I opened my mouth to call him back, to demand that he explain what the hell had just happened, but was spared having my questions dodged by a large, furry train driving into my side and knocking me off my feet.
A warm, slobbery tongue slid up my face as playful chirps filled the room. Sometimes Ralph sounded a lot more like a baby chick than he did a demon from hell. Pushing myself up on my elbows, I grinned as I found him towering over me. He was almost double my size and weight, but his amber eyes were gentle and filled with a warm fondness. The small grayish patch around one of his ears only added to his goofy, dog-like expression.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and used his sturdiness to pull myself into a seated position, his shaggy fur lodging itself in my nostrils and forcing out a sneeze in the process.
“I thought you disappeared,” I said, remembering the last time I’d seen him. It was before the wolf attack on campus. He’d torn one of them to pieces but then vanished from all of his usual haunts. I hadn’t wanted to admit to it out loud, but even though I knew it was better for him to go back to wherever he was from—hell or somewhere else—I wasn’t ready to let him go just yet.
“Huh,” Khalida said, an odd grin on her face as she sat on the edge of the bed next to Eli’s sleeping form, “I’ve never seen a hellhound allow anyone to treat it like a pet before, not even their true master. They aren’t exactly domesticated, you know?” She shook her head with amusement, her curtain of hair dancing with almost iridescent color in the light. “So strange. I told you there was something very unusual about you, Max. I look forward to figuring it out.”
Her words didn’t hold the tone of threat, but something about the way she watched me, with intrigued shrewdness, felt like one all the same.
Atlas cleared his throat and studied her, his jaw muscles tense and pulsing as he gnashed his teeth together. I had a feeling that he was deliberately refusing to make eye contact with me though I didn’t understand why.
Did he blame me for what happened to Eli? For getting us all into this mess?
I couldn’t exactly blame him if he did. Wade wouldn’t have been in that field the night he was killed and kidnapped if it weren’t for me. Eli and the rest of them would be back home, safe and sound, if I hadn’t been convinced that Wade was alive—even if it was only in my dreams.
With a musical laugh, Khalida stood from the bed and walked towards the door. “Don’t worry wolfie, I know when my presence isn’t wanted in a room. I don’t like to wear out my welcome.” She turned back to look at me with a wink. “We’ll talk again soon. I think you will all be a very amusing addition to my life. I’m very much looking forward to it. Things have been rather dull lately. Claude never invites anyone over.”
And then she left. She was just as strange and unreadable as the vampire who’d left before her. No wonder they were friends.
I still wasn’t sure whether that was reason enough to avoid her at all costs. Then again, if I was wise, I would have done the same with Darius months ago.
“What Darius did—sharing his blood like that,” I started, using Ralph's weight to help pull me back to my feet. “Do you know what he was doing? Have you heard of a person feeding from a vampire before? Outside of the movies, I mean.”
Vampire popular culture was rife with legends about a vampire’s blood holding the power to transform a human into one of them, but protectors had always been told that it was impossible—that vampirism wasn’t something contagious, unlike a werewolf bite.
Unless The Guild had been wrong about that as well.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Declan said, patting Ralph on the head awkwardly as he walked towards her demanding attention. As much as she liked to pretend she hated all things hell-related, it was clear that Ralph was slowly creating a chink in her armor.
And if any beast was capable of melting that ice, it would be Ralph. The big dude was quite possibly the most cuddly creature I’d ever encountered.
“I wouldn’t expect anything,” Atlas said, watching Ralph with a leveled focus. He didn’t seem to distrust Ralph specifically, so much as he seemed to just distrust everyone. “That vampire lives in his own world. If vampire blood could be used to cure protectors, I’m certain we would have a record of it somewhere. Hell, if it was that easy to save someone on the brink of death, protectors would die a lot less frequently. Doesn’t exactly make sense for vampires to hold the cure to their enemies in their veins.”
Even though I knew him well enough now to know that he was trying not to get his hopes up, the chill in his tone sent shivers down my spine.
