by Lia Davis
The Blood met in the Vampire Headquarters, which was where Trinity lived. Part of me hoped she wasn’t there, so nothing could be done or decided today. As much as we needed to put her behind bars or kill her, there was a chance she’d be able to defeat Kane and kill him.
I couldn’t have that.
The guard gave Kane a deep head nod as we pulled up. The gates opened quickly. We drove to the front of the enormous manor house and all four doors were opened by vampires in full body suits, gloves, hats, the whole nine yards. They gaped at Kane as he stepped out of the car in short sleeves and no hat. He smiled at them and walked inside, the three of us on his heels.
The front door opened as if on its own, and I looked back as we strode through to see a female vampire with her head bowed.
Kane walked straight into a huge room off the main hallway and the entire council jumped to their feet.
"What’s the meaning of this?" Klaus thundered as we entered the room.
Summer winked at me from behind his back. I was starting to like her.
"I’m here to challenge Trinity to a fight to the death for the rule of the vampires. Where is she?" Kane stood at his full height, staring at the council.
"She’s otherwise indisposed," Summer said snidely. I stifled a giggle.
"Are you willing to remove her from rule?" Kane asked, tone challenging.
"We’ve told you our decision," Klaus said. "What would your mother say about this?"
"My mother wouldn’t have broken the treaty," Kane put a little power in his voice and the council flinched as a unit. "You have twenty-four hours to deliver her to me in chains, or I’ll be back to do it for you. This situation has gone on long enough. There have been two more attacks and you still do nothing."
He turned and walked from the room. I grinned at Summer then followed, flanked by Quin and Voss. The same vampires that opened doors for us to enter did the same as we exited.
"I should’ve searched the place for her," Kane grumbled as we drove.
"Honestly, I don’t want it to come to a fight," I said. "What if she wins?"
Kane burst out laughing. "She won’t win."
He couldn’t be sure. I sighed and drove faster, taking my frustration out on the road.
Instead of going home, I drove to the Fowler’s. I hadn’t wanted to do a full-on investigation, but if there was a chance I could pick up on another lycan beside the family that lived there, I’d do it.
I parked the SUV in the gravel driveway a few yards from the front door of the house. It was a small, cabin-like home. There was no electricity running the place. The Fowlers liked to live off the grid.
"Are we going in?" Quin watched me from the passenger seat, and I felt the stares of my other two mates.
Tightening my grip on the steering wheel, I fixed my gaze to the two wolves, dead, in the front yard. Mr. and Mrs. Fowler. "As much as I don’t want to, I need to see if Dustin is in the house."
Dustin Fowler was their son and one of Voss’s students in his night training class. The boy was also wild and could have escaped or wasn’t home at all during the attack. I had to know either way. If he was alive, he’d need somewhere to stay.
My guys didn’t move until I did. Once I opened my door and slid out of the SUV, Quin, Voss, Kane followed.
Taking a deep breath, I scented the air. The same humans I detected from all the other scenes had been there. Red Night. There was no other lycan scent besides the Fowlers in the area. I didn’t smell Trinity, but then I hadn’t before, either.
I moved slowly to the house, keeping my ability to read emotional imprints closed off. A snap of a twig froze me in place. I glanced to where it came from and spotted Dustin. His face was a mask of anger and rage burned in his eyes.
Voss instantly stepped in front of me, like the trained sentry he was. I allowed it because Voss would have a better chance at connecting with Dustin than the rest of us. He’d been training with the boy a few times a week.
"Dustin, it’s okay to be angry and feel pain. It’s okay to grieve. Come with us, we can protect you." Voss inched closer to the boy.
Suddenly Dustin snapped his gaze to me and snarled. "It’s all your fault. You brought the vampires here by mating with their prince."
Then Dustin ran off. Voss chased after him and Quin followed in case he needed help.
I hugged my waist and leaned against the SUV. Kane pulled me into a hug. We stayed like that for several minutes before Kane asked, "How are they in wolf form?"
