by Michelle Fox
Flexing my thighs, I prepared to rush him and grab him by the throat.
Instead, someone hit me from behind with another tranquilizer.
"What should I do with him, boss?" The guard stepped in front of me. The drug hit me and I dropped to my knees, which put the darts lined up along his utility belt at my eye level.
"Tie him up and use a bungee on the trunk. I need him alive," Zion said.
"Why?" My tongue went numb and the word came out garbled and tangled up. I tried to reach for the darts. If I could get them, I could take out half of Zion's crew, but my arms wouldn't move. They'd become leaden and numb.
"You're insurance," Zion said. "If anyone from the council survives, I need a scapegoat."
I tried to talk, but it came out in a stuttering mumble. "Wh..wh..whaaaat?" I fought to stay awake, but my body didn't have much fight left. My muscles had gone slack and my brain slushed like half melted snow. I fell over onto my side, hitting the cool earth with a hard thud.
Zion came over and lifted my head. "It's time for a change. We're vampires, not philanthropists. We eat people and some of us are tired of the council telling us what we can and can't do. So, I made something big enough to draw them out. All those shifters were bait. And it worked. The council is coming to see this for themselves. And when they do, the whole building explodes. Boom. Done."
He let go of my head and I slumped to the ground. The last thing I thought of before oblivion took me was Adele. I'd failed her, just like Dahlia.
***
I woke to quiet stillness. This time they'd looped steel cable around my wrists. Difficult, but not impossible to break, although it cut me to the bone in the process. The bungee cord was more troublesome due to its elasticity, and I finally just gnawed on it with my fangs, fraying the fabric strand by strand. It felt like it took a century to get through the elastic cord, but it probably wasn't more than a few minutes.
I didn't know if it still mattered or not, but I had to get back to the club. I had to try and save Adele. I couldn't give up. Not until I knew for sure. She didn't deserve to die. None of them did.
Carefully raising the trunk, I scanned the area. The car, a big, boxy Mercedes, had been parked to the side of a wide clearing in the woods. The guards stood several feet away, their backs to me. Zion didn't appear to be anywhere. With slow, quiet movements, I stepped out of the trunk and arranged the bungee cord so it looked like it was still in place.
Darting to the side, I circled around and up behind the two men, kneeling down to listen in on their conversation.
A blond guard with a thick scar down his cheek looked to the sky. "Hey, Ekon, isn't the chopper late?"
The other guard shrugged and hoisted up his pants, drawing my eye to the tranquilizer darts. I edged closer to him. "It'll be here soon, Thad."
"What if the council finds us first?"
"They'll be dead. Zion's smarter than they are." The guard spun on his heel to scan behind him. I dropped to the ground below his line of sight.
"I hope you're right," Thad said.
The other guard, Ekon, turned back, shaking his head. "Don't let Zion hear you. He doesn't like complainers."
"I'm not complaining."
"If you like being dead, you won't say that where he can hear. It's a good way to turn yourself into dust."
"But—"
"Don't question it, Thad. Just do what you're asked to do, all right? Now shut it. We need to be paying attention to what's out there, not talking about your feelings."
Leaving the guards to bicker, I fell back on one of the other skills the Rom had taught me and carefully lifted a few of the tranquilizer darts from his belt. With the dart in hand, I positioned myself to leap out and strike them both down, but the arrival of another car forced me to jump out of sight behind the widest tree trunk I could find.
A black Mercedes SUV whipped around to park next to the sedan, and Zion stepped out of the back seat. His white shirt had been unbuttoned and sunglasses hid his eyes.
"Where's the copter?" he asked.
"About ten minutes out," said the guard with the scar.
"They're late." Zion paced and watched the sky.
"Are we done here?" asked another guard.
Zion gave a curt nod. "Yes. The club is gone, but the council never showed. It was a waste."
I frowned. If the club was gone, what did that mean for Adele? Pushing out my awareness, I used our blood bound to feel for her, but found nothing but emptiness. Either the drugs had interfered with the bond, or we were too far away from each other, or...I refused to contemplate the idea.
