A Vampire Bundle

by Alexandra Ivy

  But the chance to find a cure for millions of tormented souls was worth all that, and more. Surely Sophie would understand when the time came—if the time came—to explain it to her.

  He brushed his mouth over hers in a soul-deep kiss that left him wanting more, so much more. Then he pulled his mask back into place and turned to Barrett, took the fire extinguisher in one fist, the bag of battle supplies in the other—if the assorted bathroom and kitchen products (the most useful weapons they could assemble on such short notice) qualified as battle supplies.

  “Ready?” Barrett whispered, his hands full as well.

  “Yeah.” Ric watched Sophie pull her ski mask over her face. “Let’s go.”

  They walked down the quiet street. Outside of the flickering fireflies and the occasional stray cat, there wasn’t any movement around them, no sign of life. They reached the house quickly. Ric and Barrett took their positions at the front and side doors. Sophie tiptoed around to the back, the raw meat in her hand.

  Ric looked at his watch, waited for the precise moment they’d agreed on, then drew back to batter the door.

  On a whim, he tried it first. Unlocked?

  Not a good sign.

  He opened it just enough to slip inside, then closed it behind his back. His eyes swept the house’s dark interior. He stood in a small entryway, a three-by-three-foot area that led to the living room. There was no sign of movement. He looked up and down. No sign of a trap.

  He hesitantly took a single step into the living room and flinched.

  Nothing flared, barked, or blew up. Was the Guardian hoping he’d come closer? Where were the dogs? No traps? No defenses?

  Barrett’s voice sounded in his earpiece. “Found something in the basement.”

  “Any sign of the dogs?” he said into the microphone clipped to his chest.

  “Nope. Not down here.”

  “Sophie?” Ric said.

  “I’m here.” Her voice was shaky. “No dogs back here. Nothing.”

  “This isn’t right. It’s got to be a trap,” Ric said, creeping through the living room, alert for signs of trouble. “No Guardian would leave his lair unprotected.”

  “I’ve seen it once or twice,” Barrett said. “Some of them get so cocky, thinking their reputation is enough to keep people away. Where are you? Get down here.”

  “Fine, fine. Coming.” Ric passed through a small dining room into the kitchen. The basement stairs were at the rear. He took them very slowly. “Where are you?” he asked Barrett.

  “Way in the back. Follow the furnace ducts.”

  “Okay.” When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he said, “Sophie, you still with me?”

  “Yes. What’s going on in there?” she asked. “I’m scared.”

  “Nothing. We’re okay. It’s dead quiet.” Ric glanced up, caught sight of the furnace ductwork, and started following it to the left.

  “Ric?” Sophie’s soft voice was like a soothing caress.

  “Yes?”

  “Please be careful.”

  “I will be. Promise.”

  “I don’t want to live without you,” she said. “I…love you.”

  Her words tore his insides to shreds. She didn’t know what she’d done by saying those words just then. She’d taken the third step by confessing her love for him in the presence of his brother, a fellow clan member.

  “I love you too. And I promise I’ll do everything in my power to make sure you won’t have to live another minute without me, if that’s what you really want. But you need to be sure about this. You know what I am. As a man and as an Immortal. Are you sure you want me?”

  “Yes. I’m sure.”

  He wanted to sweep her into his arms and crush her to him. Then again, he wanted to step back and knock some sense into her too. He’d started the process of the Joining in an effort to protect her from the Ancient One. Now, thanks to her willingness to take both the second and third steps, he faced the endless agony of wanting to complete it. His soul cried out for her. His spirit, mind. It would be like an eternal hunger that couldn’t be sated, a fire that couldn’t be doused. A thirst that could never be quenched.

  Completing the Joining was not an option. He would never again Join with another human. He was a scientist who’d spent the last several centuries searching for a cure to his people’s disease. Why would he choose to pass it on to another human being? A human being he loved?

  He passed through a storage room, full of unmarked cardboard boxes stacked on metal shelves. “Barrett?”

  “Getting bored waiting for you. What’s the holdup?”

  “I’m almost there.” He paused at the door in the back of the storeroom. “I see a door.”

