Dead After Dark

by Sherrilyn Kenyon

  She turned and froze in shock. In human form, this werewolf looked similar enough to Dare to be his twin. "Who are you?"

  "Fang Kattalakis, and you better pray to whatever god you worship that nothing happens to Fury. My brother dies and I will have your throat." He looked at the wolves around her. "Keep her guarded." Then he returned to a wolf's form and ran up the stairs.

  Angelia backed slowly into the living room. Catching the sight of another door to the outside, she started for it only to find more wolves in front of her.

  Fear sliced through her as she remembered being a helpless child as the wolves ravaged her mother. Over and over she heard the screams and relived the nightmare of them tearing her parents into shreds. She tried to blast the wolves before her, but the collar rendered all her powers useless.

  She was at their mercy.

  "Get back," she snarled, throwing a lamp at one of them.

  The others snarled and woofed, circling her.

  She couldn't breathe, as panic set in. They were going to kill her!

  Vane wanted blood as he saw the deep wounds on Fury's body.

  "What happened?"

  He turned to find Fang standing in the doorway. "It looks like the Arcadians grabbed him and had some fun with him."

  Fang's nostrils flared. "I saw one of their bitches downstairs. Want me to kill her?"

  No.

  Vane frowned as he heard Fury's voice in his head. Fury opened his eyes to look at him.

  Where is she?

  "Downstairs. I have the pack guarding her."

  Fury turned human instantly. "You can't do that."

  "Why?"

  "Her parents were killed by our pack. Ripped apart in front of her when she was only three years old. She'll be terrified."

  Before Vane could respond, Fury vanished.

  Angelia kept swinging at the wolves with her broken lamp as they closed in on her. Terrified, she wanted to scream, but the sound was lodged in her throat. All she could really see was blood, and feel the same horror she'd had the night her parents' screams had echoed in her head.

  She couldn't breathe or think.

  The next thing she knew, someone was grabbing her from behind.

  She turned, trying to hit her new attacker, then froze as she saw Fury there in human form.

  His touch gentle, he took the lamp from her hand and set it on the floor. His expression stoic, his eyes were every bit as blank. "I won't let them hurt you," he said, his tone soothing. "I haven't forgotten my promise."

  A sob came out from deep inside her as he pulled her against him.

  Fury cursed at the way she trembled in his arms. He'd never seen anyone more shaken and it pissed him off. "Back off," he barked at the others. "You're acting like fucking humans." Angry at their cruelty, he led her toward the stairs.

  "I didn't need your help," she snarled at him.

  But he noticed that she didn't pull away. "Believe me, I'm well acquainted with your willingness to stab and kill in cold blood."

  Angelia stumbled at those cold words that were tinged with a well-deserved hostility. It was true. He'd been unarmed when they attacked him and she'd left him to his family and their brutality.

  Shame and horror filled her. "Why did you save me just now?"

  "I'm a dog, remember? We're loyal even when it's stupid."

  She shook her head in contradiction. "You're a wolf."

  "Same difference to most people." He stopped before a door and knocked.

  A gentle voice told them to enter.

  Fury pushed it open and nudged her inside. "It's me, Bride. I'm still naked so I'm hanging out here. This is Angelia. She's not real fond of wolves so I thought she might want to stay with you . . . if that's okay with you?"

  Bride rose from her rocking chair as she cuddled a sleeping toddler in her arms. "Are you all right, Fury?"

  Angelia saw the fatigue on his face and could only imagine how much he must be hurting. Still, he'd come for her . . .

  It was amazing.

  "Yeah," he said in a strained tone, "but I really need to lie down and rest for awhile."

  "Go sleep, sweetie."

  Fury paused and met Angelia's gaze with a feral hostility so potent, it chilled her all the way to her soul. "You hurt her, you even give her a bad look that hurts her feelings and so help me, I will slaughter you like yesterday's meal and no power, yours or otherwise, will save you. Do you understand me?"

  She nodded.

  "I'm not kidding," he warned again.

  "I know you're not."

  He inclined his head to her before he shut the door.

