by Cynthia Eden
“Told me…be ready.” Blood spurted down the front of Ian’s throat. She hadn’t cut the bastard deep enough. “Vamps…coming…”
And the slow motion ended for her. She sank to her knees and stared at the stake hanging from her chest.
She felt the cold whisper of death on her skin. The same whisper she’d felt in that alley, a year ago. Goosebumps rose on her even as a strange numbness filled her extremities.
Duncan was shouting for her, and she wanted to answer him, but she couldn’t.
The gas kept filling the room. The stake—it had sank into her heart.
She knew it had found the mark because her heart had stopped beating.
I’m sorry, Duncan.
She’d just wanted to protect him, but now, it looked like she’d just left him to face his nightmare without her.
I’m sorry. Her lips formed the words, and then she could say no more.
Ian’s claws came toward her, and she knew he planned to take her head.
Chapter Thirteen
I’m sorry.
He couldn’t hear the words, but he could read them on her lips and they ripped right through him. Duncan shoved his father aside—his father, his fucking father—and grabbed for Holly.
Her eyes were sagging closed. Blood pulsed from her wound. No, this couldn’t be happening. Not to her. He’d left her in the infirmary so that she’d be safe.
Not so that she could be staked while trying to fight his past.
“Vampires. For all their strengths, they can still be so damn weak.” Disgust had thickened Ian’s voice.
You have no weaknesses. Pate had promised him that, but the guy had been wrong.
He had a weakness. She was bleeding out in his arms.
A dull roar filled his ears. His hand was on her throat, trying to feel for a pulse, but nothing was there. “Holly?” He shook her.
Her eyes weren’t opening.
“You won’t leave me!” He whispered the desperate words to her.
She hadn’t let him slip away, and there was no way that he’d let her—
Claws pressed into his back. Sank into his spine. Twisted. The agony burned through him, but he didn’t let Holly go. He couldn’t.
“Worthless piece of shit,” Ian snarled into his ear. “You think I didn’t smell you all over her? I knew…” His claws yanked out of Duncan. Drove in again. “I knew you were linked to the bitch. Mated to a vamp.”
Mate. Yes, she was his mate. She was everything.
“I just had to get to her…” Now the claws were at his throat. “In order to make you weak. Just like he said…”
The claws were about to slice across his jugular. His father’s claws.
Stay in the closet, baby. No matter what happens…stay in and stay quiet. In his mind, Duncan saw warm golden eyes, swimming with tears, staring down at him. Mommy loves you.
Love.
Holly wasn’t moving.
“Who. Said.” The snapped words didn’t even seem to have come from him.
Ian still had his mouth near Duncan’s ear. “You thought you were stopping us, didn’t you? But when you started hunting the paranormals, he got smart to you. He’s in your precious FBI, and he’s not gonna let his own kind be caged.”
“Tell me who the fuck he is.”
“He’s a werewolf, an alpha, just like me. We’re gonna rule. Gonna make the humans scream. Putting us all together was a mistake. Now we’re just stronger. We’re—”
“Get the hell away from him!” Connor’s scream. The enraged roar of a man, but for a moment, Duncan could have sworn that he heard…
Help me…help me, Duncan! The cry of a child.
Ian was yanked away from him. His father and Connor met in a fury of fists and claws.
Duncan’s fingers wrapped around the stake in Holly’s chest. The stake wouldn’t kill her. Well, she wouldn’t stay dead, not unless she lost her head or her body was burned. As soon as the stake came out, she’d heal.
He ripped that damn stake from her. Smashed it into bits.
Her eyes flew open as she sucked in a deep breath.
His Holly. His world.
He bent his head. Pressed his lips to hers. “I love you.” Because she needed to know that. “Now, please, stay here. Whatever happens, don’t move.”
Stay quiet.
Because he didn’t want her in the line of fire.
Duncan looked up. Ian had Connor pinned against the far wall, and the older werewolf was going for Connor’s throat.