"Huh?" I lifted my head and met his gaze.
"The Fowlers. The full moon was last night."
Glancing at the dead wolves, I frowned. "They prefer their wolf forms. The moon is full three nights out of each month. We can shift during those three nights, but many prefer do it as a pack and when the moon is the fullest. If we don’t shift back to human before the full moon cycle is over, we stay in our wolf forms."
I never understood why anyone would want to be stuck in their wolf form. Now that I thought about it, I wondered if it was why Dustin was so angry and wild.
Footsteps drew my attention to Voss and Quin. Voss shook his head. "We lost him. That kid is quick. I’m guessing he shifted and most likely will stay that way until the next full moon."
I pressed my head to Kane’s chest and sighed. Kane opened the back door and I climbed in. "I need to go home and kick Kane’s ass some more."
Quin laughed. "More like he kicks ours."
Kane chuckled. "You just need to move faster, old man."
Quin smirked and flipped Kane the bird as he climbed in the driver seat.
We spent the rest of the day in the gym, all of us on edge and trying not to worry about the next day. None of us wanted Kane to fight Trinity, not even Kane, when it came down to it.
"She was my best friend," he said as we sat on the mat, cooling down after a sparring session. "I don't want to kill her."
"I know you don’t," I said consolingly. "I’m sorry. Maybe they’ll vote to do the right thing and give the rule back to you, so it won’t come to a hand-to-hand fight."
He rolled his eyes. "They won’t blink without my mother’s permission. Trinity isn’t the true leader at the moment anyway, which is probably more of a reason for them to keep her. She’s just a figure. They’re running the show at the moment, and they know if I take over, they won’t."
We continued discussing the pros and cons, basically beating the subject into the ground, until we were hungry. The day was almost gone. "We sparred straight through lunch, then talked through dinner," I said as I took a couple of pizzas out of the freezer and Voss preheated the oven. "It’s going to be time to go challenge Trinity before we know it."
Our pizzas were half gone when the call came in. "Emergency council meeting, now," my dad barked over the speakerphone when I answered.
"What happened?" I asked before he clicked off. He loved to hang up without saying goodbye.
"Another attack." The phone beeped that the call was lost. He’d hung up.
We scrambled to get ready, running to change into something more respectable than our sweaty workout clothes.
Quin was the last one to the car, with a stack of pizza on a paper plate in his hands. I gave him an amused look and he shrugged. "What? I’m still hungry."
"I’ll drive so you can eat," Kane said and hopped behind the wheel of my SUV.
I was still finishing my last piece by the time we pulled in at the center. The council was assembled, a few still in the process of walking in and sitting down. We hurried to join them.
"Who was attacked?" I asked. "What happened?"
"It was my place," a voice from the doorway said.
"Oh, thank fuck," my dad shouted, then ran to the door, pulling her into his arms. "I thought you were dead."
Quin’s Aunt Sissy stood there, covered in dirt, nasty from the top of her head to the tip of her toes.
"What the fuck is going on?" Quin roared, jumping to his feet. "Are you hurt? Why are y
ou hugging Graham Gray?"
They ignored him and continued embracing in the dark doorway. I could just see the moon outside.
"I was so worried about you," my dad whispered. My cheeks heated, uncomfortable with hearing the way he was talking to her. I didn’t mind the idea of him finally finding someone besides pining over my mom, but he could’ve warned me.
They spent a few more minutes murmuring softly to each other while I tried my hardest to ignore what they said. Quin was purple, and he kept looking at me like it was all my fault.
"What?" I whispered. "I didn’t know."
"This is ridiculous. How did we not see this?"
"Sissy hasn’t been over to the house in ages," I replied. "How could we have known?"
They joined us at the table.
"I saw them coming. When mom died, then Quin moved out, I installed some human surveillance at the house. I’m all alone, and the house is tucked so far off the road."
Kane walked into the room from the back, where we had a full kitchen and bathroom for catering and parties. He had a warm, wet washcloth in his hand. I hadn’t even noticed him leave the room. "Here," he said with a smile, handing it to Sissy.
