“She’s here, too.”
Before I could ask who, I saw the round, angelic face of the young woman who’d been turned vampire before fully experiencing life. But there hadn’t been much for Sable to experience after she’d been sentenced to life in prison for several counts of murder. Her supple lips curved into a gentle bow, and her wide, dark eyes were mesmerizing. Even though I knew she was a killer with psychopathic tendencies, it was hard not to find some empathy for the peculiar vampire. Her face was vacuous as she glided effortlessly toward us. Like her maker, Gabriella, she was eccentric—a dangerous quality in a psychopath.
Her hair, which was usually straight with various colored extensions, was now a halo of curls similar to Kelly’s. Her head bobbed rhythmically as if she were listening to music.
Her eyes registered intrigue as she closed in on us, not with vampire speed but with slow, measured steps. Kelly was calm and stood still as Sable moved around her like a viper ready to strike. She ran her tongue over her teeth again, and once she’d made a full circle around us, she stood face-to-face with Kelly, studying her with interest.
“The human pet—or rather, the formerly human pet,” she whispered. She reached out to touch Kelly.
“Don’t touch her,” Gavin growled from several feet away.
She pulled her attention from Kelly for a mere moment. Then she struck in a flash and had Kelly by the neck, hoisted up, her feet dangling. “If you come closer, I will kill her.”
“If you kill her—”
“What?” she said in a hushed voice. “You won’t see me anymore? You’ll stop talking to me? You’ve done that already. You left me for her.”
I glared at Gavin, knowing his past relationship with Sable, no matter how fleeting and casual he’d claimed it had been, now held dangerous consequences.
I inched closer, and the vampire snapped her head in my direction. “You, too,” she warned. “I’ll snap her pretty little neck.” Again, her attention moved to Kelly. One hand held her by the throat, the other lightly stroked her cheek.
“She’s soft,” Sable said with a delicate note of appreciation, but not for the texture or the suppleness of her skin. Kelly attempted not to show fear; she’d been around predators enough to know that was the most intoxicating thing to them. A whiff of it triggered a desire to feel more of it. She blinked back the tears that welled in her eyes.
“What do you want?” Kelly asked in a strained voice, looking down at the cherubic, innocent-looking young woman who was anything but innocuous.
Ignoring Kelly’s question, Sable continued, “He’s beautiful, isn’t he?” I didn’t understand Sable’s obsession with Gavin. The first time she’d seen him, she’d been drawn by a beauty that had eluded us all. He was handsome, but his beauty encompassed something more than just physical attributes. It was intangible, and its nuances were hard to grasp.
“Look at him!” Sable demanded.
Kelly dragged her eyes to Gavin. His eyes had spastic waves of green rolling over them. His rigid scowl, the hint of ruddy coloring that streaked the bridge of his nose, and the sharp lines of his jaw conveyed wrath and vengeance, not beauty. His body language promised unparalleled violence. Finally, a tear rolled down Kelly’s cheek, and Gavin bared his teeth. He shifted his weight.
“Don’t,” Sable warned. Again, her attention was on Kelly. “Would it make you sad if I killed her?”
“Yes,” he admitted. His voice low and pained.
Again, her head snapped in my direction and she snarled, “Stop it!” She was talking about my panicking. I could hear my heartbeat, so I knew she could, too. Magic pricked my fingers and roiled inside me as the desire to use it rose. But could I be fast enough with my magic to use it against Sable without jeopardizing Kelly’s life.
“I suppose you would do anything to protect her?”
Gavin glared at her, his teeth clenched so tightly he was unable to speak. When he didn’t answer, Sable squeezed harder, and Kelly made choking sounds. Still unable to speak, Gavin growled; his eyes eclipsed to green as he drew his lips back, exposing his teeth.
Sable chortled and bared her fangs. “Yours are only for show. If you don’t answer me, I’ll be forced to use mine.”
“I would do anything to protect her,” he confessed.