  Angelia turned to find Bride closing the distance on her. Without a word and still holding the toddler, Bride stepped past her and opened the door. Fury was back in wolf form, lying in the hallway where he must have collapsed as soon as he closed the door.

  Her expression sympathetic, Bride knelt on the floor and sank one hand in his white fur. "Vane?"

  He manifested in the hallway beside her. "What the hell's he doing here? I was looking for him downstairs."

  "He wanted me to watch Angelia."

  Vane looked at Angelia and gave her a nasty glare. "Why?"

  "He said she was scared and wanted me to stay with her. What's going on?"

  Vane's face softened as he looked at his mate. The love he felt for her was more than obvious and it touched Angelia's heart. No man had ever looked at her with that kind of tenderness.

  He brushed a strand of hair back from her face before he dropped his hand down to the dark hair of the sleeping toddler. "I'm not sure myself, baby. Fury always talks more to you than he does me." He returned his gaze to Angelia and it turned lethal and cold. "I warn you now. Anything happens to my mate or my son, we will hunt you down and rip you into so many pieces they'll never find all of you."

  Angelia stiffened. "I'm not an animal. I don't prey on people's families to get back at them."

  Vane scoffed. "Oh, girl, trust me. Animals don't revenge-kill or -attack. That's purely human. So in this case, you better act like an animal and guard her with your life. 'Cause that's what I'm going to take if she so much as gets a paper cut in your presence."

  Angelia returned his lethal stare with one of her own. If he thought to attack her, he was going to learn that she wasn't a weakling. She was a trained warrior and she wouldn't go down without a brutal fight. "You know, I'm really getting tired of being threatened by everyone."

  "No threats. Just a stated hard-core fact."

  Angelia glared at him, wanting to go for his throat. If only she wasn't wearing her collar.

  "All right, people," Bride said. "Enough. You," she said to Vane, "get Fury in bed and take care of him." She stood up and walked to Angelia. "You, follow me and I promise I won't threaten you unless you do something to deserve it."

  Vane laughed low in his throat. "And keep in mind that even though she's human, she took out my mother and caged her. Don't let her humanity fool you. She can be as vicious as they come."

  Bride made an air kiss at him while she cradled her son's head with one hand. "Only when I'm protecting you and Baby Boo, sweetie. Now get Fuzzhead in bed. We'll be fine."

  Angelia stepped back to allow Bride to lead the way back into the nursery. The walls were a pale baby blue decorated with teddy bears and stars. She put the toddler in his matching white-and-blue crib before she lifted the side into place.

  Feeling awkward, Angelia folded her arms across her chest. "How old's your son?"

  "Two years. I know I should take him out of the crib, but he's a kinetic sleeper and I'm not ready for him to accidentally fall out of bed yet. Silly, huh?"

  She bit back a smile at Bride's concern. "Protecting your family is never silly."

  "No, it isn't." Bride sighed as she brushed a hand through the baby's dark hair. Turning, she faced Angelia. "So you want to tell me what's going on?"

  Angelia debated on the sanity of that. Telling her that she'd helped kidnap Fury and then stood
back while two of her tessera ruthlessly tortured him didn't seem like an award-winning act of intelligence.

  More like suicide given the nature of these "people."

  "I'm not sure how to answer that."

  Bride's gaze narrowed. "Then you must be one of the ones who hurt him."

  "No," she said indignantly. "I didn't torture him. I wouldn't do that to anyone."

  Bride cocked her head suspiciously. "But you let it happen."

  She was smarter than Angelia wanted. "I did stop them."

  "After how long? Fury was in pretty bad shape and I know how much damage he can take and still stand and fight. To pass out like he did . . . someone beat him for a while."

  Angelia looked away, ashamed. It actually hurt her on a deeper level than she would have thought possible that she hadn't intervened sooner. What kind of person stood by while someone was brutalized? Especially someone she'd once called friend.

  Yet twice now in her life, she'd allowed Fury to almost be killed and done nothing to protect him.

  She wasn't any better than the animals she hated, and that part of herself she despised even more.

