recall his own history of torment and torture at the hands of the Order—long before they were even aware of it—back when he was taken from the Coliseum in Rome and sent to an experimental facility run by a new Order member named Cruen. There Titus was poked and prodded and changed into a Breeding Male monster who for decades lived in a cage and was released only to fuck and impregnate the cold, dry bodies of Pureblood veanas who hadn’t found their true mates.
It had been a true hell on earth. If Cruen hadn’t one day decided to offer him a vial of his magic-laced blood, he might have taken his own life. But the blood had turned out to be an elixir, and Titus had lived another several decades as a normal paven, with no urges, a member of the Order himself.
But everything was different now. Cruen had gone rogue and hadn’t shown himself to Titus in weeks. He prayed that the Romans and the mutore found him. The paven’s blood was Titus’s only hope for survival—his only hope to see a clear future. Because if they didn’t, he wasn’t altogether certain he could stop himself from offering up information on the whereabouts of a certain mutore female.
He didn’t want to hurt his children, but the further he slipped back into Breeding Male status, back into that depraved, uncontrollable rutting animal, the more ruthless he would become. For no one and nothing mattered to a Breeding Male animal but sex and survival.
9
The blood of the Impure male that Gray had rescued from the Paleo ran into his mouth and down his throat, but the memories he desired drifted up like a cache of balloons to his mind. He centered them there, then started popping each one in turn; first the Impure getting his virgin “call” from the Order, then his struggle to find that same frequency a second time. Gray pushed deeper, centered himself. He saw the Impure stretched out on a bed, felt his ease slipping into a relaxed mind state. This was the male’s third go-round, and he obviously felt a keen strength as he called out to the Order. Gray watched him as he waited, as he remained open and eager with what he now knew and understood, all the way until the Order’s hive answered him and welcomed this new bee inside.
The Impure had learned quickly, Gray mused. He opened his mouth wide, deepened his bite, then reached out and wrapped his thought stream around the male’s perfect memory, over and over until it was cocooned. Then he squeezed like a python.
Gray heard the male’s sharp intake of breath and he pulled out, then dropped his head into his hands and fought for peace, for his blood to slow, his pulse too.
“Take him downstairs,” he ordered to no one in particular, his voice hoarse, his head pounding and swollen. “Get him food, water, blood if he wants it, and let him rest. It’ll take a day or two for him to recover fully.”
Shit, Gray thought, gritting his teeth against a sudden lightning strike inside his mind. How long would it take for him to recover? Or recover enough so that the three other Impure warriors could go inside and mine for gold, retrieve what Gray had pulled out of their Impure informant who’d been working so intimately with the Order.
A cup of water was shoved into his hand, and he drank it down with the fervor of a desert dweller. Then a second glass. He gulped it greedily. The warriors gave him only a few more minutes of peace before they pounced.
“Did you get it?”
Gray looked up at Rio and grinned through the pain.
Vincent walked back into the room after taking the male downstairs and placing him in the care of one of the Impure guards. His eyes gleamed, and he turned to Piper. “We’re in. The Order’s mainframe, baby!”
She nodded, gave them each a brilliant smile. “Now on to phase two. Listening in and one: seeing if there’s a weak link among the nine members; two: gathering information, secrets, anything we can use as currency; and three: intercepting any and all messages to Impures.”
“The listening and sorting information will be me and Pip.” Vincent turned to Gray. “So after we take that memory from you, you should shut down for a while. Recharge.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that,” Gray said passively, thinking about how to keep his little trip back to the Paleo tonight under mental lock and eye.
“Don’t be a fool, Gray.” Piper, with her blond hair and perfect face, looked as close to an angel as one could get, but that disguise hid one tough-as-concrete female. “After we drain you, you’re going to be out of it for a while.”
“I’ll make sure I get a nap in,” he uttered drily, his head clearing of the fog from a minute ago.
“You can’t go back inside the Paleo, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
Gray’s head came up, his eyes narrowing on Rio. “Is that what I’m thinking, Rio?”
