I felt my back slam against the edge of the desk that had been across the room from where we stood. Now it was my turn to dig claws into his flesh. With a growl coming from deep in his throat, he pulled back to smile in approval at me before lunging at my neck. That brought me back to reality because I had no idea if he meant to caress my throat with his lips or tear it out with his fangs; I didn’t trust him. I shoved him away from me hard enough he went sprawling to the floor.
With a snarl he got to his feet. “What in the hell is the matter with you?”
I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “Taste test was over. I got a look at what I would be getting into bed with if I agree to your terms and you got to see if I was worth risking your neck for. But that’s as far as it goes unless you turn up when I need you.”
“This was a game to you?”
“You started it when you kissed me. I only went along for the ride until it was time to get off.”
“I was not playing a game and neither were you.”
I shrugged. “You wanted to see if I would give into you without the deal. In fact, you were hoping I would to prove what I said was wrong. Sorry, Anton, but the only thing that will get my pants off for you is if I agree to your deal.”
Anton sighed. “Why must it always be this way between us?”
“It didn’t have to be.”
“I am to believe one day you would have coming willing to my bed without my extorting it out of you?” He raised his brow at me.
I came closer to him so that my breath kissed his face. “No. You are to remember that I loved you very much at one time. That girlish devotion was only a few years away from changing into something deeper and adult that would have given you exactly what you want from me now. You could have been my first, my only, if you had had the courage to fight the world for me, but you made another choice and that put an end to a great many things. I never would have left you Anton, but you left me without a backwards glance and now all I can do is watch my back when I’m with you.”
“He was going to kill you Natasha! I had two choices: to watch you die or give you up. One I could live with, but the other…What do you think would happen to me if there was a world you were not in?” Anton shook his head. “Still you hate me for it.”
“Why didn’t you come with me? We could have run off together.”
Anton brushed a lock of my eggplant colored hair behind my ear. “You forget that you were not then what you are now. I made the safer choice for you, for us both.”
When I moved away from him I was gentle this time. “And you make the safer choice now because you think I will refuse your insulting terms and you will not have to do anything to risk what you have earned in this city. Well I can make the safer choice too. My coven could beat Gregory’s caste, but it would cost us. I need your people to make sure we succeed. We know he will attack in two nights and I want your involvement with this plan to be a surprise. Let Gregory think he faces my coven alone and when he thinks we are on the ropes, I want you to sweep in and flank them. If we survive, I will have sex with you on a night of your choosing, but not before.”
I don’t think he expected me to agree to his terms. Nor do I think he was sure if I said yes for love of my coven or feelings for him and I was not about to give either of us a decision on that one.
Anton asked, “How do you know I will show up to the battle?”
“I don’t. The same way you don’t know that I will follow through if you do show.”
“Just as you won’t know if I am there to help you or to side with my own kind.”
“Was everything you just said to me a lie?”
“No.”
“Then that’s how I know you will show up and stand with me.” I opened the door to leave, but paused and said with a grin, “Besides if you betray me I will come back to haunt you for all eternity and if you think I’m a pain in the ass alive you can’t imagine what I will do to you when I’m dead.”
“I would welcome the haunting if you were gone.”
I awoke to the sickly green lights of my alarm clock telling me it was three o’clock in the morning. At that moment I understood why vampire kepts desserts. It was for when you awoke from a dream that left you aching to be touched and all you had to do was snap your fingers and a willing body came to wait upon your pleasure with no complications or machinations. If half-castes kept desserts, I would be summoning mine right now. As heir to the coven I could ask one of the men to accommodate me, but that was not my style. Too bad things with Chris had gone south quickly; I could have paid him a visit he would never forget right now. But then if he were anything like most men, he would not object to a roll in the sheets no matter how badly things stood between us. I imagined his face if I walked into his closet of an office, locked the door and started removing my clothing or tracked him to his house and slid between his sheets naked. Tempting. Down, girl, I said to myself.
You could always call up Anton, my blood said. He would not refuse us.
Now that would be a bona fide mistake. What I needed to do was to roll over, think of something else and go back to sleep. I turned onto my other side and thought about what came after my deal was made. The fight that started at sunset and that was close to a stalemate when Anton and his crew swarmed in from every possible angle. Homegrown vampires sailed down from rooftops, barreled around corners and emerged from the shadows as if they formed out of the walls of the vacant buildings that surrounded us. Gregory’s caste was caught between our two forces and fell. The only two members left who were not dead or running for their lives after a half hour were Gregory and his second. I faced off with Gregory while Anton appeared at my side to take on the second.
“I thought you could use the help,” Anton said as he blocked a kick from the second.
“With taking out an entire caste? Yes, as I readily admitted when I came up with this plan,” I replied. “But with taking on Heckle and Jeckel here? I can handle it.”
Gregory let out a snarl as my claws raked at his neck. For an instant blood poured out, but it healed. “Nice try girl, but I’m not that easy to kill.”
