Blood Torn (Blackthorn Book 3)

by Lindsay J. Pryor

  ‘What is wrong with you?’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with me, sweetheart. Be grateful for it.’

  ‘You’re seriously turning me down?’

  ‘I’m turning the serryn down, Phia. Not you.’

  ‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ she asked, yanking free.

  ‘What do you think it means?’ He reached for her arm again but she recoiled.

  ‘You have no right to do this!’ She snapped in frustration, her eyes wide with fury and desperation. ‘If you’re not male enough, I’ll find someone who is!’

  ‘Not male enough, huh?’ he said, stepping up to her, his temper fraying. ‘Maybe it’s because I am male enough that I know when to say no. Do you know how many out there would willingly take you up on your offer? Not even wait for you to offer?’

  ‘But not you, huh? Am I really that detestable to you, Jask? Do you not like what you see? Do you not like the real me?’

  ‘This isn’t the real you, Phia.’

  ‘Oh, and you’d know that, would you? Less than two days and you know all about me.’

  ‘I know more than you’re comfortable with. More than you want me to know – and that in there is not you.’

  ‘Yeah, well I know you too, Jask.’

  ‘Then you’ll know that, unlike you, I’m not taking my eye off the ball for a quick fuck in some dirty, backstreet alley. You deserve better than this. And you’re worth more.’

  Tears clouded her eyes. ‘No, what I deserve is to know how it feels. To have one moment – just one moment of knowing what it feels like to have one of those vampires exactly where I want them. Not whilst I’m chained to a wall – I mean for real. I want to know I can do it. I need to know I can do it. And I almost did until you ruined it!’

  His heart could have flatlined. ‘What did you say?’

  Her eyes flared in minor panic – a reaction that told him everything he needed to know.

  And it was a confirmation that sickened him.

  He took a step towards her. ‘How long have you been a serryn, Phia?’

  She stepped back as much in regret as avoidance and wariness.

  He closed the gap between them as her back hit the handrail of the steps. He caught her jaw and stared deep into her eyes. ‘I asked you a question.’

  Her eyes darted between his, her cheeks flushed, her lips parted. In the shock of it, she was starting to return to herself – and with it, the guardedness was coming back.

  He tightened his grip on her jaw. ‘How long?’ he demanded quietly.

  He knew he was tightening his grip out of his own frustration, from the realisation of what was staring back at him. But not purely from anger that his plans for her were ruined – more from the fear of how the situation with Zee could have turned out.

  ‘Since the night you found me,’ she said quietly.

  ‘And before that?’

  ‘Just human.’

  She may as well have punched him.

  ‘How?’ he said. ‘How did you change? Why?’

  This time, as she stared back at him in silence, he knew he was getting nothing more out of her unless he did hurt her. But right then he had the feeling not even that would make her talk.

  It was over. His hope to use her was over. A less-than-two-day-old serryn would be useless up against an established witch. She’d know in an instant.

  His pack was lost.

  He felt sick.

  But even sicker knowing that, by not trusting his instincts, his instincts that constantly told him something wasn’t right about her, he’d let her go out there alone. The thought of what could have happened to her, what he could have found, made his chest burn.

  ‘You’re a fucking liability,’ he said, grabbing her wrist. ‘You’re going back to the compound and I’m handling this myself.’

  ‘No! You can’t!’

  ‘You watch me,’ he said, all but dragging her down the alley.

  ‘No!’ she said. ‘We came into this together!’

  ‘I saw you,’ he said, spinning to face her. ‘I saw you unable to stop. Serryn or not, that’s all it ever is with you, isn’t it? You never know when to pull back, when enough is enough. You lack discipline, you lack control, you lack foresight and you lack the common sense to know how to play the game. So yes, that makes you too much of a liability to work with me. And now that I know you’re not even a proper fucking serryn…’ He hissed before marching them both towards the main street.

  ‘Then I’ll work on my own,’ she said. ‘You are not making me go back to the compound. Marid is my issue. And I am not being shoved out of it now because I’m some kind of inconvenience.’

  He stopped and stared at her again, raindrops glistening on her hair like a tiara, her eyes wide with frustration, her now free hands clenched with resentment.

  He had to understand her.

  He needed to know what the hell was going on inside the head of the female who he dared care enough about to ask the question in the first place.

  ‘What is it with you, Phia? Why this fight? Because of your mother? Some vengeance tirade? Do you think this is what she wants for you?’

  ‘I have to.’

  He stepped closer. ‘Why?’

  When he was met with her silence he raised his voice to a level he hadn’t used in a long time.

  ‘Why?!’ he demanded.

  ‘Because it’s my fault!’ she said. ‘It’s my fault she died. I killed her.’

  She stood there trembling – and not just from the cold, the shock, or from whatever was now waning from her system. But because everything was finally spilling from inside her. The hurt in her eyes was painful.

  ‘But you said she was killed by a vampire.’

  ‘In a place she never should have been.’

  ‘Phia, you’re not making any sense.’

  She clammed up again, her gaze dropping from his, those hands tightening to fists.

  He had to strike before he lost her.