Gathering all his strength, Duncan lunged across the room. Before Ian could slice open Connor’s throat, Duncan caught his hand. “That’s my brother,” Duncan said as his body vibrated with fury. “And you aren’t hurting him anymore.”
Connor’s gaze flew to Duncan. There was disbelief and wild hope fighting in his stare.
His stare…golden just like their mother’s had been.
I remember him now. From the moment that he’d seen Connor in that basement, the memories had started to push through the shadows in his mind. My brother.
Ian whirled to attack Duncan. His father had yanked the silver scalpel out of his chest and he drove that scalpel right toward Duncan’s heart.
And the bastard was smiling as he did it. “Let’s see you save someone now, hero.” The scalpel sank into his flesh.
Duncan glanced down at the weapon. “Isn’t it supposed to burn?”
Ian’s face paled.
Connor had fallen to the floor, but he was trying to stand once more.
“I think it’s supposed to burn.” Duncan’s fingers wrapped around the hilt of the knife. “Or at least it would, if I were just a werewolf. But I’m not.”
And silver didn’t hurt vampires.
All of the strengths. None of the weaknesses. Pate hadn’t been bullshitting after all.
So he pulled out that knife. Saw his blood dripping from the blade. “You destroyed my life that night.”
“She took you away from me! My flesh! My blood—”
The blood kept dripping from the scalpel. “It is your blood.” Duncan glared at him. “But I’m not you.”
Ian attacked with fangs bared and claws out. Kill or be killed. The way of the wolf.
Duncan wasn’t in the mood to die.
So he twisted his hand and pushed the scalpel into Ian’s heart, and this time, it did burn. Ian screamed. He clawed at his chest, but Duncan just drove the weapon in deeper. Smoke rose from Ian’s chest.
When Duncan finally stepped back, Ian hit the floor. His features were frozen in a final mask of horror. Shock.
Death.
“I’m not you,” Duncan said again. His mother had protected him from this monster. Given her life to keep him safe.
Duncan’s gaze rose to Connor. The other wolf was shuddering, but he was back on his feet. His wounds seemed to be closing.
Was he going to have to fight another battle? Duncan had just killed his father, he didn’t want to kill his brother, too.
“You…”
“I wish I could have saved you,” Duncan said, when Connor’s voice just trailed away. “I wish you’d been in that damn closet with me.”
Connor looked away. “You don’t…remember it all, do you?”
No.
“I-I was supposed to go in, but I was afraid of the dark.” His voice was hushed. “Mom told me that you would keep me safe inside, that we had to be quiet, but I was afraid.” He swallowed, and the small click was painful to hear. “So I ran out, screaming. That’s how he found us. He heard my scream. He killed her when she was reaching for me, and he took me away.”
Hell.
“I’m sorry,” Duncan said. Sorry for the life that Connor must have lived. For all the pain and suffering he’d endured.
“So am I.” Connor stared at him. The lines on his face seemed so deep. “I wish I’d stayed with you in the dark.”
“Duncan?”
His head turned at Holly’s call. She stood there, blood
on her, but alive.
He ran to her and pulled her close. She was trembling against him, and he knew her body was weak. Because she’d been fucking staked. “Drink from me,” he ordered as he forced her mouth to his neck.
He’d never forget seeing her so still.
His hands tightened around him as her teeth sank into his throat. The pleasure of her bite rocked through him. Holly. His Holly.
His.
Always.
Her tongue whispered over his skin as she fed lightly from him. “Take more,” he said.
Take everything.
The gas was still leaking from overhead. The humans would be down. They’d need help. They’d need—
The infirmary doors burst open. Duncan spun to face the new threat, shielding Holly with his body.
But the new threat was just Pate. With…Shane standing behind him. Pate had a gun in each hand. So did Shane.
Pate’s gaze raked the room, then landed on him. That stare hardened a bit when he saw just how tightly Duncan was holding Holly.
“Thought you might need a hand,” Pate said.