Sable simpered. Again, her head bobbed to a sound pitched only for disturbed vampires to hear. My patience was growing thin, and she’d depleted any empathy I’d had for her. I watched with intensity for the moment to strike, gain the advantage, and get Kelly.
Sable tilted her head, examining her captive. Her gaze lazily roamed over every inch of her face. With ease, she brought Kelly closer to her, kissed her lightly on the cheeks. She kept Kelly midair with a strong hold around her neck as she stroked her arm just as delicately as she’d kissed her. Nothing in my life had prepared me for this level of crazy. I didn’t want to feel sympathy for her, but a morsel of it nudged its way in.
The tension-filled silence stretched for several moments. “You won’t be able to protect her. Not from the others. They are organizing an army and hiring hunters. She is one of you—she’ll die with you all.”
“Who’s organizing an army?” I asked.
“Liam,” she whispered in a low, hollow voice. “You broke the rules. Were-animals always break the rules. You lack discipline.”
It wasn’t necessary to point out the kettle/pot situation. Ruled by their self-indulgence and id, vampires were unable—or rather were unwilling to deny their desires.
“How did we break the rules?”
“Your coyote was caught. It’s only a matter of time before people know what you are, and then they will believe others like us must exist. You broke the rules, and now Liam is making a case to contain the situation.”
I hated the word contain. It was a misnomer more palatable than genocide. They were planning to commit mass murder of a group of people.
“Liam is forming an army to kill us?” I asked.
She nodded and returned her attention to Kelly once more before releasing her so roughly, she lost her footing and started to tumble. Sable was gone by the time Kelly had dropped to the ground. Even if they lacked the ability to travel, essentially teleporting, vampires were so fast it seemed as though they could take flight. Kelly stared wide-eyed at Gavin. When he approached her and attempted to touch her, she moved out of his reach.
“You’re all toxic,” she mused in a low, raspy voice. She put her hand gently around her neck. Barely able to look at either me or Gavin, she rested her gaze on the ground. “I know it’s not your intention.” She looked back, her features bleak to the point of despondency. “You irreparably change the lives of everyone you go near. Sable’s, Steven’s, mine. I thought”—she looked at Gavin—“I could deal with it, but I can’t. I don’t want to feel like my life is in peril all the time. I can’t have vampires trying to choke me and people forming armies to kill me. I just can’t be a victim.” She blinked back tears.
Gavin didn’t move. “Then don’t be a victim. That is in your control,” he responded in a steely voice.
Kelly’s eyes widened at his tone and response. Then she glowered at him.
In a few steps, he cleared the distance between them. “I will not be ashamed of my past. It is who I am. I changed you to save your life—the alternative would have been to let you die. Would you have liked that?”
Her lips quivered, but she didn’t answer. Instead, she blinked back more tears, holding on to her look of pure shock. He got even closer to her. I vowed to set up recurring appointments with the pack’s therapist and buy a stack of books on social norms for the pack. I planned to stand over them with a blunt object until they finished reading every one of them. He touched her chin lightly and tilted her face up to look at him. “I’ll accept your anger and rage. I will not accept defeat. You have claws, fangs, speed, and the ability to change into an animal. You will never be a victim or be at the mercy of a vampire or anyone else again. Do you understand?
”
She finally allowed the tears to course down her face. He wiped them away with his thumb. Leaning down, he kissed along the path of the removed tears.
“Winter can help her,” I offered.
He shook his head and said in a low, gentle voice, “No, I’ll help her.” He allowed me only a fraction of his attention before he returned it to Kelly. “Okay?”
She nodded.
“Good,” he breathed out. He hesitated before he lightly pressed his lips against hers. When she responded, his hands moved up to the nape of her neck, pulling her closer to him as they caressed. She slipped her hands under his shirt and curled her fingers into his skin. Their interaction became ravenous. I was a voyeur privy to something that was becoming more intimate with each passing moment. They were about to make up in a very “delicious” way—Kelly’s words, not mine—and it was obvious it was going to happen whether or not I was there. The world consisted of just them. I was an intruder.