“Did you dream?” Declan asked, her light Irish accent echoing around the room as she steered the conversation back to me. “I didn’t notice any of your usual screams.”
I cleared my throat, knowing full well that not all of those ‘usual screams’ were exactly bad.
Her emerald-green eyes looked past me, like she was doing everything she could to keep from making eye contact.
It was strange and I was probably being overly sensitive, but it felt like I fell asleep and when I woke up, I was back at the beginning in the tentative friendship I’d established with both of them. Maybe it was just the tension of having to rely on vampires to keep us temporarily safe, maybe they both just needed to put their guards up a bit. Protector defense mechanisms and what not.
Declan was leaning slightly against the doorway, her black tank top and leggings highlighting her lean, muscular curves.
Her question caused a nervous flutter to take root in my lower belly. My cheeks burned as I thought back to the last time we’d been talking, before the attack in the hotel. I told her about Villette’s warning—that if I wanted to keep from being preyed upon by an incubus, or at least avoid being drained completely, I needed to fall asleep with my sexual energy expended. In other words, I needed to be less horny when dreamland came.
And then, while I couldn’t be sure, I momentarily thought that Declan wanted to kiss me after I told her, that she maybe even wanted to help me with that very particular problem. And I, to my own surprise, wanted her to do just that. Did she see it in my eyes? The way that I looked at her while we were both below the blankets, opening up in the heavy intimacy of the dark? For a moment, at the time, I thought there was a chance that she was just as confused about her feelings for me as I was for her. But maybe I’d misread the whole thing. Maybe she was disgusted and just didn’t know how to tell me.
It was easier to be open then, when the quiet of a dark room and a few inches of mattress were the only things keeping us apart. Now though, it felt like a giant gulf between us, as if any deepening of our—friendship—was suddenly erased. And we were back to ground zero. Maybe even the prequel to ground zero, if the ice in her eyes was anything to go by.
The way she spoke to me now was even more removed and callous than usual, like I was nothing more than a part of their mission. Like when this was all over, she’d put as much distance between us as possible.
I took a deep breath, forcing myself to focus. Maybe it was the frequent midnight rendezvous with an incubus, but my hormones were all over the place. Catching feelings for or acting on any sexual attraction with anyone in Six wasn’t the way to go, not right now anyway. There was too much at stake and getting laid—while fun—wasn’t exactly a top priority. It would just turn an already messy situation into an outright disaster.
“I saw Wade,” I said, trying to keep the hurt and confusion from my voice as resolve slowly took over. I needed to stick to the mission, Declan was right in making that clear.
Her eyes widened, whether with worry or annoyance, I couldn’t tell, but it was Atlas who responded.
“Did he—”
I shook my head, cutting him off. “No. I think he’s more aware now. Of what he is and what he can do. He won’t let himself cross that boundary again, even if it means starving himself.”
I hated the fact that disappointment filled me at that realization, though I desperate
ly hoped it wasn’t evident in my voice or expression. The whole goal of speaking to Villette had apparently been for this very reason. But still, a part of me that was growing louder and stronger desperately wanted to ignore all of the reasons that Wade and I couldn’t be together in that way—to say fuck the consequences. Maybe the consequences were worth it.
The feel of him ripping his lips away from mine left me feeling empty and hollow.
“Starving himself?” Atlas leaned against the wall, shutting the door so that the three of us and Ralph had more privacy. Vampire hearing was strong enough though that I doubted it would do anything but provide a visual cue to Claude and Khalida.
Was she even a vampire? I wasn’t sure. The attacks over the last few months had proven that allegiances across species were much more prevalent than we’d ever realized. And while Khalida had a quiet, lethal power about her, she didn’t seem like a creature I’d ever encountered before. There was something so ethereal to her.