“He’s alpha…” These soft words came from Connor. “He doesn’t need anyone.”
Yes, he did. He needed Holly.
Shane approached Ian’s body.
“He’s the one who was working the escape from inside the prison,” Duncan said, voice flat. “He was also my father.”
Shane hissed out a breath. “And who put the silver in his heart?”
Holly’s fingers stroked over Duncan’s chest, as if she were trying to soothe him.
“I did,” Duncan told him.
Shane nodded. “It’s a bitch when the worst monsters are the ones who made us.” He turned away from the body. “Know how you feel. I had to take my father’s head in 1396.”
Thirteen—
“Did he tell you who was helping him on the outside?” Pate demanded. He hadn’t put his weapons up yet.
“Uh, you think we can work on turning off the gas?” Holly asked, and Duncan loved the slight snap in her words. “If Ian was telling the truth, it’s knocking out all of the humans.”
Pate finally put up his guns so that he could yank out a radio from his coat pocket. A few seconds later, he started talking to someone. Brent?
“Turn it off,” Pate ordered. “Now.”
The gas shut off. An alarm sounded.
Pate lowered the radio. “We’re on lockdown,” Pate said. “You, Shane, and I need to secure the prison and make sure no one gets off this island.”
“Just the three of us?” Duncan nodded. “Right. Piece of fucking cake.”
“I can help,” Holly said.
And he knew she could. Holly was strong. She was fierce.
But she was also more than just a killer, and they needed her skills. “The wounded are gonna come in. You’ll have to take care of them.” Because there was no telling how injured some of the guards—and prisoners—would be.
Her gaze slid to Connor. “I’ll start with him,” she murmured.
His Holly. A healer, not a killer.
Holly flashed her fangs. “But if you need me, you yell, and I’ll have your back.”
Or maybe, maybe she was both.
Duncan pressed a kiss to her lips. He loved her little fangs. Hell, he loved everything about her.
“I love you,” he said the words against her lips and felt the surprise that rippled through her.
Holly shook her head.
He caught her chin. Forced her to look straight into his eyes. “I love you.”
Maybe he’d been falling for her from the very first day—when she jabbed a needle in his arm and took his blood.
His Holly…always after his blood.
But he’d known for sure how he felt about her when he saw Holly lying so still on the infirmary floor. When her heart had stopped, his had, too.
Her lips began to lift in a small smile.
“Uh…we’ve got an island full of blood-thirsty monsters. A prison gone wild. Get your horny hands off my sister and follow orders, McGuire.”
Duncan spared a glance for Pate. “When this is over, I’m marrying her.”
Pate raised one brow. “When this is over, you’d damn well better.”
What?
“Did he tell you who was helping him?” Pate asked as his eyes cut to Ian’s prone body.
“No.” There hadn’t been time to force answers. Only time to live or die. “We just know that he’s in the FBI, someone high up, and that he’s a werewolf.”
Pate’s eyelashes flickered. “That’s more than enough.”
“You know who the bastard is?”
“No, but I know how to trap him now, and for the moment, that’s good enough.”
There was no more time for talk then. They could hear voices crying out in pain and screaming for help. They ran out, heading to fight, and Duncan looked back just once before he followed Pate.
Holly was beside Connor. Helping him lie down on a gurney.
Saving his brother.
Just as she’d saved him.
***
She stitched up the humans and the werewolves. Gave bagged blood to the vampires who needed it in order to survive.
Two men died. Humans. Guards who just didn’t wake up from whatever gas Ian had sent pumping through the ventilation.
Five other guards were caught—all wearing gas masks—as they tried to leave the prison.
Now they were the prisoners. Held in a cell just beyond the infirmary.
“Bite them,” the order came from Pate, but it wasn’t an order he gave to her. Holly glanced up and saw Shane closing in on the men. “Make them tell us everything they know.”
Holly eased out a slow breath. Compulsion. Pate wasn’t going to stop until he had his answers.