CHAPTER 7
I took another sip from the martini glass. It was the only real one I had taken since I’d ordered it while waiting in the pack’s bar for Ethan. I’d known he would be late as soon as I’d told Sebastian about Liam’s plans. Sebastian’s fingers had drummed against his desk in a steady beat, his lips had pulled into a tight, thin line, and fiery rage had been etched over his features. Warmth had radiated from his effort to control the anger. I was sure Sebastian wanted to meet with Ethan to discuss how to handle the situation effectively. Liam probably didn’t care much about us being outed—he and the elven-elite Makellos could just continue to segregate themselves in Elysian as they had before. Our exposure wouldn’t affect them in any way. Liam was taking advantage of the situation to do what he’d wanted to do for years—get rid of the were-animals.
I understood why Sebastian had colluded with Abigail to initiate a civil war between the elves to get Liam under Gideon, the new ruler of the elves and a pack ally. I was awed by Sebastian’s stratagem and how he was always steps ahead of a situation to protect the pack. But I also often found his behavior duplicitous and his alliances and collusions unsavory. I stood by my belief that I never wanted to be in his position. Then reality hit me: I inadvertently had his position to a lesser extent because he and Ethan functioned as co-Alphas and I was Ethan’s mate. Ethan took on far more responsibility than a Beta in any other pack was expected to shoulder. In any other pack, he would be the Alpha. Sebastian was aware of that, and the strength and resilience of the Midwest Pack rested on the fact we essentially had two Alphas. Even being an ordinary Beta came with a great deal of accountability in protecting the pack. I didn’t want the burden of that responsibility. The next time I took a drink, I emptied the glass.
I asked the bartender for another. A man who’d been watching me since I’d taken a seat one away from him moved closer. It gave me a chance to get a better look at him without being obvious. I recognized him from the courthouse. Besides the attorneys, he’d been one of the few people in a suit. He’d had a recorder and had been taking notes, so I’d assumed he was a reporter.
His attention was easy to ignore. He wasn’t intrusive, just casting casual looks my way that he held a little too long. Once the bartender brought my drink, he slid money across the bar to pay for it.
Grabbing the money before the bartender could, I slid it back to the man. “Thank you, but I have a tab.” I quickly pretended to be distracted by the exceptional number of people who were in the bar.
The man kept his place on the stool next to me. For several more minutes, he nursed a drink he clearly didn’t want. Then he dropped all pretenses and stared right at me. He had to recognize me as well.
“Should I say it, or will you?” he asked with a half-grin.
“Say what?”
“The whole ‘don’t I know you from somewhere’ spiel.” A pleasant smile settled on his lips.
“Reporter?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No, just an observer. It’s a very interesting case.” Especially since he was lying through his teeth.
But I returned the same cordial smile and asked, “What exactly are you observing?”
“The defendant, of course. It’s for a project I’m working on,” he responded cryptically, giving me another brief assessment. It was going to be like pulling teeth to get a tangible response.
“And that project is?” I asked and casually took another sip from my glass.
“I’m interested in the paranormal.” He leaned toward me and grinned. I wasn’t sure if he was joking or trying to make his confession sound more pleasant.
“So, you’re one of those people who go around looking for ghosts that haunt homes to prove the existence of creatures that go bump in the night.” I was grateful I was dealing with a human; he couldn’t have heard my heart skip a beat when he’d said “paranormal.” I took slow, steady breaths and scrutinized him.
I needed to know if he was part of the Red Blood. “How did you get interested in that?” I asked nonchalantly, feigning far less interest than I had.
His smile widened as he gave me another sweeping look. “If we’re going to get to know each other better, shouldn’t I know who I’m sharing my tales with?”
“Skylar.”