  ‘Fine,’ he said, reaching for her again. ‘If you won’t talk, you’re going back to the compound.’

  She recoiled from his grip. ‘She was in Midtown because of me. She shouldn’t have been there.’

  She stared at him in the silence, tears accumulating behind the raindrops. Her breathing became laboured as she gasped to repress her tears. But she didn’t seem to care enough to wipe them away when they finally did emerge.

  ‘Have you any idea how that feels?’ she asked, her brows knitted tightly together, her eyes wide despite it. ‘To hate yourself so much? Really hate yourself, to the point you can’t even look in the mirror? You stand there in judgement of me and my behaviour. Go ahead. You can’t judge me any worse than I judge myself. Because it’s all my fault. My stupid fault. And I despise myself that I’m still here and she isn’t. You want to know why I have a self-destruct button? Well, it’s because I don’t care. I don’t care what happens to me as long as I wipe every one of those things off the face of this planet. So don’t you dare tell me now that I can actually, really do something about it that you’re going to stop me – because no one is stopping me from doing this.’

  She stood motionless aside from the subtle tremble in her lips, the shallow but rapid heaving of her chest, all the while glowering at him like he was clueless.

  Only he knew exactly how it felt. He knew every one of those emotions spilling over from inside her. And the self-loathing he knew better than anything.

  If it hadn’t been for his pack, he would have been dead years ago. If Corbin hadn’t dragged him out of every fight, every confrontation, every drunken assault – anything where he could feel pain, feel just an inch of what he had inflicted on Ellen. Back when he’d wanted nothing but to spit on the world around him and spread the disease of his anger.

  And now the Phia glaring back at him was a reflection of how he’d once been.

  He saw it all behind those wild eyes as she’d condemned herself.

  Her life was just on
e incident after another in a long line of defiance, of disorder, or rebellion. Though she had survived that day in the lake, Phia had never stopped drowning. Every day she was grappling, gasping for air and reaching out for something to grab on to. All the while she was sinking deeper, pulled under by her own wild ferocity – kicking away anyone who tried to save her, mistaking them for a further threat amidst her panic. In Phia’s head, she was still fighting for the surface.

  Only now he saw far beyond the irrational, arrogant and petulant girl to the true one, who was lost, alone and scared. The one who carried a burden too heavy of guilt and self-hatred and regret. A plight that had since been worsened by a curse coursing through her veins. A curse that was beyond her control. A curse that had taken hold of an already vulnerable soul.

  But there was no way that self-destruct button was going off in his presence – not now he’d dared to feel something for her. Not now that he saw more than ever how his polar opposite undeniably had more similar traits than he could ignore. Not now that the female who stared back at him with that unrelenting chaos back in her eyes was far too deeply embedded.

  He’d help her. His first instinct was to help her. But not until he got his head around what the fuck he was going to do about it all.

  ‘This downward spiral tirade you’re on will get you nowhere,’ he said.

  ‘You can’t stop me.’

  ‘I fucking well can. And I will. Which is why you’re going back to the compound.’

  She recoiled further. ‘No! Please, Jask. I can do this. I need to do it. Keep me with you and I’ll do what you want. Tell me what you want me to do. We’ll do that first if that’s what it takes. Please.’

  The desperation in her eyes tore through him. The pleas as she stood there with her defences down, the mission so important to her that she didn’t care he saw it, gave him a power over her that he hated.

  ‘You’re not ready.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’ She stepped closer to him, her eyes painfully searching his for hope that only he could give her. ‘It’s about more than my mother, Jask. It’s about all I have left. I fucked up the mission with the Dehains. Whoever came after The Alliance came after them because of me. I need to find who’s responsible. I have to put this right. You do understand that, don’t you, Jask?’

  ‘I can find Marid without you. I can get answers.’

  ‘No you can’t. You must know how big Drake’s is. You might be able to sniff him out eventually, but I bet he sees you coming first. Only I kept my eyes open when they led me out of there. All I needed was the name of the estate and the building. Now I can lead you right to his room. You need me for this. Neither of us can risk losing our only lead.’

  He stared up at the sky, at the pending storm, the indecision between wanting to protect her, wanting to keep her close, and needing to do what was right for their mission all winning their own battles in the seconds that passed.

  ‘Come on, Jask. You know it makes sense. You’re smarter than this. I promise I’ll be on my best behaviour.’

  He looked back at her, into those wide and expectant eyes, as she bit into her bottom lip.

  Eyes that he swore could melt even his most rigid resolution.

  ‘I’d better not fucking regret this,’ he said, taking her hand a little too sharply before frogmarching her back down the alley.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  They ploughed through the spitting rain, through the crowds.

  Sophia tried to maintain her focus, but something was stirring inside again – something provoked by rubbing shoulders with so many vampires. Like a gambler stepping into a casino, temptation was all around her.

  Only the pull felt even stronger than before. Even stronger than when she’d headed to Daniel’s place and to the safe house. Even stronger than when heading to Hemlick’s. Her encounter with Zee had unearthed something. Something that was fast becoming harder to control than she’d conceived.