His hand wrapped around my throat. I grabbed his wrist and applied enough pressure to shatter the bones. They would heal in a matter of seconds, but it was enough time to pry his fingers off my neck. “Neither am I.”
“I hope your traitorous-to-his-own-kind boyfriend survives long enough to see what I do with your corpse. Fun times.”
“Is he talking about me?” Anton asked as he continued to fight the second.
“I think so, but he’s ignoring the big flaw in his plan.”
“What is that?” Gregory asked.
“You’re not going to be alive to try it.” With a powerful kick, I sent him flying backwards while I pulled a wooden stake from inside my leather trench coat. I hurled the stake and caught him directly in the heart. When his second paused to gape in shock, Anton ripped out his heart.
Anton called to his people. “There are still survivors who fled the battlefield lurking in our city, track them down and kill all that you find. Leave none of them alive to seek revenge on us.”
With a jerk of my head I indicated to my people that they were to do the same. When we were alone Anton sidled up to me and said, “We make a good team.”
“Yes we did.”
“You mean we ‘do’. We do make a good team and we have one team effort left Natasha.” He trailed his fingers lightly up and down my arm.
“Yes we do. You kept your deal, I will keep mine.”
“No argument at all? I’m disappointed.”
“You’re disappointed that I’m not trying to renege on my word?”
“I enjoy our sparing matches.”
“You do?”
“Very much.”
“You know you don’t have to talk me up to get in my pants Anton, all you have to do is name the night.”
“That’s more like it.”
“I try.” I surveyed the l
andscape, not too many of my people were down, which was good, but I needed to see to the wounded and the dead before I got busy with Anton. “Do you have a date in mind?”
Anton said, “I think we both would agree tonight is not ideal and I like anticipation, don’t you?”
“You’re going to spring this on me aren’t you?” The thought that one night he might come up behind me and whisper, “Now,” in my ear made me shiver.
That was where I jumped awake; unaware of when I had fallen back asleep, and realized I was in a foul mood. At least I wasn’t hot and bothered anymore.
Chapter 16
My “good” mood persisted when I stepped on a stupid little pink piece of paper some slob had dropped in the hallway and not bothered to bend down to pick up. True we had maids, but how hard was it to pick up after yourself so someone not paying attention to where they were walking didn’t step on your crap and look like a fool sliding down the hall?
“Hang ten Tash,” Harris called when he saw me paper surfing.
“Aren’t you going to be late for the meeting I called?”
“As long as I get there ahead of you I’m right on time.”
I snarled at him, his eyes widened and he shot off to make sure he got there way ahead of me. Sometimes it was good to be scary. I bent down to pick up the offending bit of paper. Looked like a receipt. I balled it up and tossed it in the trash on my way to the convening room. That’s where I found Rainor coming out of the kitchen. “It’s good to see you up sir.”
“You didn’t think I would miss this did you?”
“Are you saying that because you think they are going to try to flay me or because you want to show your support for my plan?”
Rainor gave a chuckle. “Both.”
“Thanks.”
He held the door open for me. “Ladies first my dear.”
In I went and the room fell silent. “I’ll get right to the point. Last night Kain found a vampire that did not belong to Anton feeding on a human in our territory. He killed the vampire and took the victim to get medical attention, but that brazen of an insult means we have trouble brewing. Those of you who were here when Gregory’s caste tried to invade will remember that it started with moves designed to provoke violence between our coven and Vincent’s caste. I think there is a good chance we are about to face the same situation all over again.”
Everyone had questions for Kain who did his best to answer them even though he had no idea I was going to bring up what he told me. Mercy already knew and this was the easiest reason I had to give for why what I was about to suggest was even a thought in my head. Besides, it gave me a chance to observe Kain’s natural reaction to everything that happened. He didn’t seem nervous that I was possibly outing his cover story for where he was last night.
Rainor stepped forward to speak. “What Natasha is about to propose is radical to our current way of thinking, but not unheard of in times gone by. I want you to hear her out before you object.” He sat down.
Way to set the stage Rainor, I thought. No one was going to get worked up before I opened my mouth with an introduction like that. Why didn’t he just shout “fire” in a department store on black Friday? “Thank you sir.”
He gave me a small smile that said he got his amusements where he could these days and what was I going to do to a dying man?
“As Rainor said, this is only an adjustment to our current way of thinking. After I met with Kain, I went to Anton and told him what had happened. He was understandably concerned that our friendly terms would be damaged by this turn of events. We talked and I suggested that to avoid any of his people being killed by mistake, or by set up, that we send mixed patrol teams out to sweep the city at night. If we work together we cannot be turned on each other.”
“I’m not walking around with a blood sucking son of a bitch!” Ben shouted.
“I’m with Ben,” Gabriel said. “We didn’t fight the vampires all those years to be back under their boots.”
“Did I say we would be their guards or their servants? No. I said we would work together. If you get attacked I don’t care if you throw the vampire with you in front of a freight train to get away with your life. My only concern is that we don’t mistakenly kill a member of the home team and wind up in another war. This will prevent that.”
