by E A Price
Her master was Matthew, the middle son, while these two must be Seth and Noah. One of the males sported darker hair and deeper lines in his face than the other two brothers. He had to be Seth, the eldest. He gave her a sneer. While the youngest brother, Noah leered at her openly.
Katherine looked up and smirked. “Is this her? Honestly, Matthew, the way you talk about her, anyone would think she was some kind of goddess, not some tiny, sour-faced thing.”
He tensed slightly. The hand on her back hardening, but he forced himself to relax. “Now, now, Mother, be kind to my future mate.”
Juliet placed a hand over her stomach. Ugh, she wanted to throw up. If she’d had any food in her stomach, she suspected she would have already. She should have allowed Ryder to bond with her when he had the chance. Even if it might have killed her, it would have been preferable to where she was at that moment. For now she was playing along, and had even submitted to squeezing herself into one of the slinky dresses provided for her, but as soon as she could manage it, she was out of there.
Katherine let out an enormous, theatrical sigh. “How am I supposed to react to the creature who first of all keeps my son away from me for years, then tried to murder him and will now take him away from me for good when she mates him.”
Juliet opened her mouth to argue that she could keep him, but she feared that would cause other problems and clamped her lips together.
“Come now, Mother,” argued Master, or Matthew as she should perhaps think of him – he was no longer her master. “I have found my mate again; I would think you would be pleased for me.”
The queen pouted and shooed her attendants away. “Well, let me see her. Come here, girl.”
Matthew gave her a small push, and with leaden feet, she walked towards Katherine, aware of every eye in the room being on her. With speed that belied her rounded frame, the older vampire was beside her in seconds. Juliet let out a yelp, and this pleased Katherine immensely. Out of the corner of her eye, Juliet noticed the jaguars stirring.
Katherine smirked as she circled Juliet. The female was wearing a diaphanous ball gown in green. She looked like a stuffed avocado.
“Really, Matthew,” the female chided, “you could do so much better. Such a plain, ugly thing – and what a dumpy little body! What male in his right mind would lust after this? Darling, I will find you someone much more appropriate. Someone less likely to leave you for dead.”
Juliet stared ahead. Dumpy? Pot calling the kettle fat! But she didn’t care. She was more than happy for Matthew to throw her over for another female. In fact, it would delight her in a way that nothing else could.
Seth growled impatiently. “Who on earth cares about who Matthew wishes to mate? We have other matters to attend.”
Katherine gripped Juliet’s arm and squeezed, her eyes lit up with happiness as she saw the anguished look on Juliet’s face. Juliet felt Matthew’s presence behind her.
“Mother,” he warned. “Don’t damage her.”
Juliet pressed her lips together. That was a bit rich considering everything he’d done to her over the years.
Katherine pouted. “You deserve better, darling. Why won’t you listen to mother?”
Juliet tried to stifle a laugh, but a sharp breath left her. Katherine snapped her eyes back to her, flashing red and steam almost curling out of her nostrils. Juliet couldn’t help it. The woman clearly had an unhealthy obsession with her sons. She couldn’t bear to let them go.
“We should kill her for what she did to you,” Katherine hissed.
Matthew growled and pulled Juliet into his arms. “You will not touch her, Mother!”
As awful as it felt to be in his grasp again, Juliet couldn’t deny that this was probably the safest place to be.
The queen snarled and instantly, her youngest son, Noah, was next to her, the leer still on his face. He patted his mother’s shoulders.
“Come on, Mother. Matthew can mate with whoever he wishes.”
Great. Noah was just another pervy Rodrigo. She needed to get out of this hellhole pronto, find Ryder and run like hell. Hell, she hoped Ryder was okay. He was tough; he could take care of himself… she hoped. Her stomach swirled. She hoped that was just indigestion. Her mind flickered to what Rick had told her. According to your blood, you’re pregnant. Best not to say that in front of these vampires.
Seth tapped his foot. “Really, Mother, we do have other matters that are of more concern.”
