by Tessa Dawn
Natalia clung to Santos’ shoulders, perhaps more out of horror than hope.
But it was something…
For now.
And it would have to be enough.
However diminutive her trust, Santos would safeguard it, honor it, and eventually cultivate it until she knew it hadn’t been misplaced.
She cried a river of silent tears while he held her, soaking his shirt and her delicate, long lashes. When at last, she had no tears left to cry, she raised her head and sniffled. “How many?” she asked, and he instinctively knew what she meant.
“Thirty innocent souls are dead. Eighty-eight survived.”
Natalia drew back and massaged her temples, her expression unbearably tired. “Can I see the bodies…the women who passed?”
Santos sucked in a horrified breath. “Oh, baby…no. It’s not…they’re too…I’m sorry, Natalia.” What else could he say? Oskar and Achilles had left a blood bath in their wake, and there was no way—absolutely none—that Santos was going to subject Natalia to those images. Besides, many of the bodies would already be gone. Vampires didn’t play around or waste time.
Seeming to understand, she slowly nodded, but her tears welled up once more, threatening to rush out in a flood. “Can you see into my mind if you want to…if I let you? Can you glimpse my thoughts or my memories…if I show you?’
Santos nodded cautiously, wondering where this was going. “With your permission, cara mia? Absolutely.” He stroked her temple, smoothing her worried brow with his thumb. “Oh, Natalia…”
She sniffled—“I want you to do it now, Santos”—and then she closed her eyes and conjured a distant memory: a dark, moonless night; a little girl, hiding in the back of her bodyguard’s jeep; a dark-haired child sneaking, unnoticed, into The Fortress, then crawling on her hands and knees through dirty halls in order to peer inside the cages…
Staring into the eyes of a four-year-old girl…
Eyes that sparkled like finely spun glass: beautiful, innocent, silver-blue irises.
The eyes of a faery princess.
“Can you see it?” she asked softly. “Can you see her?”
Santos continued to peer inside his destiny’s mind, appalled by such tragic, haunting images. “I see what you see,” he whispered.
“She was a child back then,” Natalia explained. “She would be a young woman now. But her eyes are unmistakable…incomparable. Santos, was this girl among the dead?” Her entire body shook from emotion, and Santos had to blink back a tear, take care to contain his reaction.
He cupped Natalia’s cheeks in his hands and pressed a tender kiss to her forehead. “Natalia girl; look at me.”
Her eyes met his, and they were so filled with longing—with fear, hope, dread, and desperation—she was this close to coming unglued.
“Her name is Zayda. And she is very much alive. She is well, she is free, and she is living in Dark Moon Vale.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Xavier Matista couldn’t believe his good fortune.
The timber wolf moon had finally shined down upon the lycans, imparting inordinate good luck, particularly on the Alpha General of the Western District Pack, such as it was these days, following the devastation caused by the Silivasi brothers in Mhier.
No matter.
He wouldn’t think of that.
Tonight, all was well for the werewolf.
About half past midnight, he had received a call from a human devotee, Bo Cooper, a nobody, really, in the hierarchy of the Council of Governing Nations. Considering that the overarching and elusive council of human vampire-hunters existed in several countries, each employing several operative Head-Hunters to work out of national offices—maintain regional militias—and those militias employed displaced, disgruntled, and generally confused ex-special forces, often in bands of seven, Bo was just one of many long-ago recruits the lycans used to do their dirty work. He wasn’t even as significant as Owen Green, the charismatic leader of the Denver militia that had royally screwed up Kiera Sparrow’s captivity—she was now safe and sound and living in Dark Moon Vale with Saxson Olaru.
But again, Xavier’s mind was wandering…
The point was: Humans could go where werewolves could not, and since Bo rarely slept at night, he spent a lot of time in his secluded fifth-wheel, deep in the Roosevelt National Forest—far enough outside Dark Moon Vale to not provoke the suspicion of the vampires, yet close enough to the supernatural valley to keep an eye on the various happenings—monitoring his expensive satellite equipment.