"Thank you," she exclaimed as she took it. "You’re a good boy." She shot Quin a teasing look. "Maybe you’ll be a good influence on my nephew."
Kane laughed. "I’ll try, ma’am."
Quin put his head in his hands. "What is going on?" his muffled voice was strained.
"Anyway," Sissy said. "My alarms went off. I bet they didn’t figure an ancient farmhouse belonging to an old lady would be so well armed." She smiled smugly. "I didn’t have time to get out, though, so I went to the basement and dug into my hiding place."
"You have a hiding place? When did you get so paranoid?" Quin asked weakly. "And when did you start hugging the High Alpha?"
"Don’t you worry about who I hug," she retorted. "I’ve had a hiding place since you came to be mine. Didn’t want you getting hurt if there was a vampire attack." She smiled sweetly at Kane. "Sorry, sweetheart, but we’ve been enemies a long time."
"Hopefully we’ll be changing that, and soon," he replied, reaching over and patting her on the hand.
"Why are you so dirty, Sis?" I asked, bringing her back to her story.
"The house is old. There’s a door in the basement that leads to a root cellar. It’s unfinished, deep underground, and all dirt. I keep a large section dug up, most of the cellar really, the dirt messy and all over the place. It’s so that I can dig myself into the ground and the dirt above me won’t be noticeable."
"That’s genius," I murmured. "So what happened?"
"I heard them enter the house. They were light on their feet, but you know our hearing. They searched the house. One of them came down to the cellar but it was as I hoped. In the dark, and I assume he only had a flashlight, it just looked like a root cellar. They left me there, and I heard them leaving. Then I smelled the smoke."
"They burned down the house?" Quin exclaimed. "No."
"I’m sorry, Quinny," I whispered, putting my arm around him.
Sissy nodded her head. "I had to move fast, and I was terrified I was just going to run right into them outside. What if they were smoking me out?"
"It’s a good thing you got out," Graham said. "I couldn’t have lost you."
"Well, they weren’t smoking me out. I heard them talking before they left. Once they searched and found the place empty, they said something to the effect of bad intel." She shook her head. "They weren’t the smartest."
"Did you hear anyone that sounded familiar?" I asked. "Anyone at all?"
"No, Jillian, I’m sorry."
"That’s okay. I’m just glad you’re alive." I looked around at the shocked council. "Now, are you ready to move? Are you ready to stop dragging your feet about going after Trinity? She’s behind all this."
"It’s still not that simple," one of the elders, Tobias, exclaimed. "We can’t attack her and her guard without risk of great harm to our own soldiers."
"You old coot," Voss said. I fought my laughter, but my dad didn’t.
He snorted, then shrugged when everyone looked at him. "He is an old coot."
Voss shook his head and continued. "It’s worth the risk. Plus, Kane might be able to command the vampire guard to stand down."
"Probably," Kane said. "Even those loyal to Trinity will recognize me as her master, deep down. We’ve gone our entire lives with me being the heir to the throne and her being my guard. It’s hard to completely change your outlook on a hierarchy like that."
"I’m against it," Tobias said stubbornly.
"As am I," another elder, a woman this time.
"What do you have against it, Ruby?" I asked.
"Same as Tobias. I’ve got a grandson in the guard. I don’t want to lose him." She shifted in her seat.
For fuck’s sake. "Your grandson is a trainer for the guard, Ruby. He quit fighting twenty years ago." Her grandson was sixty years old and would be one of the last people recruited for a job like this.
"Still," she said with her jaw set.
Something wasn’t right. Why would these normally bloodthirsty elders refuse to go after a vampire threat? They hated vampires, and would be some of the hardest to convince that we should join them and create one united people.
"We’re going around in circles," I said bitterly. "I think it’s time for you to do your thing, dad." I gave him a pointed look. He needed to step up as high alpha and command them to fight.