He glanced over at her. His eyes narrowed on her face. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” She tossed away her bloody gloves. All the patients had been tended to. Or at least, she’d done what she could. More guards had been flown in on choppers, more doctors, too.
Things were under control in Purgatory, for the most part.
“Don’t look at me like I’m a stranger,” Pate said. There actually seemed to be pain whispering in his voice.
She realized that was exactly the way she’d seen him. “I don’t know you anymore.”
He turned and caught her hands. Behind him, she saw Shane enter the cell with the guards.
Pate said, “I never wanted to risk you, not in any way.”
“But you’d risk Duncan?” Because he had.
“I had a job to do. More lives that you can guess were depending on me.”
“That doesn’t make Duncan expendable.”
Pate shook his head. “No.”
“Were you setting him up all along, just so that he’d be strong enough to fight whoever was waiting in this prison?”
Pate searched her eyes. “He wanted you. I saw it in his eyes the first time he looked at you.”
That wasn’t an answer to her question.
The infirmary doors squeaked open behind her. Duncan. She knew it was him without even looking. She could smell him. Feel him.
“You wanted him, I saw that, too, but you weren’t going to risk being with a human. You thought you were too dangerous.”
Her hands clenched within his grip.
“I knew what potential Duncan had inside of him, and I knew that if he was going to be with my sister, then he’d have to be strong enough to protect her.”
She didn’t want to hear this. She’d asked but—
“I made him strong enough.”
Insane. Cold-blooded.
Pate’s eyes cut over her shoulder. “You’re welcome, McGuire. Don’t worry, you can thank me later.”
Pate began to stalk past them.
Holly’s hand flew out. She grabbed Pate’s arm. “You owe him.”
He shrugged. “I owe a lot of people.”
“You owe him, and you
’re gonna pay.” Even if she had to make him do it.
“And just what payment is it that I owe?”
“Let his brother go.”
“What?” Duncan and Pate said at the same time.
Then Pate shook his head. “That man is a killer. There’s no way he’s leaving this island.”
Duncan had fallen silent once more.
“What if he’s not a killer? What if he’s not the man you think at all?” Because she’d seen a different side of Connor. He’d been in the infirmary, and he’d helped her work on the prisoners. He wasn’t a cold-blooded killer, she was sure of it. “Check him out. Dig deeper. Find out the truth about him. If he’s not the man you think, then let him go.”
Pate stared down at her. A tense moment passed, then, “You know I’d do anything for you.”
Even force her lover to become more than human? Yes, she was getting that idea. That terrifying, horrible idea.
Pate nodded grimly. “I’ll dig deeper. Shane can compel or you can or—”
“I can,” Duncan growled. “I’ll be the one to find out my brother’s secrets.”
“Fine.” Pate exhaled on a rough sigh. “If he isn’t the killer we think, he’ll go free. You have my word.”
Then Pate was walking away. Holly reached for Duncan’s hand.
“Oh, Duncan, just so you know…”
Pate had stopped near the guards’ cell. Shane was inside. The guards weren’t moving.
Duncan frowned at him.
“I was bullshitting before. Getting you amped before the battle. I do know your weakness, and I’m not talking about the desperate need you seem to have for my sister.” Pate glanced back at him. “If you ever hurt her, I’ll make everything that’s passed before this moment seem like a fucking cake walk for you. Got me?”
Duncan’s fingers twined with Holly’s. “I got you.” He didn’t sound scared, though.
Pate grunted and entered the cell.
Duncan’s attention turned back to Holly. “I got you,” he said again, the words softer.
They were in a prison for paranormals. She was a vampire. He was, well, alpha, but she’d never been happier than she was in that moment. “You won’t ever hurt me,” she said, absolutely sure of that.
“No, I won’t.” His lips feathered over hers. “I’ll just love you, for the rest of my life.”
He kissed her again, then he was pulling her from the infirmary. More federal agents were there. She knew that Pate had hand-picked all of those agents. She and Duncan passed them all, went outside, out into the darkness that waited.