"What do you want us to do?" asked the other guard, the one who had been complaining.
"You two drive back to the City Oscura with our cargo there. We're going to need him, but I don't want to arrive home with him. We can't be seen together." He tapped the trunk where everyone still believed I was. "I'll fly back tonight and start laying the groundwork for plan B."
A whirring sound overhead cut off further conversation. The helicopter landed, and Zion ran to get inside, stooping low to the ground, and not waiting for the blades to stop rotating. The men who'd been in the SUV followed, clambering in after him and leaving me alone with the two remaining guards, Thad and Ekon.
I watched Zion disappear behind the blacked-out windows of the helicopter, wondering what plan B was. The whole thing had been a trap, a power play. The blood slave ring had been a means to an end, a complete upheaval of power in the vampire world. I couldn't let him get away with it.
But first, I had to make sure no one would come up behind me. Creeping forward, I took advantage of the distraction the helicopter provided and buried tranquilizers in the one guard's neck before he even registered I was there.
They each half turned to look at me, their mouths gaping open in surprise. The one I'd hit tried to attack, but instead fell down, unconscious.
I wrapped the younger guard in a head lock. He tried to punch me, but I grabbed his hand. I wasn't gentle or kind in what I had to do. This wasn't Adele. Pinning him against a tree, I ripped his forearm open with my fangs and gulped down every drop of blood I could catch. Once I had enough to heal my injuries, I jabbed the guard with a dart and held him in a tight hug until he, too, passed out.
Taking the bungee cord from the trunk, I tied them together. Then, searching their pockets, I found the keys to the Mercedes sedan and took off. It was time to find out what the hell had happened while I'd been unconscious.
***
The club was, as Zion had said, rubble. A pile of stones stood in its place like a cairn. Another vampire massacre. My hands clenched at the thought. I'd believed I could make an impact, change things from the inside. Yet here I was, hundreds of years later, with more blood on my hands. No thanks to heartless, soulless vampires.
I kicked at a stone and growled in frustration.
But then a scent hit my nose. Shifters and not the ones that had been in the basement. Healthy, vibrant shifters, and...a hint of lilac. Adele.
I ran around the parking lot, sniffing like a crazy person. If she'd survived, I had to find her. I needed to see it to believe it. But there were no other clues beyond the scent.
Kicking more stones, I remembered she'd said something about a bad alpha, the one who'd lured her into Zion's trap. There were packs all over this area. Maybe they'd found her and taken her back to sell again. In which case, I absolutely had to find her.
Going back to the car, I drove up into the woods. Shifters avoided cities and congregated in remote areas. I just had to find the right spot.
***
I didn't get too far in my search, though. The car died a few miles in. I left it behind and ran through the forests, my senses alert for any sign of shifters or Adele. After several hours of nothing, I decided it would be better to regroup and come up with a strategy. Maybe contact local packs or pack law enforcement. I had no way to know which direction to go or who could and couldn't be trusted.
I made
my way out of the woods and back to Hudson, the largest nearby town. A new cell phone would give me the answers I couldn't find on my own. Plus, it was beyond time to check in with the Contessa and access resources besides my nose.
Hudson wasn't large, but it had a busy retail area on its main street. I found the nearest twenty-four hour big box store with phones and paid a small fortune to make the calls I needed. Thankfully, my wallet was still with me.
Back in the sedan, I called the Contessa, my current patron. She was Italian nobility who'd been turned in the US during the Jazz Age. Her sensibilities were more modern than most vampires. I'd learned how to use a cell phone because of her. She'd been the one who'd made me a special investigator for the council. Not everyone was a fan, though, and my position had caused trouble over the years.
The phone rang and a second later her thick accent purred in my ear. "Hello?"
"It's me. You're in danger," I said. "They're targeting the council. It's way more than a blood ring."
"Davian, listen to me."