And this night, Bo Cooper’s insomnia had truly paid off.
For reasons the human could not fathom, the house of Jadon had come alive in an instant: warriors mobilizing, vampires assembling, and of singular importance, Kagen Silivasi had been one of them. Thinking quickly—and kudos to the human because his swift improvisation had been brilliant—Bo had thumbed through his registry of covert intelligence; scanned the roster of human servants, those who lived in or near the vale, serving the Vampyr for generations; and quickly come across Cole and Chrissy Bailey. The couple lived in a small log cabin just outside the outskirts of the Dark Moon Hot Springs, and Chrissy was eight months’ pregnant. She wanted to have her baby at home, and Kagen had overseen her maternity care, visiting the cabin often, along with Arielle. Alas, Xavier would not need to stake out the outdoor shower beside the private herb garden…
Utilizing his satellite phone, Bo had called the Dark Moon Clinic, pretending to be Cole, both frantic and desperate: “Chrissy is in labor! The baby’s coming early. We don’t know what to do…please, please help us.”
True to her healer’s heart and her caring nature, Arielle Nightsong-Silivasi had left her son, Ryder, with the clinic’s nurse, Katia, and set out in the family’s Jeep Rubicon to get to the young couple’s cabin.
Only she hadn’t quite made it.
The moment she had reached the fork in the road, the wolf-trap-free intersection that led to the couple’s secluded cottage, Xavier Matista had pounced.
Now, as he sat by the fire on the other side of the portal, safely ensconced in Mhier, where Kagen could neither track his mate’s blood, nor follow her through worlds, he stared at the beautiful copper-haired warrior before him, studying her familiar aquamarine eyes.
The female was terrified.
Good.
“Welcome home, Arielle.” He growled the words, scanning the diamond-embedded cuffs on her wrists. Goldilocks wasn’t just a girl anymore; he would have to take caution during her captivity. She grunted something vile beneath her leather gag, and Xavier laughed.
Her terror was positively orgasmic.
It was too bad he couldn’t kill her…use her…have his way with her and deliver her body back to his enemy in a deerskin bag.
But restraint was the name of the game.
As much as Xavier wanted vengeance on the Silivasis, a chance to best his detestable enemies, he wanted his daughter, Zayda, even more. And assuring Keitaro that Arielle would remain safe and sound—undamaged and unmolested—was his only chance of getting Zayda back.
If Xavier killed Arielle, the Silivasis wouldn’t sleep.
The warriors would never stop hunting.
The Master Wizard might do…hell, who knew what! Magick was an unpredictable variable.
And for all the general knew, Zayda might be returned in a deerskin canteen, as a blasphemous mockery, her organs churned into liquid, her bones ground to powder through a blender. Nathaniel Silivasi had a wicked imagination and an even more devious sense of justice.
No.
Xavier would stick to the plan.
Besides, Bo had already delivered Xavier’s note to Kagen’s doorstep…
Tomorrow, Xavier would slip back through the portal and call Keitaro Silivasi on a basic human device—he would contact his enemy on a cell phone to schedule the exchange of their daughters.
Kagen Silivasi clenched his fists, rotated his neck on his shoulders, and cracked two up
per vertebrae, inadvertently, trying to control his trembling.
Then he read the note a second time:
Vampires—one and all—just kidding! This note is for Keitaro Silivasi, but I’m certain it will be of interest to Kagen, too—salutations from the land of Mhier!
As you read this, I am sitting in my front room beside a blazing fire, admiring Arielle Nightsong’s legendary beauty—yes, Kagen’s beloved destiny and the daughter of Keitaro’s heart (how quaint by the way).
Before you go off half-cocked, think it over: We both know you can no longer enter Mhier—isn’t that why you have begged me for months to “come out and play” in Dark Moon Vale? Well, here’s the thing: I no longer wish to play. I would rather forge a limited truce—at least long enough to exchange our women. A captive for a captive. A daughter for a daughter. Arielle Nightsong-Silivasi for Zayda Patrone-Matista.