  Her hand loosened in Jask’s as she felt herself being drawn back into the crowds. But sensing it, he only held on tighter, pulling her closer, proving that fate really had thrown her a lifeline in the shape of the lycan. A lycan who now led her purposefully through the darkness and density ahead.

  Every instinct of self-preservation resented it, but for the first time in years she needed someone. The very feeling she had tried to avoid, to shut out, for all that time, was inevitably rising to the surface.

  And it was only proven more when someone pushed between them, her heart jolting as their hands were pulled apart.

  But they only lost contact for a second before Jask had hold of her again, this time tighter, this time his fingers interlaced with hers to secure his grip.

  Only when the crowds gradually dispersed, as they left them behind, did he finally release her.

  As they picked up a steady pace along the quieter streets, as her head became clearer, so too came a flush of embarrassment as recollections of pinning him against the wall, of lowering to her knees, of taking him in her mouth, came flooding back. And the persistence… the pulling at his trousers… let alone the words that had slipped from her mouth.

  At the time she’d felt like an outsider looking in on herself. She’d felt so distant, not there in the moment at all – conscious of what she was doing, but unable to stop herself. She’d wanted him so badly. So badly.

  And he’d said no.

  She lowered her gaze to the pavement, the humiliation taking full hold as they turned down another street.

  She wondered if he sensed her awkwardness, but he didn’t say anything. Just as he didn’t say anything further about her serrynity. She could tell he was annoyed – annoyance that was only suppressed by a sense of purpose.

  ‘Are you taking me up on my offer?’ she asked. ‘Are we going to do what you need me to do first?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I need you completely level-headed and at ease for that. And I don’t think you’re going to get to that stage until we get answers.’

  ‘Taking a risk, aren’t you? How are you going to persuade me to do what you want if you’ve done everything I want first?’

  He looked down at her, but this time he didn’t answer.

  Jask took a left down a lane, led her through concrete forecourts before heading across a short patch of wasteland.

  They stopped at the periphery of the abandoned housing estate. The multi-storey blocks loomed down at them – the regimented windows and concrete balconies reflecting more an abandoned institution than a once thriving residential area.

  Jask led the way through the buildings, weaving through block after block, the overgrowth, the litter, abandoned cars and household items.

  Her heart skipped a beat as she saw the play area in the distance, tucked behind rusted, buckled railings.

  Children were now few and far between in Blackthorn, most of them kept locked away – mainly from the cons. Vampires had even fewer young than the lycans. They rarely chose to reproduce and usually vampires did so only much later in life when they wanted to continue their line. So the play parks remained abandoned and damaged. It was a haunting sight but no more than the emptiness that loomed from the vacant apartments that surrounded them.

  But the park, the faded pink elephant rocker with the broken ear, told her they were there.

  ‘This is the Regency,’ he said, before she had time to say the same. ‘But there are several ways in.’

  She looked ahead at the doorway. ‘That’s the one,’ she said. ‘That’s where they brought me out.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She nodded, a chill creeping over her. ‘Oh, I’m sure.’

  It had been the first thing she’d seen as she’d been led out of the building. That was before she’d nearly fallen face first into the wall after she’d managed to wrench herself from their grasp. The graffiti face that had loomed back at her in partial shock and distaste was one she would never forget.

  And it stared across the park at her now, rig
ht next to the doorway.

  ‘I kept my eyes open so I could find my way back,’ she said.

  As she felt his gaze burning into her, she looked back at him, his eyebrows raised slightly.

  She shrugged. ‘You don’t think I was going to let him off that easily, do you?’

  He looked back at the building and scanned the windows. ‘Then let’s be quick about it.’

  Marching over, Jask yanked open the door, instantly tucking Phia behind him.

  ‘I don’t need your protection,’ she whispered.

  But his swift glower was enough to silence her as they stepped inside.

  Jask was perfectly still for a moment, and she knew he was listening out for the slightest sound as well as taking in scents in the air.

  The fact he stepped further into the confines reassured her all was okay.

  Dust motes lingered in the air, glistening in the weak moonlight as they made their way along the empty corridor, deeper into the darkness.

  As they stopped at the stairs, he indicated upwards but Sophia shook her head, cocking it to the right instead. She remembered the elevators ahead, the corridor that spanned to the right.

  As they turned the corner, Phia pointed towards the metal balustrade cornering off a stone staircase. Steps that descended to another level. Steps that led to the basement.

  He frowned.

  She nodded. ‘Definitely,’ she mouthed.

  He led the way down the steps, down to the door below. But it wasn’t locked. It wasn’t even properly on its hinges.

  He looked back at her and she could tell he was contemplating leaving her behind.

  She shook her head in warning, giving him her best stubborn glare. He seemed to pick up on the fact there was no way he was going in there without her.

  Clenching his jaw, he turned his attention back to the door. Deftly, silently, he eased it aside.

  It was a tight space, poorly lit other than a hint of light coming from an open door to the left.

  A room Sophia remembered only too well.

  Seeing it again flooded her with anger and resentment, with renewed humiliation, not least as Jask stood alongside her and finally saw for himself what she had been through.