“I can’t tell. You’re too fucking talented at blocking me.” Rio shifted to the edge of his seat. “You know there will be more guards in that place than ever before.” “It’s impossible.” He cocked his head to one side and uttered caustically, “You going to risk getting taken by the Order? Blood castrated like Samuel, like all those others, like your dear old—”
Gray jacked to his feet, ignoring the shot of dizziness between his ears, and headed for Rio.
The male was on his feet too, meeting Gray nose to nose, pissed-off male to pissed-off male. “Sometimes I think you just don’t care enough about this cause.”
A low growl rumbled in Gray’s chest. “Are you fucking kidding me? Those Impures in the Paleo are the Cause—and don’t you forget it!”
“No, they’re the victims,” Rio returned. “You need to learn the difference.”
The urge to knock the male’s head off was nearly irresistible, but Gray forced himself to back up. He found Piper’s and Vincent’s concerned gazes and said, “Are you two selling and drinking this swill too? Lose some bodies to win the war?”
Piper spoke first. “We’re not suggesting abandoning the Impures at the Paleo.”
“Good,” Gray said tightly. “Because that’s not going to happen.”
“Doesn’t have to be you getting them out though,” Vincent said with the intelligent, calm thing he was always working. “Besides, I hear the old way into the Paleo ain’t happening. Heard it’s crawling with guards. It’d be like walking into a bank that’s been hit three days in a row and expecting to get out with anything less than a shot in the leg and a pair of metal bracelets around your wrists.”
Though the interior of his skull continued to scream, Gray’s eyes narrowed. “Then I’ll find another way in.”
“How?” Vincent demanded, frustration pumping behind his eyes. “And how will you get there and back? The Pureblood who helped us out before has been taken. He’s being questioned by the Order. No car, no gas, Brother.”
“I’ll help you.”
They all turned to see Dillon standing there halfway between the hall and where the warriors stood in the main room.
Rio snorted. “So the cat’s lost its fur,” he said. “And its way, apparently.”
Before Gray could shut the male down, Dillon did it for him.
“Listen, Impure,” she said, eyeing the military badass. “I’m here to stay. As a guest of your leader there.”
Dropping into the chair he’d occupied earlier, Rio chuckled. “Just because Gray wants you around—or feels sorry for your kitty-cat ass—doesn’t mean the rest of us do.”
“Maybe save that newsflash for something surprising—and something I give a shit about,” Dillon returned, walking into the room. Her eyes remained on Rio. “Now, unless you want to go a couple rounds with a Pureblood veana who’s trained to stop a heartbeat in under five seconds—which I’m totally up for, by the way—then let’s talk tactic.”
“I don’t talk tactic with the enemy,” he returned.
Her brow lifted. “I thought the Order was the enemy. Maybe you’re the one who’s forgetting why you’re here and what you’re fighting for.”
“Fuck you, Mutore.”
“No, fuck you and the high horse you rode in on.” She gave him the finger, then smiled. “By the way, I had it for breakfast and it was damn tasty. Maybe you’ll be next. I’d lock your door at night.”
Gray grinned—at her, at Rio. He hadn’t said a word through the whole back and forth, just sat and watched the show. Hell, the lady needed no help. Not when it came to picking up a cocky male by the nuts and tossing him off a cliff. In fact, he was pretty sure that to even suggest help at this point was an insult to her talent. And damn, the veana had talent. Her verbal takedown was a motherfucking thing of beauty—just like she was. Nothing better, nothing hotter than Death-Blow Dillon.
He stared at her long, lean body with the curves up top and down below, his mouth watering and his dick jerking to life inside his jeans. Oh, damn…And then there was the fact that she was wearing his clothes. A simple white T-shirt knotted against her small waist, showing off that flat, hard stomach. His jeans were way too big on her, but she’d cuffed them at the bottom and rolled the waist. He wondered if she was also wearing a pair of his boxers.
His nostrils flared, his hands closed around the sides of his chair. He didn’t know which was sexier—his briefs on her hot little ass and cunt or nothing at all.
