Typhoon growled. He turned to see Hailstorm and half a dozen others leave the trees. His gaze swept the lineup. None of them were the shifters who had been at the clinic earlier. Not that it mattered. He growled again as he focused on Hailstorm. The rage he’d felt, seeing the other shifter attacking Mia when her back was turned, rose up in his chest again.
He charged. All the others attacked at the same time, and he found himself in the middle of a snapping, growling mob. He batted two away and launched himself at Hailstorm.
In true cowardly fashion, Hailstorm slipped away, allowing two of his men to take the attack. Typhoon sank his teeth into one of their shoulders and hurled the shifter behind him. He turned to snap at another who was coming at him from behind. His claws tore across the face of a third, and he let out a furious snarl that had three of them flinching back.
Typhoon grabbed the scruff of another shifter and twisted hard. The shifter let out a pained yelp as something snapped, and Typhoon released him. The shifter scrambled away from the fight, limping on three legs. The others regrouped, and Typhoon took the opportunity to go at Hailstorm again.
Hailstorm threw himself at a car that Typhoon hadn’t seen with a howl. He shifted back to human form and reached for something inside it. Just as Typhoon landed on him, teeth clenched around his leg, Hailstorm whipped around.
A gun gleamed in his hand. Typhoon released his leg and reached for the gun, but was too late. The report of a gunshot echoed off the trees, and a fiery, burning pain hit Typhoon in the pit of his stomach.
Coward.
Typhoon’s teeth clamped over Hailstorm’s arm. He shook himself hard. A cold feeling seeped around the burn in his stomach, cutting off the pain.
Hailstorm let out a cry. His arm snapped, and the gun fell to the ground. Typhoon dragged him away from the weapon. The cold feeling spread through his body, and he found himself panting for breath. Hot blood dripped from his belly, and his head spun.
He needed something. He needed…blood.
A whine erupted from Typhoon’s throat when two of the other shifters attacked him from behind. Teeth and claws tore into his flanks, the pain muted by the cold seeping through his body. Typhoon knew the signs. He stumbled, fighting the cold, the pain, everything. The growing need for blood rose like flames in the back of his throat. He turned sharply to snap at the two, but they jumped out of range from his teeth.
His wolf had begun to withdraw. Typhoon desperately clung to it, trying to coax it back to the forefront, but it slipped away like water, and he hit the ground on his hands and knees, fingers digging into the gravel road.
Hailstorm laughed. Fangs erupted from Typhoon’s jaws. He let out a howl of anger and despair and threw himself at Hailstorm. The need for blood blinded everything else, and he slammed Hailstorm back to the ground. He heard his enemy’s blood pulsing just below the surface, and his gaze narrowed in on Hailstorm’s neck.
His enemy let out a strangled shout, fear and shock mixed in his voice. Typhoon dropped his head, and his fangs pierced Hailstorm’s throat. Hot blood gushed into his mouth, and Typhoon drank greedily. Warmth rushed through his body as he drank, the pain coming back full-force but accompanied by the itch that told him that his wounds were closing, faster than a shifter’s should.
There were cries behind him. Hailstorm clawed at him, struggling hard. Typhoon clutched at him tighter, needing more blood.
Something heavy broke across his back, and Typhoon ripped away, turning to the attacker with a snarl. The others stared at him, eyes wide and terrified. That was when he realized what they were seeing: blood-red eyes, skin too pale to be human, and the scent of rotten fruit mingled with his wild scent. They stared at him with horror, seeing him for what he was—the vampire inside of him.
Typhoon’s stomach cramped. His muscles bunched, the desire to attack and the need to run warring inside him. Hailstorm whimpered and whined behind him, and Typhoon remembered: he couldn’t let these men go, just like that. Even if they hadn’t seen his transformation, they'd still attacked him. Had tried to kill him.