It’s a very simple offer, and I’ll make it only once.
Kagen, do tell your father that I am not playing games with him over this, nor will I tolerate any treachery or attempts to get over… I will contact Keitaro tomorrow, so make sure he stays by his phone. In the meantime, take care of Zayda as I will take care of Arielle. Certainly, you understand, the reverse would also hold true.
Sincerely,
General Matista
Kagen knew he needed to head directly to the old family homestead, take the note straight to his father, but his soul demanded—and his very DNA raged—to make another stop first…
He had already searched the house, and Arielle wasn’t there.
He had checked on Ryder, spoken to Katia, and called Cole and Chrissy Bailey—the female had not gone into labor, and Cole had not called the clinic.
Xavier had lured Kagen’s destiny into a trap…
And that was the rage consuming Kagen’s soul.
The note reeked of the mangy lycan’s foul scent, but it also carried traces of a human male—likely the one who had called the clinic—and Kagen had turned that stench over in his nostrils like a human drug addict, suffering from withdrawal, snorting a line of cocaine. He had dissected every olfactory sensory neuron as it traveled through the odor receptors and made its way to the limbic system in his brain, until the fragrance was cemented for all time in Kagen’s memory…
Forever a part of his primordial awareness.
And now that he had the scent banked in his very soul, there would be no peace until he tracked it.
Stepping onto the second-floor terrace, he released his dark brown wings, the moon’s light catching the silver highlights as he shot into the air. What might have been a twenty-minute drive was traversed in under two minutes, and it only took that long because Kagen had to filter out an infinite number of competing odors.
At last, he descended in a thicket and approached a hidden camper, well concealed beneath a dozen towering pines, and then he blasted through the aluminum and steel and snatched the nearest occupant—a lone human male—by his scrawny, convulsing throat.
He had no intentions of toying with this prey.
The situation was too dire.
Still grasping the human by the neck, he flew through the hole in the camper; soared to the top of a towering tree; and impaled the piece of shit on a jutting, spindly branch, dissecting him through the sternum. And then he tunneled so violently into the fool’s temporal lobe that a lobotomy would have been kinder.
Kagen absorbed every thought, emotion, and memory as the soon-to-be-dead Homo sapien screamed and convulsed, and then he released his fangs, pierced them deep into the bastard’s jugular, and drank until Bo Lee Cooper expired from exsanguination.
Leaving the lifeless body hanging from the tree, Kagen made a mental note to contact Napolean’s sentinels tomorrow, let them know about the human vampire-hunter and the covert fifth-wheel parked just outside the vale, and then he careened through the dark, ominous sky on his way to awaken Keitaro.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Later That Morning ~ The Lake House
Natalia wasn’t sure why she had slept so deeply when her mind was so fitful, her heart was so troubled, and her spirit was still all but weeping.
So much loss.
So much change.
So much violence and confrontation…
Santos must have used his vampiric powers to impart some temporary measure of peace, so Natalia could get some sleep while alone in his bedroom, as he spent the night on the couch.
Now, as she crawled from beneath the luxurious sateen sheets in the soft, comfortable bed, which faced a wall-length panoramic window overlooking a hidden lake, she padded softly across the master bedroom and headed into the water closet.
She brushed her teeth, ran a comb through her hair, and slipped into her familiar cherry blossom, charmeuse satin robe before ambling her way out of the bedroom and heading toward the aroma of freshly brewed coffee. From what Santos had told her, the morning after conversion, vampires no longer needed human food, and few of the males in the house of Jadon partook of the same. However, destinies were renowned for clinging to their favorite cravings, and it wouldn’t hurt their immortal bodies to do so, just so long as they primarily imbibed on blood…
Ew.
Just ew.
She didn’t want to think about that now.