Knowing she’d shut up Rio, Dillon turned to face Gray then, her eyes narrowing at the expression on his face—which was no doubt a mask of desperate cavemanlike lust. “I want to help you,” she said.
Gray wasn’t fool enough to think this was in any way a question. “Me or the Resistance?” he asked.
Her lips parted and she smiled, flashing her fangs. “Whatever gets me out of here, gets my fists up and a gun in my hand.” She shook her head. “I can’t sit around here all day doing nothing.”
Gray stared at her, into those steely hazel eyes. He got what she was saying, what she needed. She’d been caged too long, behind bars and under that animal fur. And not for nothing, but he wouldn’t mind having her on the team. If she could manage to play ball.
“She’s a mutore,” Piper said, no malice to her tone. “If she shifts while she’s in the field, the Order will be on it before you have a chance to take out anyone.”
Dillon’s gaze moved to the female. “I won’t shift, honey.”
“That easy, huh?” Piper said with a slight grin. “I thought you’d lost control of it.”
“She has control,” Gray said. He stood. He’d had enough of this play. Dillon had had her fun with Rio and the hostility with Piper was cute and all, but they were acting as though this was anyone else’s decision but his.
“She will remain in control,” Gray stated flatly. “Just as she will remain here with me.” He gave each of his warriors a look that warned them to cease fire. Then he turned to Dillon. “I accept your help, but understand—my mission, my rules. Stray once and you’re out, back to my room.”
Back to my bed.
Celestine felt her daughter’s presence before she saw her, and turned from the window she was staring out of. Blue eyes wide with surprise, cheeks flushed, Sara rushed into the room.
“Mom!”
Celestine opened her arms, and when the veana walked into them, she held her tightly. It felt so wonderful to touch her child. It had been too long.
“It’s so good to see you,” Sara said, pulling away and guiding Celestine over to the couch. “I have so much to tell you.”
Cellie’s chest tightened. She was a sham of a veana in that moment, unworthy to even be called a parent. This young female wanted to sit and spend time talking, reflecting on the past or sharing stories of her life now with Alexander and his brothers. And Celestine could think only of Gray and what she must do.
“But first,” Sara began, that trademark gleam of curiosity lighting her eyes as she sensed something. “What are you doing here? I mean, I’m glad you are—but no phone call, no warning?” Those beautiful eyes—her father’s eyes—narrowed. “Is something wrong?”
Lying to one’s children for their own protection was acceptable, had to be. It kept them safe, kept them alive. Celestine settled on the couch and took her daughter’s hand in her own. “I’ve missed you, and I thought, why not come and surprise you with a visit.”
For one moment it looked as though Sara was going to question that answer, but then she shook her head and smiled. “Well, I’m glad you did.”
“I’ve tried to reach Gray as well,” Celestine continued hurriedly. “I’d love to see him on this visit, if it’s possible.”
Sara’s joy dimmed. “Yeah. It’s not an easy endeavor getting through to Gray or pinning him down for anything social. He’s good, though. Doing his own thing.”
“For the Impures?” Celestine asked quickly. Perhaps too quickly.
A look of surprise moved over Sara’s face. “How did you know?”
Celestine forced a laugh. “It wouldn’t be all that grand of a leap, my darling. He finds out he’s a vampire, an Impure, and goes in search of what that means.” She shrugged. “It’s what I would’ve done.”
Sara looked momentarily stricken. “Should I have done that too? Am I a bad Impure for not wanting to know more about what that means or jumping into that life, that cause, without truly—?”
“No, no, Sara. Please, honey.” This was not how she’d wanted this to go.
“Perhaps I need to think about this some more,” Sara said, her face tense with self-analysis. “You and Dad wanted to protect us from the Order, didn’t want them to find your Impure offspring. I feel as though I completely understand that.” She touched her stomach absentmindedly. “If I had a child someday…I would do the very same thing.”
Guilt moved through Celestine like a fish through water, like a fish escaping a shark. Sara knew all she needed to know, all that was important. And she had Alexander and Nicholas and Lucian to protect her now.
