She lifted a brow. Even to him it sounded absurd. His fights up to this point had been about desperate survival. He wouldn’t have bested that demon without Ophelia’s help. He was so out of his league, but he excelled at caring for people.
“Never mind.” He unloaded his holster and his weapons and handed them to her. Then he tugged his shirt off.
She accepted it all with impatient efficiency. “Leave now so I can go after Quentin.”
He did as she asked. Because as soon as he got Antonia inside the compound’s walls, he could notify the others. Ophelia needed help and she wasn’t going to wait for it.
Chapter Sixteen
Ophelia stripped off her dress, careful of her throbbing arm. Keeping her weight off the leg that Gaston had pummeled, she swayed as she shrugged into Bastian’s shirt. Its warmth encompassed her. His scent surrounded her, doing nothing but remind her that his blood could quench her thirst. It could heal her within minutes.
But he was gone, as he should be. Without Antonia to worry about, Ophelia could dismantle this place to get to Quentin Segal.
Her stomach heaved as she threaded her broken arm through the shirt. Agony made sparks dance in her vision. Her femur was fractured at the very least and her arm likely sported more breaks than it had several minutes ago.
Master Gaston had noticed her favoring her limb and he’d concentrated his attack on her left side. But she’d come out on top and he’d come out in a billion pieces of dust.
At least she hadn’t had to do it in front of Antonia. And Bastian had ashed Marcus. Bonus.
She managed to wrestle herself into Bastian’s holster. It hung off her frame as badly as her shirt, but like the cozy material, it provided more protection than that damn dress.
With knife in hand, she trotted back the way she came. She clamped her teeth together and gritted through the storm of pain assaulting her body. If they heard the noise and came to check on her and Antonia, she wanted to be there to greet them—with a few rounds of lead.
The way she hobbled, a mixture of hopping and running, she worried she’d alert them to her location. She needed to get the jump on them if she was to have a decent chance with her injuries.
The thought of shooting a kid stalled her. He’d heal, but she’d have to stop him while killing Roberts and then wait for her team to arrive with the spell to oust the demon from him.
Then what, she didn’t know. The boy would need a watchful eye and a lot of therapy. And Lora was still alive, but Ophelia was sure the Synod would take care of that. Hopefully before they went public with the underworld interference.
They needed to go public, though. How many more teens had to go missing, or even younger children, before the Synod realized Bastian was correct? They could get ahead of this issue by having more eyes and ears knowing what to watch and listen for.
Yes, there might be those who would choose to dabble in things best left alone. But that was happening anyway.
She limped down the stairs and flitted through the kitchen. She smelled them before she got to the dining hall.
“Where the hell could they have gone?” Finneus roared.
“You said these bolts would hold,” grated Spectre.
“Dammit, yes! They should’ve. Ophelia’s not that strong.”
Fucker. She had to hurry. As plastered in blood as she was, they’d smell her presence.
“Look at me, Roberts.”
“Fuck you, demon.”
She tiptoed to the entrance, slipping the gun out as she went. The motion wasn’t enough to distract her from the pain. She stumbled, hissing in a breath when she caught herself with her bad leg. They went silent.
Dammit! She spun into the entrance. As soon as they were in sight, she opened fire. She emptied the clip, switching to aim at Quentin only once. They were so stunned from the first round searing into them that they didn’t move. Quentin dropped from the gunshot to his leg.
She swallowed her bile. Had to be done. Had to be done. It was the only way to save him.
The gun clicked. Empty. She tossed it and sprinted forward, knife clenched in her good hand. A real blade, not cutlery. It felt good; it felt right. Much more like her than the heels and the dress.
She charged toward her targets, ignoring the fire in the soles of her bare feet and the howls from her thigh muscles.
Finneus recovered first, though that may not be the correct word. He noticed her and lurched forward. The hands that had been clutching his chest rose into a defensive position. Blood dripped from them.