  “Yeah. Come on. I’m back here. Let’s hurry up and get this over with.”

  “Okay.” He turned the knob, pushed. The room was enveloped in pitch blackness so thick even his sensitive eyes couldn’t find Barrett. “Where are you? It’s too damn dark in here—”

  A set of hands clamped around both his arms.

  Sophie’s scream shot into his ear through his earpiece.

  A roar of rage rumbled up from his chest and bellowed from his mouth. “Barrett!”

  Chapter 16

  They burst through the back door like a pack of rabid wolves. One, two, three, four, five…six. Six teeth-baring, growling, snarling, people-eating beasts.

  “Oh shit!” Taken by surprise, Sophie dropped the steak at her feet and stared, gape mouthed, stunned into a state similar to that of a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.

  Teeth flashed in the moonlight. The dogs formed a line and crept closer. She had no doubt they’d be on top of her in about a second flat. She could see their muscles rippling under their fur as they readied to pounce like wild dogs on injured prey.

  It was too late. She couldn’t run. She knew she couldn’t fight them all off. She was a goner.

  “Ric,” she whispered. Her voice shook. “I love you.” Then, as the pack lunged forward, she turned and sprinted for the shed.

  She got the door open, but before she could close herself inside, the first animal caught her ankle in his jaws.

  The pain stole her breath away. It razored up her leg, charged along her spine, then exploded in her head. Out of instinct, she started kicking her free foot at the biting animal. But a second one caught that ankle and down she went, on her butt.

  Within a heartbeat, there were mouths everywhere. Teeth. Pain. The terrifying sounds of clothes ripping, teeth chomping, and dogs growling. Her own screams.

  She smelled the sickly sweet scent of blood. The pungent, sulfurous odor of their breath. Wet animal and earth.

  Her vision was blurred by her movement, arms flailing, thrashing in a frantic, fruitless effort to find relief from the pain.

  She could feel her strength waning. Her limbs were getting heavy and it was getting harder and harder to lift them. Her will to fight was fading as she began to accept her fate. She was dog food.

  “Please, just let it be fast. Let one of them bite me in the neck or something, end it quickly.” She stilled, then realized the beasts had stopped biting.

  She forced her heavy eyelids up and gasped. The dogs were gone.

  There were now six enormous, naked men standing in a circle around her, looking down. They were all dark haired and gorgeous. Perfect bodies. Perfect faces. Perfect…other parts. Outside of the fact that their eyes glowed red, it was like being stared at by the Chippendales.

  Hell spawn or angels?

  As she mulled that question over, one of the Chippendales reached down and raked a fingernail over her partially exposed nipple, igniting an unwelcome chain reaction in her body. A great ball of fire burst inside her belly. White-hot need blazed a path down to her sex, where it churned round and round, like thunderclouds over the ocean. Storms were brewing. She dragged in a deep breath and tried to will away the lust threatening to carry her away like a tsunami.

  She felt like she was out
side of herself, like her body was no longer connected to her mind. She knew she loved Ric, knew these oversexed boy toys were not appealing to her. Yet wanting crashed through her body, carried on the waves of pleasure the strange man’s touches stirred.

  “This way,” the one who had touched her said. He reached a hand down to help her stand. She accepted his help, but the instant she was upright, black and white flashes cut through her vision. Tired. So tired.

  She felt the ground smack her in the face.

  Her final thought before she let go was of Ric and Dao. She’d let them both down. “I’m…sorry.”

  The dark and quiet was welcome relief from her fear, confusion, pain…and lust.

  Stripped of his clothes, as well as his lifeline to Sophie, the two-way radio, and tied spread-eagle in the center of a circle painted on the basement’s concrete floor, Ric glared up at his brother. His brother! The one person on the planet whom he’d ever trusted. What the fuck?

  Barrett was standing next to the Guardian, looking smug.

  Speaking of smug, on the dragon’s other side stood none other than Margaret Mandel. She looked very pleased as she rubbed her hands together. “Look who we have here. My sweet little Wissenschaft, Ric Vogel. So nice to see you again,” she purred.