  "I'm not proud of it, all right. I should have done something sooner and I know it. But I did keep them from doing anything more to him."

  "You're rationalizing your cruelty."

  Angelia clenched her teeth. "I'm not rationalizing anything. Honestly, I just want to go home. I don't like this time period and I don't like being here with my enemies."

  Bride gave her no reprieve. "And I don't like what was done to Fury, but until I know more about it, we're not enemies. The hostility at this point is only coming from you. I told Fury I'd keep you company and that's what I'm doing. No enmity here."

  Angelia cut a vicious glare toward the woman and her patronizing tone. "You have no idea what this feels like."

  "Oh wait . . ." Bride said with a sarcastic laugh. "I was minding my own business when Bryani sent in a demon to kidnap me here in my time period and take me to her village in medieval England--this back when I didn't even know such things were possible. Once there, everyone I came into contact with threatened me when I'd done absolutely nothing to any of them, ever. And that included Dare Kattalakis. Then the males of their patria tried to rape me for no other reason than I was mated to Vane . . . Oh, wait, what am I saying? We hadn't gone through the mating ritual yet. They were willing to attack me for nothing more than bearing his mark. So, I think I do have a little clue about what you're feeling here. And in our defense, you're not being manhandled."

  Angelia put more distance between them. What Bride described had been four years ago. And though she hadn't participated in it, she knew from the others how much damage they'd intended to do to the woman before her, and that sickened her, too. "I wasn't there when they did that to you. I was out on patrol. I only heard about it afterward."

  "Well, bully for you. It was still extremely traumatic for me. And unlike your people, I can assure you that not a single wolf in this house will attack you unless you provoke it by something you do against them."

  Angelia scoffed at her arrogance and naivete. "You're human. How can you entrust your life to animals? Don't you understand how savage they are?"

  Bride shrugged. "My father's a veterinarian. I was raised around all kinds of animals, wild and tame, feathered, furred, scaled, and other. And honestly, I find them much more predictable than any human. They don't backstab and they don't lie or betray. In all my life, I've never had an animal hurt my feelings or make me cry because of something they did."

  "Count yourself lucky," Angelia sneered. "I watched my entire family as they were eaten alive by the very pack of animals you have downstairs in your house with your child. The blood of my parents flowed from their bodies through the floorboards and drenched me while I lay in terror of being torn apart by them."

  She looked to the crib where Bride's son slumbered, peacefully unaware of how much danger he was in because of his mother's stupidity. "I was only a year older than your child when it happened. My parents gave their lives for mine and I watched as they gave them. So you'll have to excuse me if I have a hard time thinking good of any animal except those who are dead or caged."

  "It really makes you wonder what the animals did to be provoked, doesn't it?"

  Angelia turned at the sound of the low, deep voice that rumbled like thunder and sent chills over her. Standing head and shoulders above her, this man had a bad attitude so fierce it bled from every pore of his skin.

  Dressed all in black, he wore jeans, Harley biker boots, and a short-sleeved t-shirt that showed off a perfect male body. He had a long silver sword earring in his left lobe with a hilt made of a skull and crossbones.

  As he scanned her body, his lips were twisted into a sneer made even more ominous by his black goatee. Straight black hair that reached to his shoulders was brushed back from a pair of startlingly blue eyes.

  His demeanor tough and lethal, he reminded her of a cold-blooded killer. And when he looked at her she had the feeling he was measuring her for a coffin.

  Her heart pounding, she glanced down to his left hand. Each finger, including his thumb, was covered with a long, articulated silver claw and tipped with a point so sharp that it was obviously his weapon of choice. This man liked to get down and dirty with his kills.

  To call him psychotic would be a step up for him.

  Instinctively, she took three steps back.

  Bride laughed a happy sound as she saw him and disregarded the fact that he obviously wasn't right in the head and that he was most likely an even bigger threat to them than the wolves downstairs. "Z . . . what on earth are you doing here?"

  He cut those cold eyes away from her and focused on Bride. "Astrid wanted me to check on Sasha. Apparently something bad went down at Sanctuary last night and she's worried about his safety."