She would simply focus on a morning cup of coffee, grateful that Santos had been considerate enough to think ahead…to brew the java for Natalia.
Locating the elaborate stainless steel coffee and espresso machine, she began to rummage through several dark mahogany cabinets in search of a mug—and that’s when she glanced absently out the floor-to-ceiling windows, and her breath hitched in her throat.
Santos Olaru was standing on the top tier of his expansive deck, wearing nothing but a pair of loose-fitting, knee-length gym shorts, and leaning over the rail.
His bronzed, muscular back was arched.
His strong, angular jaw revealed a masculine hint of a five o’clock shadow.
And the sun was gleaming off his broad, powerful shoulders like the rays were reaching down to caress his flawless skin.
Natalia gulped.
For all intents and purposes, he looked like a statue of a Greek god, posing atop the battlements of Mount Olympus: proud, regal, and chiseled from timeless granite.
He must have felt her presence because he turned his head to the side and rotated that magnificent body in a slow, almost feline glide: his shoulders rolling, his hamstrings flexing, and one of the globes on that faultless backside contracting.
His eyes met hers, and he smiled.
Natalia almost fainted.
And then he indicated the sliding glass doors with a nod of his chin and crooked his fingers inward—he wanted her to come outside.
Natalia shook her head.
Oh no…nope…she needed…she needed a cup of coffee.
She fumbled through the cupboard, desperate to find a mug, anything to remain distracted.
Natalia, come outside. He spoke in her mind, and she shivered.
“You can do this, Talia,” she whispered beneath her breath. “Just go outside and say good morning, then come right back inside and finish making coffee. Easy peasy.”
He was just a man.
Well, he was just a vampire…
Just a flawless, gorgeous, overwhelmingly intimidating, masculine, half-naked vampire who thought she belonged to him.
But yeah…
She could do this.
It was no big deal.
Raising her chin and lifting her shoulders, she strolled gracefully to the patio doors and misjudged the width by about six inches. She slammed into the aluminum door frame with the bone of her right hip and immediately reached for the tie on her robe, trying to play it off by fumbling with the fabric. She retied the knot and shuffled quickly to the left, out of the reach of the dangerous aluminum, her head still held high. Oh, Lord, she muttered inwardly, concentrating far too hard on just making it out the door.
The corn
er of his mouth quirked up in a sexy, devious smile, and she wanted to throw something at him—but she had nothing in her hands.
This wasn’t cute or funny.
The situation was dire.
Very serious.
Their lives—her life—had just been upended.
“How did you sleep,” he asked, and there had to be an extra ounce of grit and vibrato in that sin-laced voice.
Natalia stared at the ground. “Very well…surprisingly. And you?”
He cocked one shoulder in a lackadaisical shrug. “I slept okay.”
She nodded.
“How are you feeling this morning?” he asked her next, and her eyes went straight to…his crotch.
She gasped at her own impropriety—what the hell was she doing?—and she took a couple of clumsy steps back. Oh lord, it wasn’t that she was curious…like, sexually… She would never come on to a man so directly. It was just…well, perhaps she had just been trying to avoid his face and maybe, just maybe, she’d wanted to make sure he wasn’t…aroused.
Aroused?
Natalia, get a grip!
She placed one hand over her heart and the other over her throat. “I…I’m feeling kind of overwhelmed.”
He studied her then, those stunning crystal-blue orbs boring into her dark brown irises, before appraising her expression, her stance, and her body language…before settling back against the railing and crossing his arms lazily over his middle. “Overwhelmed?” he repeated.
Natalia’s mouth was very dry.
She needed that cup of coffee.
“I…I just think I’m hungry.” Oh, heaven; had she just said hungry?
Santos’ penetrating gaze swept down to her throat, and his pupils zeroed in on her jugular.
She felt her larynx constrict. “I meant…thirsty. I think I’m very, very thirsty.”
He appraised her thoughtfully for the span of several heartbeats, and then he extended his hand. “Come here.”