"You need to get out of the City Oscura." I spoke over her. "The vampire behind everything is coming and he's got something up his sleeve."
"Ah, yes. I've already met this Zion. He has video of you."
"Of me?" I fell silent. He'd called me insurance and scapegoat. I hadn't really considered what that might mean.
"Yes, you. Feeding. Claiming."
"I had to as part of my cover."
"He says you were running the ring."
"That's ridiculous."
"He's got evidence and is showing it to everyone."
"You sent me here. You know the truth."
"The truth is whatever people believe, and Zion has their eyes and ears right now."
"What do I do?"
"Don't come back to the city. Not now. With time, I can manage this, but if they get a hold of you..."
"Is there an execution order? Is that what you're telling me? After all this time?"
"It's dirty politics, Davian. It's not about you."
"I'm just the latest pawn in the game then? What about you Contessa? Are they going to kill you, too? And the general? The baron?" The three of them made up a triad of power on the council.
"We can take care of ourselves. It's you we can't protect. Just stay out of it."
"So...what? I just sit here?"
"Yes. I'll call you if I need you." She hung up, and I hurled the phone across the car. It hit the window and shattered into pieces, leaving a web of cracks in the glass.
It had all been a trap. All of it. I'd fallen for it. So had the council members who'd trusted me to know better. Damn it.
Chapter Seven
Davian
I parked in the woods on the outskirts of Hudson just before dawn and made my bed in the trunk. Waiting for sleep, I planned my next move. First, another phone and reach out to my network. Then a call to my pack contacts. Someone had to know something about how to find Adele. If I couldn't go back to City Oscura, at least it gave me time to keep looking for her. My mind churning with everything that had happened, I drifted off into a deep sleep.
The next night arrived with a loud thump on the trunk. I jerked awake at the sound.
The trunk opened and pine-scented air rushed in.
One of the guards I'd attacked earlier leered at me with a smirk. The scar marked him as Thad. "Hey there, asshole."
Ekon, the one who'd had the darts, appeared and waved a phone at me. "We've been tracking you."
I sat up and tried to dive past him, but ran into the second guard who pushed me back. I tensed, preparing to fight. It shouldn't be too difficult. Two vampires of questionable intelligence did not make much of a challenge.
I just needed a distraction. Something to divide their attention. "Ten thousand dollars each and we're done," I said.
Ekon snorted. "We'd be dust before we even spent a dollar. No. You're coming with us, like Zion wanted."
"And you fucking sucked on me," growled Thad. "You can't pay me off."
I smiled. "You tasted like ass, by the way. You should pay more attention to your diet. Garbage in, garbage out."
"I'm not food." He swung at me and the fight was on. I ducked and parried, pleased to see their speed matched their intellect—slow, dull and not ever going to go very fast.
I slammed a fist into Thad's head, aiming for a one punch knock-out. The force of the hit threw him down to the ground. His eyes rolled back and he slumped to the earth, lifeless.
Ekon did the same thing as Thad. These two were like gnats. Annoying and nowhere near fast enough to avoid my fist smashing them into oblivion.
I ducked Ekon's predictable fists. "You guys really need to work on your game."
He didn't have a chance to respond because my uppercut had already snapped his head back and severed his connection to consciousness. He also fell to the ground.
Once again, I tied the men up, this time using their shoelaces, and dragged them into a clearing. Let the sun rise on their stupidity. Maybe before they burned to dust, they'd have a second to reflect on their regrets.
***
Stealing cars was becoming a habit. I slid behind the wheel of the Dodge pick-up the two geniuses who'd come after me had managed to procure and headed for Hudson in pursuit of phone number two. Phone in hand, I made calls with one hand and drove with the other, the pull to find Adele still stronger than I wanted to admit.
Everyone had heard about the blood ring. There'd been an alpha named Mason involved. He'd been killed just yesterday, but no one knew anything about Adele. Word was everyone in the building had died in the explosion. I got a rough layout of the pack lands in the area from a low-level Pack Council bureaucrat. He had cousins in the region and knew most of the packs.