  Bride's eyes widened. "So what do you know?"

  He cut a suspicious glance toward Angelia that made her blood run cold. "Some Arcadians have found a way to trap Katagaria in their animal forms and strip out their magick. Sasha said the ones responsible attacked Fury and no one had seen him since. Hence my unannounced presence here without Trace's playmate. If Sasha's threatened, Astrid's upset. If Astrid's upset, I'm going to kill whatever's upsetting her until she's happy again. So where's Fury?"

  From any other man, that would have come across as a joke, but Angelia didn't doubt for one instant that Z fully intended to carry out his threat. Especially not the way he was flexing those claws on his hand.

  "Wow, Zarek," Bride said slowly, her eyes shining with amusement. "I think that may be the most words you've ever spoken to me during any single visit. Maybe even all of them combined. I'm impressed. As for Fury, I think I should state that he's not the one who upset Sasha, so please don't kill him. I'd miss him if he was gone. He was badly wounded and passed out as soon as he got home."

  He let out an expletive so foul, Angelia actually blushed from it.

  Zarek narrowed his gaze in her direction. "What about her? Does she know anything?" The tone of it wasn't a question. It was an undeniable threat.

  Angelia straightened and tensed, ready to fight if need be. "I'm an Aristos. I don't think you want to tangle with me."

  He scoffed at her bravado. "Like I give a shit. I'm a god, baby, so in the grand scheme of things, if I wanted to rip your head off and use it for a bowling ball, there's not many who could stop me and most of those who could would be too afraid of me to even try."

  She had a feeling he wasn't boasting.

  "Zarek," Bride said in a chiding tone. "I don't think torturing her will get you the information you want."

  A slow, sinister smile curved his handsome lips. "Yeah, but it could be fun. I say let's try it and see." He stepped forward.

  Bride planted herself in front of him. "I know you want to please your wife, and I can seriously appreciate that. But I told Fury that she'd be safe. Please don't make me a liar, Z."

  He gro
wled deep in his throat and for the first time Angelia respected Bride, who didn't flinch under his cutthroat scrutiny.

  "Fine, Bride. But I want to know what's going on, and if I have to stay here without my wife and child for too long . . . let's just say it won't go well for any of you. Where's Vane?"

  "With Fury. First door on your right."

  He flexed his claws before he turned and left. He started to slam the door, then glanced back at the sleeping toddler and changed his mind.

  He closed it quietly.

  "Thank you," Angelia said as soon as they were alone.

  "You're welcome."

  She rubbed her hands up and down her arms in an effort to dispel the chills his presence had left behind. "Is he always like that?"

  Bride covered her baby with a small blue blanket. "Actually, I'm told he's a lot mellower now than he used to be. When Vane first met him, he really was suicidal and psychotic."

  "And you think that's changed . . . how?"

  Bride smiled. "Good point, but believe it or not, when he brings his son over to play with mine, he's actually very gentle with the two of them."

  That she would pay money to see. She couldn't imagine someone that insane being paternal or tender.

  Pushing Zarek out of her thoughts, Angelia walked to the window to look out on the street below. It was so unlike her home. But she knew that Dare and Oscar would be looking for her. Dare was one of the best trackers in their patria. He shouldn't have any trouble finding her and bringing help.

  May the gods have mercy on this pack when they arrived . . .

  "So . . ." Bride said, letting her voice trail off a bit. "Care to tell me what this weapon is that you guys have invented?"

  Angelia didn't speak. The weapon was ingenious, and it was one they would die to protect. With it, they had proven that mankind was at the top of the food chain. None of the animals in the Katagaria would have ever been able to design it.

  It was the one thing that could protect her people from them forever.

  "It really makes you wonder what the animals did to be provoked, doesn't it?" Z's words haunted her. Honestly, she'd never really thought about that before. All she'd ever heard was that the attack had been unprovoked and undeserved.

  She had no reason to doubt that.

  But what if it hadn't been?

  "Why did Bryani attack you?" she asked Bride.

  "She claimed she was trying to save me from being mated to her monster of a son. Personally, I think she was just a little whacko."