He launched himself at the nearest one, but his feet caught on each other, still weak from his injuries. He managed to catch the enemy around the neck with his hands, but his wolf stayed stubbornly distant. The other shifters let out howls and launched at him simultaneously. Teeth and claws tore into him. What little warmth he’d gotten from drinking from Hailstorm quickly fled as the blood spurted from his body. Pain lanced through him, and he swung blindly, but his movements were too slow, too sluggish, and he couldn’t hit even one of his attackers. Darkness faded in and out of his vision.
Teeth sank into his shoulder, and Typhoon let out another howl. He punched the wolf in the ribs, and then all he could do was curl up into a ball. He wrapped his arms around the back of his neck while protecting his throat and stomach with his legs, but it didn’t stop his attackers, who tore into him with renewed frenzy. The air was full of snarls and growls as chunks of flesh were torn from his body.
Then there was a yelp as one of his attackers was yanked away. Something thudded heavy against the ground. Another yelp rang through the air followed by another and then another, and the gun went off again. Typhoon flinched, but there was no new pain. The scent of rotten fruit overpowered him as long howls, and yelps faded into the space around him.
Typhoon stayed where he was, curled in a ball. He panted for breath. His body felt utterly frozen. He couldn’t have uncurled, even if he wanted to, as he was unable to command his limbs to move. Everything seemed to fade in circles around him, and he let out a groan as his stomach clenched and threatened to rebel.
Hands clasped his arms and pulled them away from his body. This time, Typhoon tried to resist, but he had no strength. His head lolled back. Sunlight streamed into his eyes, making them water, and then he saw a familiar face.
“Hold on, Robby,” his father breathed, picking him up. He stumbled a little, but Typhoon had no strength to help him. “Just hold on.”
Chapter Nine
Mia
Taking care of her injuries wasn’t exactly easy as they were on her back, but they weren’t deep. Mia elected to sit in the shower until they stopped bleeding, which only took about ten minutes. Then, since Jasper was in need of a change, she brought him into the shower with her and gently cleaned him while trying not to think about Typhoon.
Once the water started to run cold, she got out and carefully dressed before settling Jasper back into his car seat and cleaning the clinic. When she was done, she was too tired to think about driving, and she curled up in her office—she'd slept over there often enough that she'd decided to put a pull-out couch in there—and tried to sleep, which was difficult, as thoughts of Typhoon kept invading her mind.
He'd never looked so angry before. If he had, the anger hadn't been directed at her. What was going through his mind at that moment? He'd said he didn’t want a child, yet he'd bought her at the auction and married her, knowing she had an infant son all the while.
She knew he hadn't intended to stay married to her, and that he was just being a gentleman. If he decided he would stay married to her, was it because they had a child?
Mia didn’t want that, as strange as it was. Sure, a man marrying her because he wanted a regular sex buddy was fine, but to do it because he felt obligated? No. No way.
He wouldn't do that, anyway. He'd said it himself—he wasn’t interested in being a father. No, he was probably off to figure out how to annul their marriage. Or—she shuddered—he'd decided to deal with Blake. She didn’t envy the other shifter, but he had attacked both her and Typhoon. She understood where the justice came in.
There was a bang outside the office, and Mia bolted upright. As she headed for the door—glancing at Jasper quickly, who, unlike her, was sound asleep—it burst open. The scent of blood and rotten fruit assaulted her nostrils, and she instinctively withdrew.
The vampire standing in the doorway wasn’t as pale as they normally were. For him to
be out in the sunlight like that he must've drunk shifter blood…and recently. Mia looked at his blood-smeared body, catching the faint, wild scent of him.
She drew back from the vampire, and her tiger rushed to the surface. If he thought she’d go down without a fight, he had another thing coming!
“Mia Efron?” the vampire asked, dark eyes sharp on her face.
“What the hell do you want?”
The vampire stepped forward. “I need you. Robby needs you. I’ve put him in that room. Please, I know you don’t have any reason to trust a vampire, but I’m here for your help. Please.”
Mia hesitated. Maybe the vampire was genuine. Then again, maybe he wasn’t. Could she risk it? Claws grew from her nails. Her teeth sharped in her mouth. Fire-orange fur began to sprout on her body.