Now Finneus, she hadn’t spared. She’d aimed for organs—major ones.
She closed the distance between them. When she was several feet away, she planted her right foot and jumped. Using her good elbow, she plowed it into his face. It connected and bone crunched. His head flung backward and his body followed. She landed next to him and collapsed in a heap. Her leg refused to support her.
She crawled on her good side to Quentin. He spun, his mouth open in a silent scream.
Ah hell. The demon had retreated. The coward was leaving the kid to deal with the pain.
She had no supplies at her disposal, but she had the harness and the rag around her thigh. Yanking Quentin’s legs out from under him, she dropped her knife to drag him closer to her.
He hollered and wiggled. The pain tormented him too much to put up a solid fight. The poor kid should still be oblivious that a body could hurt that badly.
Flipping him to his back, she crawled on top of him, and between her usable knee and right hand, she hog-tied him with the holster.
It wouldn’t be enough. He’d get his wits back and realize he was strong enough to just walk out of his restraints.
“Come on, come on, come on.” She pleaded for her team to show up as she dragged a protesting Quentin to the table.
“What are you doing? Ah—fuck. What the hell are you doing with me?”
Did the kid even know he was possessed? Had Lora tricked him into it and the boy went into la-la land when Spectre took over?
All of them had been out of the prime network for so long, none of the others had probably ever been here. They’d have to drive.
How long had it been since Bastian left?
She hopped around to look for any chains that weren’t attached. Locating two, she balanced well enough to pick them up. She used those to tie his hands together.
Stepping back to monitor her work, she glanced over her shoulder. Damn. Finneus was whimpering and twitching. He’d come to and, like her, be able to work around his injuries. Then they’d be two broke-down fuckers fighting each other. He had useable limbs, but his torso was full of bullet holes. Half her limbs were broken, but her torso was only full of bruises.
Quentin turned his head and blinked. So young. She sighed and met his gaze.
A smug smile curled his lips and black infused his gaze.
She couldn’t look away. Her world dimmed, like she was going underwater and didn’t want to surface. So peaceful.
She’d stand here and watch Quentin until her team came. Yeah, that was a good plan. She heard the whisper of clothing and grunts of pain behind her, but they didn’t concern her. She just had to keep watching Quentin.
Chapter Seventeen
“Don’t look in his eyes!”
Bastian?
But he wasn’t her team. She had to watch Quentin. That’s all she had to do until her team arrived.
“Ophelia!”
Geez, Bastian. Don’t you see I have a job to do?
She didn’t turn her head to look at him. Didn’t want to.
He jumped between her and Quentin and shook her shoulders.
Light burst behind her eyes, and she gasped like she really had been underwater. Pain ricocheted through her from head to toe.
“Ow, my fucking arm, Bastian.” She blinked. What had she been doing?
“He can trance you. That’s how he abducted Antonia. Don’t lo
ok him in the eyes.” A still-shirtless Bastian stepped to the side. She averted her gaze from Quentin’s. “Roberts was coming up behind you, but he turned and ran when he saw me. He can’t have gone far.”
“We need to get Quentin out of here and work that spell.”
Bastian nodded, glaring in the direction Finneus had gone. “It’s almost dawn. I can carry him.” He spun and hoisted a hog-tied and squirming Quentin in his arms.
“Bastian? Dude, what the hell are you doing? Come on. It’s just me.”
Bastian stared straight ahead. “Don’t play stupid, demon. We know everything, and we know you know everything.”
Quentin snapped his mouth shut, his fangs clicking together.
She took a measured step. Her knee buckled, but she caught herself. She sucked in a lungful of air. Each step she took, the same thing happened. She’d had a long night, fighting off the drugs and a few vampires, and was sorely in need of healing blood.
Bastian was in the doorway before he turned to see how far behind she really was.
“Hellfire, Ophelia. I’m sorry. I—”
“Go.”
He opened his mouth to argue, but she cut him off before he made a sound.
