by Anne Malcom
Protecting Sophie.
Or so they thought. I doubted they realized that Sophie was the one doing the most epic of protecting. But they were males, so it didn’t factor into their minds that the thing beyond the obvious—snapping hybrid vampires’ necks—was infinitely more dangerous.
Rick’s suit was now ruffled, and his face stained with blood. Hair wild and body lethal, his fangs extended as he cut through the enemies like butter.
It was Thorne who held my gaze. He was a machine, suit ripped in various places, wounds scattering his muscled body as he took on multiple attackers at once. I had stolen his knife, so he was doing it bare-handed.
And it was beautiful.
Or it would’ve been had he not been about to die.
All these details rushed into my mind in the space between seconds. I absorbed them with a detached horror that I couldn’t quite fathom but felt nonetheless.
I knew I had a choice in that moment, in that space between seconds. I would forsake my revenge, my need for it so strong that it was like the bloodlust after turning into a vampire. I could feed that monster, kill Jonathan as I had been intending to do, as I had needed to do since I had been confronted with him in Russia.
Or I could sprint across the room and save Thorne from the hybrid behind him, sneaking up instead of blindly attacking as they had been known for.
I was across the room in less than a second.
The hybrid’s head was flying across the room in the next one.
Thorne’s eyes met mine, frantic with violence and anger, and all that disappeared when he blinked at me.
Relief painted his stark and strained features. A kind of relief that didn’t belong on a man fighting off a small army of rabid vampires on his wedding day. It was the relief of a man who’d figured out that his terminal diagnosis was actually a fuckup on the doctor’s part and he wasn’t looking ahead toward death and destruction.
I used my unbroken hand to rip one hybrid off him, and he kicked the other one in the chest. Again, we had that little moment between moments. That time we didn’t just gaze—our lips found one another’s in the chaos of the death surrounding us.
The kiss was warm, frantic, desperate, and far too fucking short. But then goodbye kisses, full of the knowledge of the proximity of death, always were short, weren’t they?
We were detached and fighting again in the next second. I tore through the hybrids as Jonathan strolled easily through the throng that seemed to part just for him.
And that’s when it hit me. Of course they parted for him. They were his.
He was controlling this entire horde. And he’d somehow found a way to circumvent the need for royal or noble blood to create the strongest of hybrids.
That’s what it was that day in the docks, experiments with different vampires, mixing different bloodlines to create better hybrids. To create almost real vampires. And they’d done it without Malena. Or maybe they hadn’t. Maybe we hadn’t had her as bound as we once thought.
Obviously I didn’t have time to work on my theory of how this came to pass in the middle of battle, too busy sprinting toward Jonathan.
But now he was healed, and pissed.
Embedding a stiletto into your ex’s ball sack and then running across the room to save and kiss your husband might do that to a man.
So when I reached him at full speed, intending on attacking, I wasn’t fully prepared for his fury, nor the punch to the center of my chest that sent me flying across the room in the opposite direction of the fight. I landed with a crunch against the floor-to-ceiling windows.
It was a good thing I’d had them reinforced or I would’ve flown straight out of them. And in my weakened state, I couldn’t have guaranteed a survival after hitting the ground.
Fuck, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to guarantee a survival anyway.
My chest was concave, the force of the punch causing the bones to collapse on themselves and pierce my insides.
I froze as one of my bones brushed against my thundering heart, which at that point was almost exposed to the elements.
Not to mention my dress was ruined.
I would’ve yelled about that. Then hopped up and tried to kill Jonathan with renewed vigor.
But vigor seemed to have abandoned me, thanks to that beating heart that sent shards of pain through my entire body every time it pulsed.
Nifty little nugget of truth: female vampires in the midst of their Awakening could actually die if something—not just a copper dagger—pierced their heart. Something like their own fucking bone, for example.
So I couldn’t yell, or speak for that matter. Let alone hop up and fight Jonathan as he slowly and happily sauntered toward me.
Something warm trailed out of the corner of my mouth—blood, I guessed. My fingers started to prickle with numbness that couldn’t have been good, and I struggled to push up on my palm to lumber to my feet as Jonathan came closer.
“No, mon ange, do not move,” he said softly, voice full of tenderness that was undercut by the fact that he was the one who had literally punched my rib cage into my fucking heart. “I fear I was a little overzealous,” he continued, coming to a stop in front of me, looking downward. “You tried my temper, though, mon ange. You abandoned me to save that pitiful human,” he spat, glancing over to the battle that somehow seemed another world away, not a mere handful of feet.
Bodies were strewn everywhere, and I was happy to see that none of them belonged to my side.
But my eyes found Thorne’s, full of panic, desperation as he was swallowed by the sea of attackers that kept him in that spot. His mouth was moving, yelling something, but my hearing wasn’t working properly.
“I do apologize, mon ange,” Jonathan said, focusing on me and moving my chin so I could no longer see Thorne. Not that I needed to see him; our connection burned brighter than any gaze.
I could taste his pain and fear as easily as I tasted his blood, as easily as I knew he tasted my death.
But that wasn’t something to focus on right then. Instead I focused on glaring at Jonathan’s self-satisfied smug face.