“He mentioned that someone has come to see him,” I said, trying to remember all of the details. While my dreams of Wade were so vivid that they felt real, they disappeared from my memory as dreams often did, the longer that I was awake. “Someone brought him food but he’s otherwise been ignored. He’s starving though because he doesn’t understand how to use his powers or how to control them. But we did dream-walk.”
Ralph hopped up onto the bed and cuddled himself between me and Eli, like he was trying to comfort us both. I scratched behind his ear absentmindedly, his presence soothing my discomfort in a way that surprised me. One day, I needed to focus on the fact that a fucking hellhound had the power to calm my anxiety, but today was not that day.
“Dream-walk?” Declan asked, her eyes glistening with curiosity. “Like, you traveled to someone else’s dream? Together?” she glanced at Atlas, her eyes wide with surprise. “I didn’t even know that was possible.”
“He wanted to meet you,” I said, peeling my eyes from her to look at Atlas, “so we tried to travel to you, but you must not have been asleep. So, after trying you both, we figured everyone here was awake and we eventually landed on Izzy instead.”
Declan’s brows lifted in surprise, her posture stiff with focus though she didn’t say anything.
“Why Isadora” Atlas asked. His jaw clenched and I somehow knew that he was blaming himself, as if he was in the wrong for not being asleep at the precise moment his brother wanted to reach him. Men could be ridiculous sometimes.
Most times, actually.
I used every ounce of restraint I had not to roll my eyes. Something told me that Atlas was at the end of his nerves, that the tiniest shove could push him overboard.
“Because I guided him there and the girl sleeps like the dead. She was the best option I could think of, and the only one other than Ro I could be certain wouldn’t betray us.” A long moment drew out between us in silence, nothing but the sound of Ralph’s heavy pants echoing in the room. “She hates being called Isadora, by the way. Though I’m sure you’re aware of that.”
Apparently I didn’t have as much self-restraint as I thought. Something about pushing Atlas was just a little bit too irresistible.
Declan stifled a chuckle and met my eyes for the first time since I’d woken up. Just as they landed on mine, they dropped to the ground again. I swallowed my disappointment. “Didn’t that exhaust him even more though? Exerting that kind of energy must take a heavy toll on him.”
There wasn’t an accusation in her words, but it stung all the same. Because it did exhaust him and I had been the one to encourage the process, to push him until it worked. And then we overstayed our welcome. “He wanted to get out of the prison cell. The cabin fever is really getting to him. And we needed to get the—focus—off of other things.”
Declan squared her shoulders towards Atlas, no longer even bothering to pretend I was in the room. “I doubt he’ll be able to resist a feed for long. The succubus at the bar told Max the best way to keep him from killing her is to enter sleep sexually satisfied. It might help quell a bit of the attraction she has for your brother so that she’ll be less vulnerable and more resistant when it matters. Might also help slow the amount of energy he drains from her if there is a smaller entry point for him to latch onto.”
In a single breath, she’d gone from Declan Connolly, a reserved girl standing in a vampire’s home, to a bonafide protector in mission mode. I couldn’t help but feel a bit annoyed at her tone, at the way she treated me like a problem rather than an equal. It wasn’t exactly like I asked to fall into incubus dreams. Then again, I wasn’t exactly complaining either.
If my cheeks were burning before, they were damn near on fire now. I cleared my throat and tried to stare at anything in the room that wasn’t Declan or Atlas. I knew she was right to tell him, but the way she did it, so callous and matter-of-fact, had my stomach clenching with shame. And discussing my sexual appetites while we were in work mode felt all kinds of uncomfortable.
When I glanced at Atlas, his dark eyes were locked on me, posture stiff. “Then make sure you take care of that from now on,” he said, clearing his throat awkwardly. “If my brother accidentally kills you, it will destroy him. So see to it that he doesn’t.”
I couldn’t bring myself to tell them that Wade and I had...worked off some energy before I left him; that I didn’t leave him completely drained. I had a feeling that if I told them the truth, they’d do everything in their power to keep me from visiting him again. And those visits were the best chance we had at actually finding him and making sure he was still alive.