  Ric didn’t respond. Instead he looked at the Guardian. “And here I thought you would be my biggest problem.”

  The Guardian smiled. “From the look of things, I’d say I’m the least of your problems.”

  Margaret clicked her tongue and shook her head. “You know, you had a choice. I offered the option of becoming my lover but you turned that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity down. Now I’m forced to use you for a much less pleasing purpose—at least from your point of view. A shame, since your body is absolutely exquisite. I would’ve worshipped it daily.” She crouched down, spreading her knees to reveal a pair of black lace panties under her short skirt, and gave him a long, hot sweeping gaze.

  Rage piggybacked on confusion charged through his veins, heating them. He trembled with the need to grab hold of the lamia’s neck and snap it in two. Her gaze found his face, snared his. Knowing what she’d do, he fought to break his free. It was too dangerous. He would lose the battle if she tried to charm him.

  Too late. He felt the velvet touch of her mind to his and instantly the fight left him. He felt his body reacting, warming. His mind slipping away.

  He was weakening, falling under her glamour.

  “No,” he heard himself mumble. He tried to fight back, to resist the lamia’s song, calling, calling to him. So sweet and tempting. She was too strong, her will, her mind, her spirit. Then she knelt next to him, pressed her warm, wet mouth over his, and kissed him.

  He couldn’t stop her.

  He hated the fact that he was a male at that point, hated the fact that his body had a mind of its own and didn’t give a flying fuck who or what was kissing him. His brain told his traitorous body this was wrong. The danger of falling under the lamia’s seduction aside, he loved Sophie. Loved her more than anything, more than he ever expected to. If Sophie saw this, if she knew, it would kill her. Still, his body heated. Wanting coursed through his body on slow ripples.

  He bit back a growl, knowing his anger would only encourage the lamia, and instead thought of the most boring, mundane things he could think of, knowing that was the only way to best his aching, lust-filled body. Waiting at the secretary of state’s office. Or spending eons in line to collect an unemployment check. Or sitting in rush-hour traffic during the height of summer road-construction season on I-75. Oh yeah, that was a good one. He felt his expression relax into one of complete and utter boredom, despite the vigorous oral attention the lamia was currently giving his neck.

  It got to her. When she tried to kiss him again but he refused, she shrieked in anger, “That human couldn’t possibly have that much of a hold on you yet!”

  He tried not to smile but it was hard. Feeling a little smug, since that was the first time he’d ever won a battle with his single-minded hormones, he just looked at her with raised eyebrows.

  “I know why you want the shield and spear.” Rising up to a squat, she pulled on her skirt until the hem was up around her waist. She parted her knees and fingered her panties. “Look at me. Don’t you want me? Why are you fighting this? I know what you want to do for your people.”

  Black lace. Wet. Slick. His body warmed again. His brain started to melt, overheated by the unwelcome lust pulsing through his body. It was the glamour, the lamia’s most potent weapon. He turned his gaze to the ceiling.

  Wood beams. Furnace ductwork. Cobwebs. Much better. At least his brain worked when he stared at those. “Yeah, so what?” he said.

  “You weren’t thinking of letting that human have the spear and shield, were you.”

  Was that a question or a statement? He wasn’t sure. But he decided not to respond anyway, partly because he wanted to piss the lamia off, partly because he didn’t want her knowing anything, and partly because he didn’t know the answer himself. When he’d first stumbled into Sophie at the library, he’d expected to continue his search, expected to find the relics and deliver them to the mage. Expected to receive the spell that would free his race from the damnation of a slow, painful death.

  Even when he’d taken Sophie as his lover, he’d still expected to carry out his plans. He figured she’d be angry at first, hurt. But he’d help her find another way to defeat the lamia. Divorce was an option, granted almost impossible, and sometimes deadly. But it was something. It was the choice between two good deeds: the salvation of an entire race versus the salvation of a single human being.

  Such a simple choice, or so he’d thought until today.

  But now…now he wasn’t so sure he could go through with it. He knew Sophie would hate him for lying to her. Despise him for taking the relics for his purpose, no matter how honorable it was.