The queen gave Juliet one last glower and flounced away as easily as her bulk would allow.
“Don’t worry,” murmured Matthew in her ear, “we won’t see her often. I am having my castle rebuilt. We will live there again, and it will be just like the good old days again. Just me and you forever.”
Just when things couldn’t seem any worse.
Chapter Thirty-Three
“Fuck that place looks more heavily guarded than… than…” Ryder faltered. “Fuck I’m too angry to think of anything.”
What the hell was Juliet doing in there? Why had they taken her? He wondered if it was because of him – because of them being mates. Whatever the reason, it didn’t matter. Getting her back was the only thing that mattered.
The enormous house was surrounded by a huge fence, and vampires patrolled the grounds with what Ryder first took to be dogs, but on closer inspection, he noticed they were something else entirely.
“Are those fucking leopards?”
Frank shook his head. “Jaguars.”
“Ah good, I was worried for a second,” he replied with just a hint of sarcasm.
Frank smiled. “The vampires are the ones to watch.”
“Wily bastards.”
Frank chuckled.
“What are we waiting for? We need to get in there. We’re losing nighttime.”
“We run on in there; they’ll tear us to pieces before we even get the chance to know what it’s like to be attacked by a jaguar.”
They were currently hiding, half a mile away in the grounds of another McMansion. According to Frank, all the huge houses in the area belonged to vampires. Ryder guessed you would need to live a few centuries in order to accrue enough wealth to buy one. This one was clearly unoccupied at that moment. Calder was adept with electronics and had disabled the alarm.
“We need a distraction,” said Ingrid.
“I’ll march right on over and tell them I’m selling chocolate bars to send my school band to Washington, shall I?!” howled Ryder.
Typical freaking vampires grumbled his beast. Always wanting to waste time talking things to death. They seemed to think they had years to mull over a problem. Well, Juliet didn’t have years. For all they knew, she had minutes, and something needed to happen.
Ingrid arched a pair of perfect eyebrows, and her bear shifter mate growled. “Take it easy. We’re waiting for our man on the inside.”
“Man on the inside?”
“Someone close to the queen. Told us she was coming to town. He’ll find us a way in.”
“And you’re just telling me now?!”
Frank snatched up his cell phone a split second after it started ringing. “Yes?” He listened for a few seconds and then murmured, “fine.”
He looked at Ryder. “Your girl’s fine, for now. Her being there has nothing to do with you.”
“Why the hell did they take her then?”
“One of the queen’s sons has decided to claim her as a mate.”
Ryder goggled at him for a few seconds. Even his beast seemed surprised, but only for a moment. After that, it was non-stop roaring.
“The hell he has!”
*
Juliet flitted around the bedroom, searching for an escape route. The windows were nailed shut and barred – not impossible to get through, but it would take time to pry off those bars and she was still a little weakened. The bathroom had no window whatsoever, and the bedroom was severely lacking in secret passages – she checked every single book on the shelves just in case.
> Escape would not be imminent. Not with the gorilla sized vampire guarding her door. The guy looked like he used to be a darn Viking!
“Trying to leave already, my darling?”
Juliet started and spun to glare at Matthew. He was even more cat-like than Ryder. Though not nearly as sexy, or irresistible, or… Juliet felt her cheeks heat in a blush. Great, now she was blushing, too. She’d just got her errant heart under control; the last thing she needed was her embarrassment reflex kicking in and two flame red cheeks alerting him to the fact that something was up with her.
Matthew had the beginnings of a frown, and Juliet rushed to distract him.
“You can’t legally keep me here.”
Matthew sidled through the bedroom, chuckling at her comment, lazily removing his jacket and tossing it onto the bed. “My love, you never fail to amuse me. I am glad that your sense of humor has not dimmed in our centuries apart. Laws don’t apply to people like us. We transcend laws.”
Good to know his arrogance had only grown over the years. Hard to believe it could get any bigger and yet – here it was!