"Huntsville's the biggest," he'd said. "Start there. The alpha's good. You can trust him."
I picked the rolling mountain that best matched the description I'd been given and aimed for the top. When the road ended, abruptly and in the middle of nowhere, I took that as a good sign. It meant someone didn't want people going any farther. Humans would turn around and leave, but shifters would know to keep going on foot.
I stepped out of the car and smiled at the faint musk of wolves dancing in the air. Yep. This dead end was a pack access road.
Trudging along, I followed the scent which led to a small city center that a sign named as Huntsville. This late at night, the bars had already closed. Any shifter still awake was out for a run, not beer. Just to prove the point, a yip sounded and a trio of wolves padded down the street. Lifting their noses in the air, they turned this way and that, searching. They'd caught wind of me somehow. Vampires didn't smell like much, but I'd been feeding from a werewolf. Adele's scent was probably in my blood now and making me more fragrant than usual. Not great news, especially now that I was deep in pack lands...uninvited. If they found me, it would be a fight to the death.
I ducked down a side street and stepped into a shadow. A howl in the distance distracted them, and they trotted off toward it. I must not have smelled strong enough to keep their attention.
Still, I left the town and headed for the woods, where the scent of pine and other animals would help cover me. I inhaled the smell of the woods around me. I lived in the City Oscura which was a massive cave network that had little scent, but I'd grown up in a place like this with the smell of loamy earth and living things in my nose. I used to run, too, but only as a human.
I sucked in more air, searching for a direction to go in, and caught the barest hint of lilac. Concentrating on the blood bond, I felt the barest flicker of a heartbeat. Frowning, I followed the lilac. Maybe I'd finally gotten lucky.
The scent grew stronger and stronger as I went, and eventually, I heard voices, too. A woman singing, the power in her voice making even my dead flesh quiver. Following it, I came upon a cabin nestled in a small clearing. The singing came from an older woman with hair white as the moon. Adele stood before her, pulling against the bonds that
spread her between two pine trees.
Before I could do anything, a younger woman ran over. I blinked because she looked just like Adele. Was this her sister?
"Hey! What are you doing?" yelled the younger woman.
The older woman didn't move at first, remaining still as a stone, save for her soft singing. Sharp knives lay at the healer's side, forming a neat, but deadly line. The fire's light danced on the blades.
"Marie! You're not going to cut her, are you?" The younger woman took a step closer.
The older woman slowly swiveled her head to look at the younger woman, her expression placid.
"Let my sister go." She edged to the side, looking like she might go in and untie Adele herself. She just wasn't sure she was fast enough. I could see the doubt in her body language.
"In time, Lia," Marie said. "This is how it needs to be for now."
"Why?" Lia glared at the old woman.
"The vampires still have their fangs in her." Marie turned to Adele. "Tell her. You crave it, don't you?"
"Fuck off," muttered Adele.
"Look at your sister," Marie said, unmoved by the malice directed at her. "Show her the truth."
Adele turned her head and hid her face in her shoulder.
"I said, show her." Marie's voice rumbled, deep and ominous as bad weather. The hair on the back of my neck stood up as the older woman's power filled the air. Lia edged closer to her sister, hands reaching out but not touching.
"Now," barked Marie. An unseen force emanated from the healer and shoved into Adele. Lia stumbled as it hit her, too. She had to give up ground and stepped away, gasping as she fought to breathe.
Adele lifted her head, cords in her neck showing how hard she fought not to, but the old woman's power was stronger than her will. Lia's weight moved to her toes and she half crouched, ready to spring to her sister's defense, but when she saw Adele's face, she moved away, not toward her.
"Holy moon. What happened to you?"
From the light of the fire, I could see the whites of Adele's eyes had gone red. She had a feral, hungry look to her as well. I closed my eyes but I couldn't unsee it. She was blood struck.