I heard Dawn say to Serena, “I wonder how much of this is to warm us up to the idea of her spending more time with Anton?”
“Remember how he used to look at her behind Vincent’s back?” Serena asked.
Mercy’s head whipped towards them. “You two are unbelievable.”
I gave her a tiny smile of thanks. Good to see someone had a decent opinion of me. How many of them thought my only goal was to screw Anton? If I wanted to jump his bones all I had to do was ask and he’d do me right that second. Well, maybe not. He did like to twist the knife; if I said I wanted him he’d probably try to make me beg for it like he didn’t want it too. If I wanted to be with him whether it was for a night or for life I didn’t need their approval. My bed, my choice. “Are there any questions?”
Gabriel’s hand went up. “Was this your idea or the vampire’s?”
“I’ll answer that,” Rainor said. He must have heard Dawn and Serena too. “It was Natasha’s idea, as she already said, taken to our allies with my approval, as it is presented to you with my approval.”
Next up in the air was Kain’s hand. “No disrespect, but how can we be sure that the vampires won’t take advantage of this arrangement to kill us off? All they have to say is the ‘enemy’ regrettably killed their half-caste partner for the evening and they can pick us off one by one. Who would be the wiser?”
“Why is it you see treachery every where Kain?” I asked.
He paled at my veiled accusation; after all he did know the real score. Calmly he said, “It is my job to see every angle of a situation good or bad. This has its pluses, but there are real concerns that need to be addressed first.”
I could tell the majority of the coven thought Kain was on the right path. I could not believe he would mention that idea in front of every one. He should be showing a united front with Rainor and me and wait until we were alone to say he had concerns. “To answer your question, we all would be the wiser the first time it happened and three of us would patrol with one lone vampire at our mercy the next night.”
Serena was next. “But that would still leave one of us dead at the vampires’ hands. I don’t like this plan, it gives them too much power to move around our territory, and that’s not even taking into account us turning over half of one of our establishments to them.”
This was going nowhere fast. Time to put my money where my mouth was. “If it will prove to you all that this isn’t a plan on Anton’s part to arrange accidental deaths for each and everyone of us so he can slowly take over our territory, I will go first. Tonight I’ll patrol the city with a vampire at my side.”
“Anton will enjoy that,” Dawn said.
I glared at her. “Anton no more patrols the city than our leader does. I’ll be with one of his foot soldiers. When I come back safe and sound I expect you all to see Kain for your new assignments that include parts of the vampires’ territory. Assignments that Kain will happily create while I am fearlessly risking my neck for the greater good. Does anyone have any more questions?”
Half a dozen hands shot up.
“Questions that aren’t about me and Anton.”
All the hands went down except for Harris’. This I had to hear because he had been way too quiet during all this. “Yes, Harris.”
“If you and Dawn are going to have a smack down over this can I watch? Because I missed you knocking her on her ass and Mercy won’t give up too many details and I feel slighted.”
“No.”
“Please? I’ll make you a cake.”
“That wouldn’t entice me to let you do anything Harris, you can’t cook.”
“Then I’ll buy you one.”
“I thi
nk we’re done,” Rainor said. He stood up and addressed the room. “Thank you all for your time. Natasha, thank you for taking the lead with this and for putting up with the immaturity of some of those in our family. I leave you all with this to think about. If we do not learn to adapt to new ways, we become as stagnant and unbending as they are and we are doomed to become them. Part of what makes a half-caste different from a vampire is that we move with time instead of getting stuck in it.”
Once he left the room we were all free to go. Although a few sat mulling over what Rainor had said, most people were filing out amongst a cloud of disgusted and worried mutters. No one could understand why I was allying us closer to the vampires after one unauthorized feeding and I could not tell them that there was another more sinister reason behind it. Even if I did open the door to the real reason it would have led to more trouble as paranoia took hold and witch hunts broke out inside our walls. I would rather them be unhappy thinking this was about scratching my Anton itch then terrified of what might happen to us all as a result of the treaty violation. The Order produced panic and panic in a half-caste was a dangerous thing. It did hurt to hear Gabriel say to Serena that I was ok with this arrangement because I was practically a vampire myself.
Good to know I was as well liked after all these years as the day I set foot in this house for the first time. They had hated and feared me then. Who wouldn’t look at a half-caste raised by vampires for eleven years who then moved on to live with the Elders for another three with trepidation? It was like saying I had been reared by the boogie monster and Attila the Hun. Then they found out why my vampire family had ejected me. That’s when the real fun began because they wanted to test me to see if it was true. Well, it was fun for them for about a month and then it was fun for me. You kill one guy with a spoon and it earns you some breathing room. Ok, a lot of breathing room.
Like I said before, when I wasn’t a natural born vampire the way Lucius hoped he tossed me aside and forgot me, but my half-caste blood reared its head at puberty with a bang. You see, Lucius had a vampire consort in addition to whatever dessert he currently had and she didn’t like me. Her name was Vivian and she went out of her way to make me miserable whenever she noticed me, which tended to happen often unless Anton or my nanny squirreled me away somewhere.
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