“I only accept apologies if they come in the form of diamonds or monetary value,” I hissed, my voice thick and wet, blood spattering into the air as I spoke. “Words don’t sparkle and can’t be used to buy shoes, so they are of little to no value to me.”
I regarded him with pure hatred as I again struggled to stand, that time managing to press shakily onto one of my knees. “And your breaths on this earth are numbered, so I suggest you use them lightly. Or at least not in my direction.”
I had intended to stand and fight—most likely stand and die—but my ribs pressed sharply into the chamber of my heart, almost puncturing it, so I froze in the vulnerable position, hating the fucking curse. Hating Jonathan more.
“I can end it,” he murmured. “This entire battle, your friends’ eventual deaths.” His brows narrowed. “You know it will come. I command these creatures. And I can command them to leave. With me. And you. Never to return to harm the people you so stupidly love.”
I laughed. It hurt and almost killed me, but it was totally worth it to do it in his face. “Do I look new to you?” I asked. “I’m not that stupid little doe-eyed human who was blind to your lies, Jonathan. I don’t believe in fairy tales. Nor sociopathic stalker vampire exes who really need to learn the meaning of no.”
His jaw ticked again. “Very well, I will kill them all. But first I will take you.” His gaze roved over me, communicating his very real meaning.
To rape me in the middle of a battle while my chest was literally caving in on itself.
And I wouldn’t be able to do a fucking thing, because my body was beginning to shut down with the force of my continued movements. And I would move, would sever my own fucking heart with the shard of my chest bone to avoid Jonathan raping me.
Not because I couldn’t handle that.
It would be horrific and traumatizing.
But
it would kill Thorne. To see that, in the middle of a battle. Maybe the last thing he saw.
And I would not let that happen.
I was about to quite literally fall on my sword when a vampire barreled into Jonathan, sending a tangle of bodies flying across the room and crashing into a wall.
I struggled against my injuries as I watched Duncan emerge from the wall, covered in plaster and blood, still smiling. His eyes met mine. “Yer all right, lassie,” he said. “Take a spell. I’ll take care of the ex.” Then he winked and turned around just as Jonathan fastened his hands around his neck and ripped his head from his shoulders.
Great battles and deaths of great warriors always seemed to last forever. Like the scene in Gladiator. The hero battles for an age, triumphing in spirit, dying in a dramatic martyrdom.
Duncan was no martyr, that was for sure. Nor was he a hero. But he was one of the most impressive warriors, and vampires, to walk this earth.
And he’d walk it no more.
His head rolled along the floor and, like it had been designed, came to a stop right in front of my horrified face. I let out a sound that could’ve been called a whimper, shock freezing every inch of me not paralyzed by my injuries.
Duncan’s eyes were still vibrant, alive, but it was comical having them attached to a mere head.
It couldn’t have been real.
I’d detached enough heads from vampires—and immortals in general—not to be freaked out. But when you saw the person you liked, you respected, reduced to something little more than flesh and blood and bone, all sense of their previous personality gone like a feather in a hurricane, it was something that stabbed you right in the heart.
And evidently gave me enough strength to push to my feet. My chest seemed to have healed enough not to kill me with the motion, despite the pain increasing tenfold as I continued to stare at Duncan’s unblinking, lifeless eyes.
I watched people die all the time. More than I watched people live. Preferred it. Death was so much easier than life.
Plus, dead people were less likely to annoy me.
I’d made a lot of people dead too. Didn’t regret any of them. Their deaths were either necessary or fun at the time.
But watching someone I cared about die was not fun, to say the least. I never imagined that he would die. Not just because he was immortal and one of the fiercest fighters I had ever known. No, because his presence was too big to be yanked away by the Grim Reaper.
Then again, it wasn’t the Grim Reaper who’d snatched my friend away, snuffed out his personality.
Jonathan sauntered over to me, kicking Duncan’s head as he did so, as if it were a rogue soccer ball.
I’d done such things before in my time, so it wasn’t a surprise to me to see the treatment of something that had once been an immortal degraded in such a way.
But the pain that came with it was.
Jonathan glanced down to where Duncan’s mass of auburn hair had settled, then back up to me. “I will end every single one of these people you fight me with,” he said, voice even, measured. “It is a lesson you need, to teach you that you are not this vampire, mon ange. Once I take away everything you think you care about, you will know that.”
And just I was about to lean forward, push forward and quite possibly kill myself in pursuit of the revenge for my friend, the world seemed to freeze and explode at the same time.
Power shot through me, and by the looks of it, everyone left standing. It seemed as if it crunched all my bones to dust but somehow repaired them at the same time.
I watched as every single hybrid in the room collapsed in a heap on the floor. The air five feet in front of Sophie shimmered, blackened and then, like it was some kind of trick, Malena appeared.
Jonathan seemed just as frozen as the rest of us, watching the witches stare at each other, feeling the battle between that sweet magic and that rancid bitter stuff mingle in the air.
The thuds of battle, of flesh ripping, of grunting, had been silenced. Now there was nothing but the low hum as the air bowed down to magic.