“I don’t help vampires,” she spat at him. “Get out of my clinic or—”
Typhoon's voice came from somewhere behind the vampire. “Mia?”
A ripple of shock went through her. She stood rooted to the spot for a moment before hesitantly stepping forward. “Why would a vampire want to help his greatest enemy?”
The vampire’s jaw tightened, and he stepped back as well, though whether to keep drawing Mia forward or to put some distance between them if she decided to attack, she didn’t know. The vampire shook his head. “Robby isn’t my enemy.”
Robby. Mia hesitated a moment longer before shaking her head. She never knew Typhoon’s real name; Robby didn’t seem to suit him at all. If it really was him…
Some vampires could change their voices, but their vampiric powers lessened substantially after drinking shifter blood. It was mid-day outside—any vampire around there on that day had to have drunk a significant amount of shifter blood, which meant they would no longer have their creepy powers.
“What happened?” she snapped as she swept past the vampire to the room Typhoon was in, pulling up short as soon as she entered.
Typhoon was on the bed, all right, but he didn’t look…like himself. His skin was marble-white—his usual tone was closer to a tanned deer hide. Blood red eyes shone from his face, and a set of distinctive fangs was in his mouth. The teeth weren’t the curved, pointed fangs of a shifter, either. These were straight, sharpened on both sides, and distinctly vampiric.
Horror flooded her chest as she backed up a step. Shifters couldn’t be turned into vampires. They were poisoned by the venom. The result of the vampire DNA trying to rewrite the shifter DNA was always fatal.
She'd seen Typhoon shift into his wolf; it was impossible for him to be a vampire! Impossible!
“Is this some sort of joke?” she rasped.
Typhoon’s gaze was wide and terrified as it locked on her. He panted heavily and tried to push himself up, but his body was so battered, it was a miracle he was even conscious. His gaze flickered to the vampire. “Why bring me—” His eyes rolled into the back of his head, and he went limp. Blood dripped from his hands to the floor.
The vampire rushed to his side and cradled him gently. His dark eyes turned pleadingly to Mia. “Please, he needs blood. I didn’t know where else to take him.”
“Blood?” Mia’s brain didn’t seem to want to work. What the hell was going on? What was happening? “Because…he’s a vampire?”
“Only half. Please, I can explain once he’s healed. You have blood here, don’t you? This is a clinic where you treat injured shifters—you have to have blood.”
“We suffered some bad attacks lately,” Mia murmured. “I haven’t had time to replenish my stores.”
The last of it had been taken by the human paramedics when they'd transported the patients to the hospital. There was no blood left in the clinic except for vampire blood. She opened her mouth to say that she did have blood, after all, when the vampire hissed under his breath.
“You’ll have to feed him, then. I can’t. My blood will only make it worse.”
Mia felt paralyzed as she stared at Typhoon’s face. He was getting weaker by the second, the smell of rotting fruit growing stronger. The scent of blood was almost overpowering even though the flow from his wounds had begun to slow. What would happen when he ran out of blood entirely? Would he die, or would he just be vampire through and through?
The vampire stroked his hair, and tears leaked from his eyes. The sight of him crying and the gentle way he held onto Typhoon triggered something in Mia’s brain. She couldn’t just sit there and do nothing while a vampire took care of someone in need of help.
Mia strode forward and yanked her sleeve up her arm. It crossed her mind that if anybody else had still been at the clinic, Typhoon and the vampire would have both been dead by then, and there was nothing she could have done to stop it. Her stomach cramped, but she pushed the thoughts aside. There wasn’t anybody else there besides her, the vampire, Typhoon…and Jasper.
Oh, Goddess! If Typhoon was a vampire, what did that make Jasper?
“What do I need to do?” Mia asked, holding her wrist over Typhoon’s face—she wasn’t putting her neck anywhere near those fangs.
“Just put your wrist in his mouth. Instinct will take over.”