Juliet forced herself to remain still as he approached. He beamed at her, fangs and all. Her queasiness returned ten-fold as his heightened arousal hit her with the subtlety of a croquet mallet to the head. He wanted her; he always bloody wanted her. Even now she couldn’t figure out why. Maybe because he knew she hated him so much. While other woman fell at his feet, she despised him. Perhaps that is what he liked.
“Laws apply to everyone – humans, shifters, vampires, even aliens!” she argued bitterly. “You’re not above laws. People will notice I’m missing; they’ll come looking for me.”
Matthew curled a lock of her hair around his fingers and brought it to his nose to sniff. “No one will care. Julian will tell everyone you have decided to quit the Enforcers Agency and move back to Europe. No one will come after you.” He tugged on her hair, making her wince. “I suspect the only one who would have cared would be your sabre-tooth cat shifter. I am sorry to disappoint you. He is dead.”
Juliet sniffed. “You’re lying.”
“Am I?” His eyes flicked to a parcel on top of the dresser.
Her heart constricted. She wanted to play it cool. Pretend she didn’t care, but before reason could set in, she was across the room and tearing apart the mundane brown wrap. The possibilities flitted through her imagination, each more revolting than the last.
Tearing the box open, she cried out in relief. Part of her thought she would see his head staring back at her, or at least a hand or some fingers. Nope. It was just his jacket. The one he had been wearing when he left her house a few hours earlier, now torn but all the blood on it was old. Yes, the garment had previously encountered some blood – given Ryder’s predilection for confrontation that was no surprise.
Juliet inhaled his scent, basking in the masculine deliciousness, before giggling. “Is this supposed to prove something to me? I don’t believe for a second he’s dead. If he were, knowing you, you’d have put his head in that box. You’re bluffing, badly.”
She tensed as he placed a hand on her back. She expected a roar of denial, expected a backhand to the face. But neither came. Perhaps Matthew had mellowed with age.
“Believe what you wish, my darling. But you are mine, and I won’t make the same mistakes I made last time.”
“No more oil lamps?” she taunted.
“No more waiting to make you mine. I never bonded with you back then, because I was convinced I would tire of you, and I wouldn’t wish to be bonded to you forever. But now, after five hundred years, my feelings are stronger than ever. It’s time to bond.”
Juliet fingered Ryder’s jacket, hoping to feel some of his warmth, but it had long seeped away. “You can’t force a bond. It has to be mutual.”
“It will be.”
His lips brushed her neck as his hands held her in place. Juliet struggled against him, stilling as his fangs scraped her skin.
“I will never choose to bond with you.”
“Eventually you will; it just depends on how big that heart of yours really is, how much it really does bleed for others. I’ll start with… Lucie.”
She hesitated. “Lucie?”
“Emily tells me she’s a somewhat submissive, drippy little hedgehog shifter who works for you. Or rather, worked for you.”
“What does Lucie have to do with anything?”
“Personally, nothing. I have never particularly cared for shifters – their only worth is that they are strong and resilient, and make excellent servants. I certainly couldn’t care how many hedgehogs there are in the world. She is merely a means to an end.” His breath tickled her ear. “For every day you refuse to bond with me, I will kill one of your co-workers. Lucie will be the first. Given that she is pregnant, I feel the impact on you will be particularly devastating. Start as you mean to go on – that’s my motto.” He chuckled. “After her, it will be Cecile, a swan shifter I’m told and also with child. Then Erin, correct me if I get any of these names wrong, after that, Jessie, perhaps we’ll then have a male – Gunner, I think, and then perhaps Avery, and so on and so forth. This could go on for a long time – you certainly had a lot of people working for you – but how long exactly depends on you. You have until sunset tomorrow to make up your mind regarding Lucie’s future.”
Juliet struggled out of his grip. He must have already made his point because he actually let her go. She rounded on him furiously. “You can’t kill all those people.”
“Their lives are in your delicate hands.”