Sophie’s eyes were glowing properly violet, her hands fisted at her sides as her eyes focused on Malena, her entire body vibrating. Blood began to seep from those glowing eyes, and my stomach turned.
I was watching her die. My best friend. She was killing herself in order to save everyone in that room, in order to try and fix what I had caused.
My eyes touched on Duncan’s head.
No, that wouldn’t happen. I would not let her die.
Fuck the consequences.
Just as I was about to use the last of my strength to pounce on Malena, someone else beat me to it. The wolf crashed through the ruined doors, smashing into the dark witch with a savage growl.
They were a blur as the wet ripping of flesh and crunching of bone echoed through my apartment.
Through my wedding reception.
Then there was silence, and the wolf didn’t even hesitate when he dropped the pieces of the witch’s corpse. Weakened human by Sophie’s magic, combined with the wolf’s attack, she was dead.
He darted over to the glowing Sophie, snatching at her, even as her foreign eyes zeroed in on him without recognition.
“Let me go or you die, wolf,” an empty voice commanded.
Not Sophie’s voice.
She had obviously called on something really bad in order to save us, to weaken the witch to the point of mortality.
“You’ll have to kill me if you want me to let you go, my moon,” he rasped. Then he gathered her in his arms and was gone.
Like gone.
I chose that moment to notice Jonathan still frozen in place.
“Checkmate, motherfucker,” I hissed as I inched forward, seeing Thorne sprinting over bodies from behind me.
Jonathan’s face flickered with a lot of things—panic, worry, anger—but also something else. Some confidence that the sole survivor of a botched attack should not have.
“Ah, the game has just begun, mon ange,” he purred, clutching something inside his pocket that made more magic seep into the air, and then he was gone.
Thorne arrived just in time to snatch at the naked air.
Then just in time to catch me when I collapsed.
“Well, no one’s gonna say our wedding was boring,” I rasped.
Then I passed out.
Chapter 15
I stared at the pyre, my face dry and my heart empty.
Except it wasn’t. It was so fucking full that every time the bastard beat, I got a fresh wave of pain to ripple over me with the accusation.
The flames danced in front of my eyes, swimming with the images of Duncan’s grinning face as he saved me from my fucking ex-husband.
The vampire who had fought kings, armies, brought down empires, he was now nothing more than ash in a funeral pyre because of his fucking friendship with me.
I wanted to be hot with vengeance. I wanted to go on a killing spree and use Duncan’s death as the motivator to find Jonathan, my mother, and end them all.
But I didn’t feel that.
I was just hollow. And without my bloodlust, without my need for revenge, I had no fucking clue who the fuck I was.
The crowd watching the vampire burn was silent. There were no eulogies here, no words of comfort.
We were all immortals—apart from the humans in attendance—and we knew there was no comfort in death. Only nothingness. We knew there was no way to dress it up with pretty fucking words like ‘hero,’ ‘warrior’s death.’ or ‘fighter.’ Death was death.
Final.
Brutal.
Ugly and empty.
For the thousandth time since we got there, I looked for Sophie. I hadn’t seen her since she’d been yanked from my apartment by the crazed wolf, her eyes empty and glowing and stuck in the clutches of that power that wasn’t receding like the tide. No, it was taking her over like a fucking tsunami.
And I’d been calling her, texting her, cyberbullying her on Instagra
m.
Nothing.
I went around to her apartments, the one above her office and the other one in Soho. Both were empty.
Worry would’ve clutched me since I was carrying around the truth that my friends could, and did, die, but I knew she was with the wolf, and even though I hated him more than I hated kitten heels, he would rather die than let her get hurt.
As much as I fucking hated to do it, I had to put my faith in the stupid alpha animal to keep my witch from going off the deep end. Or bring her back from it, as I feared might happen.
Because I knew if she had been in her right mind, she would’ve been there, in the middle of the woods outside the slayer compound, watching Duncan burn. Maybe she’d say some kind of fucking spell, bring him back. Though that was impossible.
But I knew Duncan had always believed in reincarnation. He probably believed in it for selfish reasons more than anything, but then again, didn’t everyone believe in that kind of shit for reasons that were entirely selfish? Either you believed in it for yourself so the prospect of death wasn’t a big yawning abyss of nothingness, or you believed it for your loved ones so you could trick yourself into thinking they’re somewhere instead of facing the reality that they were just fucking gone.
Thorne’s arm was tight around my shoulders. He had pretty much had at least one hand on me since the entire fucking thing went down. I didn’t complain at the beginning because I was seriously unconscious and healing from almost dying.
Again.
And then after I woke up, when everything clutched me with the daggers of truth inescapable, I couldn’t imagine getting through it without Thorne’s hands on me at every point in the day.
His mouth on me, his body moving against mine in the shadows, making furious and desperate love to me at every free moment. Not just because we were making up for lost time, but because we needed to do the one thing that chased away the proximity of our mutual deaths.
I was still blinking into the fire, trying really fucking hard not to look at the female slayer—Ellie. Of course I didn’t find out the name of the woman my friend might’ve been in love with until after he died, that was how self-absorbed I was. Because her face was as cold and as empty as I imagined mine to be. And it was the people who faced tragedy with nothing on their faces who were dying inside.