  That would kill him faster than a day spent sunbathing at the equator.

  He would tolerate the most horrid torture easier than he would handle seeing hatred in her eyes, turned on him. He would endure hundreds of years of agony to avoid seeing pain in her eyes, for even a minute.

  He cleared his throat. “You just hope I’ll take the relics because then your sister’s safe from Sophie,” he said, turning his gaze back to Margaret.

  She shrugged. “No, not really. She wouldn’t be safe for long; none of us would. Once Ysgawyn gets the relics, he would have the power to exterminate our entire race, me included.”

  “You lie. He’s a sworn mage, powerless to hurt anyone with his magic.”

  She shook her head and tsked through her teeth. With slow, deliberate movements she removed her skirt, her blouse, her bra. She stood proud, her brown-tipped breasts high and firm, her waist narrow, her hips full enough to be tempting. The musky-sweet scent of her arousal filled his nostrils. Smiling, her eyes glittering with passionate promise, she reached up to loosen her hair from the tight bun at the back of her head. It fell in heavy waves over her shoulders, framing her siren’s face. “Didn’t anyone tell you, you can’t believe the words of Ysgawyn? He’s no longer sworn. And he’s not above using any form of deceit to get what he wants. The spell that will bring the destruction of the lamiae will give him power beyond your wildest imaginings. Power like no mage has had in centuries.”

  Ric closed his eyes against the distraction of her standing nude before him and tried to concentrate on what she’d said. Ysgawyn casting a spell to destroy all the lamiae? Impossible! Or was it? He’d seemed mighty eager to get his hands on those relics. If they didn’t serve him in some manner, what could he possibly want with them? “Who am I to believe—”

  “Believe Margaret, Ric,” Barrett interrupted. “She speaks the truth.”

  Ric opened his eyes to glare at his brother. The brother who stood by the lamia’s side. The brother who seemed to have led him into this trap. “You want me to believe her?” He squinted at the lamia, who had taken a step behind B
arrett, the coward. “I’m having a hard time trusting you after this. You lied to me, pretended to be here to help me. Then led me straight into the lamia’s trap. And now you have the balls to tell me to believe her? How could I possibly do that? You know what she is. What she and her clan have done to humans. To our people. How could you stomach standing by her side watching this?”

  “Yes, I know what she is. But I couldn’t let you go through with it,” Barrett explained. “I couldn’t let you give Ysgawyn the shield and spear. It’s against the law of the Immortals.”

  “You prize the law over the blood we share? We’re brothers. Remember? Or has the lamia already worked her glamour on you too? Are you under her spell?”

  “No.” Barrett shook his head. “I have all my mental capacities intact—”

  “That’s up for debate.”

  “Shut up, you bastard, and listen for once.” Barrett was gritting his teeth. His face practically glowed it was so red. “You want to know how much you mean to me? I prize your pathetic ass over the law. Your life over my own, even. My freedom. My career. My future.” He held out his wrist, showing the mark of the Bond. A deep purple stain forming a full circle around his wrist.

  Ric didn’t often have to inhale, being a vampire. But at that moment, his lungs burned for air. He sucked in the deepest breath he’d taken in centuries, then fought against the metal cuffs securing his wrists and ankles to the ground. “What. Have. You. Done!”

  “I went to the Judicial. Signed a promissory note. My life for yours. I had to. What you were about to do would’ve cost you your life if you’d succeeded—what you would’ve done if I hadn’t let Margaret stop you. Lamia or not, she’s spared you the mistake of an eternity. Please, don’t be a fool! Don’t go through with it. We both have too much to lose if you do. We all do.”

  “Went to the Judicial? Why would you do that?” Ric wanted to roar out his rage, shout long and loud until the walls around him tumbled to the ground. His brother had taken The Bond to protect him? For what? Barrett had promised to give up everything, had volunteered to pay the price for his transgressions. Would never again be able to make a decision freely if Ric went through with his plans. Why had Barrett done such a thing? No part of Ric’s plan was illegal. “I didn’t ask you to. I would never ask you to.”