He extended his hand, and I gave it a firm shake. “I’m Andrew, but you can call me Drew. All my friends do.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Andrew.” We weren’t friends and we might end up as enemies depending on how the conversation went.
“With everything going on, don’t you ever think about paranormal and supernatural creatures?”
I shrugged and took a drink before responding with disinterest. “If they existed, someone would’ve discovered them by now. With technology and everything we have, it would be virtually impossible not to know about them.”
“Not necessarily. You know that look you’re giving me right now? Mocking judgment and that slight panic in your eyes as if you’re looking for the perfect excuse to escape from a delusional person? No one wants to get that look from anyone, let alone a very beautiful woman. People know things but keep it to themselves, afraid no one will believe them. I have reliable sources who say they exist. Vampires, werewolves, and witches live among us.”
“And if you ever watched an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you’d know there are demons as well. I hope you own a stake, a cross, and a lot of holy water. That stuff is real, right?” I mocked.
He tossed his head back in boisterous laughter. “I’m here to find out.” Deep in thought, he traced a finger along the rim of his glass, “I can’t help but believe they all exist. Probably types of supernaturals even I can’t imagine, and I have a very good imagination.”
He turned toward me and gave me a lingering once over. His intrigued brown eyes drifted along my face, arm, and fingers as if he expected to see something there—claws, maybe? I saw awareness and certainty in his eyes them. There wasn’t a question in his mind about our existence; he was just searching for evidence.
“How do you know the defendant?” he asked.
“How do you know I know him?” He’d been in the courtroom before we’d arrived, but we’d entered with several people, so it hadn’t been exactly obvious that I was there for Steven.
“Hmm, do you often attend pretrial motions and nervously fidget the entire time? Or is that just a nervous twitch you get whenever you’re in a courtroom?” he countered with a smirk.
“This case is interesting. I don’t think he’s guilty,” I offered. If he wanted to find out the connection between me and Steven, he’d have to do the legwork himself.
“Really? The only way I would consider him innocent is if he’d been at my house the day of the crime. But I guess it’s easy to be taken in by those big green eyes and dimples. That face—seriously, who could believe he’s a murderer?”
“He’s not a murderer!” I snapped. Anger had gotten to me so badly I had to put down my glass for fear that I would crush it. Once again, I was faced wi
th the undeniable seriousness of the situation. Steven was on trial for murder. He could go to prison. Cotton coated my tongue, and I finished the contents of my glass to get rid of it. Now my mouth felt like Chambord and pineapple-flavored cotton.
“And you say you don’t know the defendant?” His tone made it clear he didn’t believe me.
“She knows his attorney,” Ethan stated in a low, crisp voice from behind Andrew as he nudged his way between us.
Andrew didn’t seem too concerned with the intrusion. “Ah, but that doesn’t explain the nervousness. After all, if you lose, it’s Steven who goes to prison. You, Mr. Charleston, can go back to corporate law, which, based on my research, you’ve been practicing for the past five years.”
Ethan’s jaw clenched. He enjoyed arriving on the scene with all the information and didn’t like when the tables were turned. “I don’t like to lose, and Sky understands that.”
Andrew smiled mischievously. “Well, for what it’s worth, I don’t think your client is technically guilty. I don’t think he could help himself. His kind tends to get violent closer to the full moon.”
“His kind?” Ethan asked, amusement clinging to his words.
“I believe he thinks Steven is a supernatural creature.” I kept my tone light and mocking, hoping my ridicule would send Andrew in another direction.
“Vampires can’t walk in the day. Witches aren’t known to be violent—but werewolves are.” The sheer confidence in his statement made me leery.
“Did you learn that from True Blood?” Ethan asked, maintaining his cool composure as he gave Andrew a derisive look.
“No. My research shows that lycanthropes are strong and fast. You saw the video. His strength and preternatural movement can’t be described as anything other than supernatural. There’s no other way to explain it.”
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