“Just like Antonia. He’s the priority.”
Bastian stared at her for another heartbeat. “I’m coming back for you.”
“Again.” She gave him a smile that had to be creased with lines of pain. “I know. Then I can tell you that you were right.”
“I don’t care about that.” He gave her one last earnest look. “I’ll be back.”
“It’s almost sunrise. Don’t endanger yourself.”
He rushed off as if he hadn’t heard her. Quentin’s coaxing faded the farther away he got.
She hobbled farther, allowing herself to slow. Despite the sad state of her body, a smile played over her lips.
Bastian. She believed him. He didn’t care about being right. He only cared about those he…loved.
Could she be lucky enough to be included among those? Her motivation to gut through the blinding pain was knowing how good it’d feel to sup from him and be cradled in his arms all day as she healed.
There were no thoughts of physical satisfaction other than being close to him. She’d never had those feelings before. She wanted him around. She wanted to be around him. She wanted to cook breakfast every night and come home to him.
Domestic bliss with a domestic god.
Nice.
She wove through the kitchen. Her pace increased when she could use the counters for support.
She looked around for anything she could use as a makeshift cane. Wrong room. She wasn’t up to wrenching apart stainless steel.
Clearing the kitchen, she faced the stairs. A scraping sound caught her attention.
Spinning around, her eyes flew wide.
A bloodied, swollen, enraged Finneus charged her. In his hand was a silver blade. A steak knife.
It hadn’t occurred to her to grab another knife. She was on her way to freedom, dammit!
Throwing up her arms, her weight shifted to her injured leg and she dropped with a cry.
He plowed into her, but the knife went over her head. She punched upward, but his leg jostled hers and she lost her momentum, more white stars blazing across her vision.
Again with Finneus. She punched him once more. Strong body against strong limbs. Aiming for his gut where she’d gotten a few bullets in, she didn’t let up until he dropped on top of her.
“You…” he shouted, still on his knees and struggling to stick his knife in her. “Are a giant… pain”—pink spittle sprayed across her face—“in the ass.”
She wriggled out from under him and shoved his face backward, followed by a kick to his blood-soaked abdomen. Aiming her next kick for his hand, the blade clattered to the floor.
He paused in his assault on her to scramble for his meager weapon. She pushed herself up the steps, keeping her eye on him. This was the best place for a showdown. He couldn’t advance very well without her kicking him, and she couldn’t fall because the angle of the stairs propped her up.
But there was an exit door at the top of the stairs and if she could take this business outside, she might have a chance of killing him with her bare hands. Well, bare hand. Her broken and swollen one bordered on useless.
She got up a few more steps, breathing heavier than she ought to be. How much blood had she lost? Or was it all pooling in her injured extremities?
Finneus gave a shout of triumph when he wrapped his hand around his tiny blade. But it was still a hell of an advantage to her nothing.
One more stair. She didn’t dare look back to see how far she had yet to go, but she must have half a flight. The scent of crisp, cool outdoor air wafted through the stairwell. She was so close, and so was dawn.
Finneus rose, but he couldn’t straighten. It was like the dried blood pasted his clothing together, while new blood cemented the fabric to his skin.
Keep bleeding.
She kept moving. Grunt. Up another step.
He advanced, and no matter how fearsome of a facade he put on, he couldn’t hide the misery his body was putting him in. They’d been through a nasty night and it was still a draw on who’d come out alive.
He crept closer, unable to move very fast, his knuckles white with a death grip on the railing to keep upright.
She continued her backward flight. Propping her hand behind her, she wanted to whoop when her fingers met air instead of another stair. The landing!
Her exuberance faded. If she scooted onto the landing, then how was she going to stand and defend herself while doing it?
Shit.
Finneus’s menacing gaze was full of deadly promise. She summoned the last of her strength and rose to her good leg. She spun and hopped to the next step. Getting outside was paramount; the sun was her best weapon.