“Bullshit! That’s no choice at all!”
Matthew grinned excitedly. “So that means you wish to bond with me immediately.”
“No!”
Juliet grabbed a vase and hurled it at him. Deftly, Matthew stepped out the way, with very little effort, nor with any loss of his good mood.
“My darling, you should…”
His words cut off as Noah strode into the room completely uninvited.
“How dare you!” howled Matthew all but pouncing on his younger brother.
“Lovers’ tiff?” drawled Noah, ogling the broken vase.
“Get out!” Matthew snarled. He snatched hold of Juliet and pushed her behind him proprietorially.
Noah tried to peek at her. “Forgive my brother. He’s a little territorial of his females.”
“Because you always steal them,” grumbled Matthew.
“Can’t steal something that doesn’t want to be taken.” He winked at Juliet.
“Stay away from her,” Matthew warned.
Noah sighed. “Mother wishes to see you. You should resist her summons at your peril.”
The words were said lightly, and with some amusement, but there was also a darker current to his tone. Perhaps nearly two millenia strapped to Mommy’s apron strings were getting a bit much to bear. Juliet could scarcely stand a couple of minutes; she couldn’t say she blamed them for being restless. She remembered when Matthew used to leave her to visit his mother; he always returned in a mood so dark it put thunderstorms to shame.
Matthew clacked his fangs together. “Fine. Stay here,” he said to Juliet. “A guard will be on the door.”
“To stop me from escaping?”
Matthew gave Noah a hard look. “That too.”
Noah threw back his head and barked with laughter as he walked out the room, followed by Matthew.
Juliet retrieved Ryder’s jacket and buried her face in it, taking in his scent, trying to leach every tiny iota of it from the garment. She’d never been a particularly heroic person, but she wasn’t going to allow anyone to get hurt because of her. Either she needed to escape or…, or she gave in and bonded with him.
Hell. No.
She was escaping. She had done her time with Matthew. Some murderers were imprisoned for less time than she was forced to spend with him!
Juliet pulled the bulky jacket on and set about trying the windows again. She was making some headway in jiggli
ng it open just as someone else came into the room.
“Trying to leave us already,” sneered the queen, “and here was me thinking we might get to know one another a little better.”
Out of the frying pan…
Chapter Thirty-Four
Truthfully, it wasn’t the first time Ryder had broken into someone’s house.
His tiger almost grinned at how much of an understatement that was. Hey, the times he broke into Juliet’s house didn’t count – she was his mate he was supposed to be there.
No, he did once break into his English teacher’s house when he was in high school. Ryder tee-peed his kitchen and sprayed shaving foam everywhere – which is so much more satisfying than just egging the outside of the house. The guy had it coming. He had it out for Ryder and gave him an F on a perfectly good essay about Hamlet. How did he know it was perfectly good? He had one of the nerds write it for him and dumb it down enough to get a C.
This, however, was a little different. His teacher Mr. Blastcock – real name, swear to god – wasn’t a vampire, didn’t have a small vampire army patrolling and certainly didn’t have jaguars roaming. Though his Chihuahua was kind of yappy.
They waited for a gap in the security – pointed out by their mystery ‘man on the inside’. They then scaled the massive fence, Ryder refused to let himself puff or pant or swear about the fact that half his clothes were ripped and still entangled with said fence. The vampires were fast, and even if they did sporadically breathe, none of them seemed to have any trouble with the breakneck speed they were taking, so there was no way he was going to let any of them see him struggle either.
They had sprayed themselves with some kind of magical substance to cover their scents. He hoped it covered sweat. Jeez, maybe he wasn’t in as good a shape as he thought. Wasn’t helping that his beast had practically been crashing against him to be let free, but Ryder tried to soothe him. It wasn’t time for the beast to be freed. Not yet. Surely a sabre-tooth tiger trying to clamber over a fence would be even funnier than him doing it. But soon. Soon he would be getting his mate back and kicking some damn vampire butt.