He didn’t get a chance. We heard a shout from outside, where the council guard was assembled. Dad’s sentries were out there, as well as our elite fighters, who protected the council.
Fighting sounds reached our ears, then a gunshot. We raced to the door. Kane reached it first and peeked out. "It’s the Red Night," he said, shocked.
"The fire was a ploy to get the council together," my dad said. "Destroy them," he growled.
We threw the doors open and rushed out, probably not the best idea when they had guns. Lucky for us, our guards had them well engaged.
Joining the fray, I ran to the closest one and jerked his gun out of his hands. He didn’t stand a chance against my strength. Opting to kill him with my bare hands, I threw the gun down and snapped his neck. One down.
We were nearly finished dispatching the soldiers when we heard a shout over an intercom. "Freeze!"
The sound came from the forest beside the hall. Soldiers streamed out of the woods, more than I’d ever seen when I’d studied the scenes. There had to be thirty or forty of them, and every one of them had a high-powered rifle trained on us.
We froze.
"What the hell do we do?" I asked. Kane shrugged. Helpful.
"What do you want?" my father yelled across the clearing.
They didn’t respond, just walked slowly forward.
"We have to move," I said.
I turned my head toward the door to the hall to see if the path was clear. A gunshot cracked and we all flinched as it hit the wall beside the door I was contemplating running for.
"Move again and I’ll start taking you down one by one," the man with the megaphone said.
"What do you want?" Kane yelled. "I could take a few of them out before they could fire again," he whispered to me. "But not many."
"No, just wait.” I hissed. “Maybe they want to negotiate or something. There’s a reason they haven’t gunned us down yet."
They continued toward us, covered in body armor and loaded with more guns and magazines. They’d come to fight, so why weren’t they fighting?
Before they reached us, large group of vampires streamed out of the dark woods, moving at their top speed. They began dispatching the soldiers, and it was several seconds before the Red Night even realized they were being murdered from behind. Once the vamps slowed to fight the soldiers, I realized they were led by Trinity.
The Red Night turned to return the attack, and we ran forward to help the vampires. Most of us, anyway. Our
elders went back into the hall and slammed the door.
The vampires made quick work of the soldiers, with our help. It didn’t hurt that Trinity had brought a good forty vampire soldiers with her.
When it was over, and every soldier was on the ground, dead or dying, Trinity smiled at us triumphantly. "Now what do you have to say?" she asked. "Now that I’ve saved your asses?"
Kane snarled at her. "You planned this."
"Hey," a gurgling voice said from my feet. I looked down to see the soldier with the megaphone still alive.
Everyone, lycan and vampire alike, turned to look at him. I lifted my boot to crush his skull, but he spoke again.
"She betrayed us," he whispered, clutching his shoulder. It looked like his body armor had been ripped off, then a vamp had tried to take out his throat but missed. He was losing blood too fast to last long, though. "She’s working with a werewolf." He gasped. "Emer—" He didn’t finish the word before his head flopped to the side.
"Emerson," Voss whispered in horror. I turned to look at him, then to look for Trinity. It was time for this to end.
She was gone.
Epilogue
Jillian
Kane stood in front of the combined might of the lycans and vampires. More had turned out for this announcement than our original council meeting. Many more.
"Trinity Sanders and Emerson Jensen are enemies of the vampires and lycans alike," he said to the packed room. "They have betrayed both the pack and the coven, and they have disappeared."
The crowd muttered, shocked by the news.
Kane continued. "Most of you have heard the story by now. They’re responsible for more than twenty murders across the two groups."
He paused, letting the news sink in. "As such, I am taking control of the Coven. Since we don’t know who Trinity was blackmailing and who she wasn’t, the council is disbanded immediately. We will hold elections to refill the council seats." The vampires gasped, and a large majority of them began clapping.
My dad stepped forward, holding up a hand to quiet the room. "The Lycan council is also disbanded. We will hold elections as well, but we will do it alongside the vampires, creating a joint council to serve the needs of both groups."