Finneus roared and she pictured him hauling himself up each step by sliding against the railing.
Her heart raced, and each beat reverberated in the broken limbs. Each time she tensed to hop—and worse, land—the pain sent new waves of nausea coursing through her. She tightened her belly. She would not puke while hopping.
The exit was close. Only six feet away.
“Ophelia!” Finneus had cleared the top.
She risked a look over her shoulder, and terror flooded her system. He was within reach and was raising the knife to strike at her.
She flung herself out the door. A screech of metal echoed across the yard and the wham of the door busting off its hinges and hitting the exterior mingled with Finneus’s enraged shout. She tumbled across the yard to land on her face twenty feet away.
Her mouth stretched open in a silent cry. Ow! For fuck’s sake that hurt.
“We’ll both die, bitch!”
Craning her head to the side, she monitored him at the door, willing him to come outside.
Weak heat caressed her muscles. This was her favorite part of the day—used to be her favorite part. Snuggled in Bastian’s arms during the daylight hours sounded much better than greeting the dawn. Her self-destructive habit had lost its appeal.
Didn’t mean she wanted to quit being around for the sunrise.
Finneus glanced at the horizon visible beyond the trees. Not many of their kind dabbled in testing their sunlight resistance.
What if he flashed away when he stepped outside? It’d make this evening feel like it was for nothing.
She forced out a chuckle, but it sounded like a wheezing pant. “What’s the matter, Finneus? Fear you’re too weak?”
Anger sparked in his eyes. Yes. The taunt worked.
“I seem to be doing okay, but then, my blood was always stronger.” She kept going, even when she wanted to just lay her head down and soak up the warmth offered by the sky. “Isn’t that why you always wanted to feed from me?”
Finneus was a proud male, arrogant to a fault. It was what had drawn
her to him over the last several years before she’d settled on poor treatment from Nadair.
If all those rounds of sex with Finneus had given her the ammunition to destroy him, then she wouldn’t regret it. What had Bastian said? Her past made her strong.
“You opened your legs and offered a vein for anyone,” he sneered but took a tentative step toward her, blinking as if noonday rays shone down on him.
She laughed, and it wasn’t much stronger than her attempt at chuckling. “I had to because no one ever satisfied me.”
Yep, that cut him.
His nostrils flared and he advanced. A cough doubled him over. Red foam bubbled out of his mouth and he propped a hand on his knee. He kept that stance as he stumble-stepped toward her.
“You’ll be”—pant—“satisfied as I stake you to the ground”—pant—“with this knife and let you boil like a lobster as the sun rises.”
He squinted at the sky and used the hand clutching his knife to wipe imaginary sweat off his brow.
Good, he was sorely unused to the sun. Her skin was warming, but she wasn’t uncomfortable—yet. If he truly managed to incapacitate her, then she really would end up as a pile of ash like Gaston.
She wrestled up on her elbow, making it look like she was trying to slide away from him when she was trying to angle herself better.
He made it within feet of her, looming over her with a nasty sneer. The skin on his face had already deepened a few shades of red. From the sun or anger? “Today you die, Ophelia. I’m sick of your meddling.”
She quirked a brow. “You sold yourself. You sold kids. You’re not a male of worth, no matter who your parents were.”
He bared his fangs and tensed to jump on her. She lashed out with her leg and swept his feet out from under him.
She groaned. The motion jostled her pained body. Finneus dropped and fell on her.
“You—” He sucked in a gasp. “So hot.”
He forgot her and glanced back to the entrance to the building. His eyes blanked, and she panicked. She could not allow him to flash to safety.
She hugged him to her, squeezing his torso as hard as she could. By now, her hold wasn’t very strong, but neither was Finneus’s. She probed with her fingers and he rocked against her, trying to get away. If she could keep him in such pain that he couldn’t flash, then her plan might work. Unfortunately, it’d work against her, too. Her ability to flash was hindered by the state of her body, but she wouldn’t let it stop her.
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