With that, he left the room. Silence filled the space between me and Declan until a heavy door slammed in the distance—loud enough that I wouldn’t be surprised if it was ripped off the hinges.
“There’s food in the kitchen. You should eat.” And then, without waiting for a response, she turned from the room and left, leaving me alone with Ralph, Eli, and a pit in the bottom of my stomach filled with nothing but confusion and frustration.
5
Max
The house—or, rather, mansion—was stunning. Declan didn’t exactly leave me with instructions on how to find the kitchen, but I wound my way through the endless halls, hand buried into Ralph’s luxurious fur as we explored.
There was something so therapeutic about having him here, like no matter what happened, we’d all be okay so long as he was around. I could almost feel my pulse slow to a normal, relaxed cadence.
“Gotta say, bud,” I said, digging my bare feet into the lush, dark gray carpet in one of the empty rooms. The walls were covered in paintings that looked both ugly and expensive, the shelves lined with random knickknacks that were covered in dust from lack of use. The room was dark, with only a single dull bulb ahead to cast it into light. Did Claude and Khalida live here on their own? The place was huge, and only a small portion of it seemed like it was being used. “Totally digging this whole thing where you come swooping in just when I need you. I think I’m officially a dog person.”
He yipped playfully in response, head held high with pride. His expression was so goofy that half the time it was easy to forget that he was actually a powerful beast from a different realm. Seriously, if the demons ever wanted to extend an olive branch to protectors, to mend broken ties and demolish bad blood, they need only send a hellhound in their place. Who could say no to a puppy?
I let out a sigh, shaking my head. “Sometimes I wish you could just talk. Tell me why you’re here, how you’re able to track my movements so easily. Where do you go when you disappear? Why did you show up when you did? Why me?”
I could’ve sworn that he could understand me, back when I sat with him in the basement of the lab. But Cy looked at me like I was off my rocker when I mentioned it.
I cracked my neck, my limbs all still stiff from getting knocked unconscious—which, gotta say, was completely embarrassing that I just passed right the fuck out in the middle of a raging vamp battle.
Bad habit of min
e. And one I’d need to get over if I wanted to have any sort of lasting career as a protector. Especially if I wanted to get sent on field missions. No wonder Cy demanded that I stay home when Ro and the rest of Ten got assigned a new job.
A warm, tingly scent reached my nose and I turned a corner, following the luxurious scent until I found myself standing in a giant, well-used kitchen. Compared to the few rooms I’d explored, this one looked like it belonged in a completely different house.
It wasn’t the sort of rich-person kitchen you saw in movies, where you took one look and basically knew that no one spent time there. This kitchen was filled with well-loved appliances, the cupboards lined with mismatched mugs that were selected one-by-one, rather than all at once in a boring, matching set.
It felt so homey. So human.
A large loaf of fresh baked bread was resting on the marble island in the center of the room, knife and butter perched against the charcuterie board next to it. The sight alone sent my stomach into a series of grumbles, never mind the amazing smell. How long had it been since I had something to eat? I forgot to ask everyone how long I was out, lost in my dream world with Wade.
Not waiting another moment, I sliced a piece off for myself and another one for Ralph, my mouth watering as the fresh bread and butter hit my tongue. My tastebuds felt like they were magnified, like I could distinguish between each and every flavor. I let out an embarrassing groan as I shoved another bite in my mouth. Maybe this was magic bread.
“Khali is a great cook,” a low, familiar voice echoed behind me. Familiar, but also not somehow. “If I weren’t a vampire, I’d double in body weight every time she visits.”
I spun around, nearly choking on the bread lodged halfway down my throat. Claude.
He was dressed head-to-toe in black, his platinum hair mussed in that perfect way that looked both effortless and stylish. His eyes, which were so familiar to me in Darius, felt strange and cold as they studied me with a vague curiosity.
Hell and Back: The Protector Guild Book 4 Page 7