Typhoon tensed. His eyes flickered, and he let out a protesting noise. “Don’t…hurt…”
The vampire stroked his hair again. “I won’t let that happen, Robby. I promise. I won't let you hurt her. I’ll make sure you stop.”
Typhoon groaned. His head flopped to one side. How much time was left?
The vampire pinned Typhoon to the table, and Mia took a deep breath. Without allowing herself to think of anything else, she pressed her wrist into Typhoon’s mouth.
Typhoon whimpered. His eyes flashed open. His bloody irises locked on her, and his jaw opened. Typhoon bit down on Mia's wrist so fast and hard that she could do nothing else but jerk, and a cry of pain burst forth from her lips.
Typhoon’s teeth tore through her skin, and he began to suck. Pain lanced up her arm, starting at where his mouth connected with her. Dark growls rolled from his chest.
Mia yanked away instinctively, and Typhoon snarled as he lunged.
“Don’t stop him," the vampire gasped, "not yet.” He struggled to hold Typhoon in place.
Blood dripped from Mia's wrist, but she put her arm back against Typhoon’s mouth, nevertheless, and he began to suck again. She could feel the blood leaving her body. Soon, her legs became shaky.
“I can’t,” she stuttered.
Her knee buckled, and she leaned against the table, gasping for breath. She wanted to pull away again, but Typhoon’s struggles had grown stronger, and she didn’t dare. What if he broke free and went for her throat?
The vampire wrapped his arms around Typhoon’s body, climbed onto the table, and pinned him into place. Go,” he grunted. “Quickly!”
Mia’s brain started to spin. At first, she wasn’t certain what the vampire was saying.
“Go!”
Her tiger yowled, and instinct took over as Mia ripped herself away from Typhoon. She stumbled toward the door, hearing curses and screams rise up behind her.
The vampire grunted with the effort of keeping Typhoon pinned. The noise had obviously woken Jasper because a thin wail came from her office. Mia raced to her son, snatching up the car seat on the way. Her keys sat on her desk, and she almost missed them as she went for the door. Mia's legs shook, and her arms felt heavy. She could hardly keep herself upright as she swayed toward the building entrance.
A howl broke from behind her, and she put on as much speed as she could. She raced to her car, hurriedly clicked the car seat into place, and jumped into the driver’s seat. Mia had to get away from there, just go as far as she could.
Typhoon was…what? A vampire, a shifter, or somehow both? She’d heard rumors that some vampires were looking to create vampire-shifter hybrids, but that was new. Typhoon was at least thirty-five years old, a little older than she was. If there'd been a vampire-shifter hybrid running around for thirty-plus years, she'd have known about it, right?
; And he was always the last person to show mercy to vampires. If he was a vampire himself, why would he do that? Unless, of course, he was working from this side to weaken the Brotherhood to bring them to a point where an all-out war was necessary.
Was Jasper the vampire-shifter hybrid they wanted? What would happen to him if the Brotherhood found out? Would their protective feelings for her be enough to save him?
“Goddesses of old and new, protect us,” she whispered, terror slithering through her blood. If such goddesses existed, would they care about one insignificant tiger?
She didn’t know where she was going until she ended up outside of a familiar mansion. It wasn’t as big as his one in Ivywood, but Josef had a house in every city in which the Brotherhood had a chapter, Easthallow included.
Mia wrapped a strip of cloth around her wrist as she pulled up to the gate.
A bored-sounding voice came from the speaker at the side of the driveway. “Name and business.”
“Mia Efron.” Should she tell them what happened or pretend she was checking up on Andy? Maybe neither. “I need to come in, please. Roxy and Josef know me.”
There was a brief pause before the gates swung inward. Mia let out a relieved sigh as she drove in.
Roxy and Josef were waiting for her at the front door, both of them looking confused and concerned. Mia no longer wanted to talk about anything she'd witnessed as she got out of her car. Jasper fussed, and exhaustion took over.
“Is everything okay?” Roxy asked, coming down to greet her.
Mia stared past her and shook her head. “I need a place to stay for a while. Somewhere safe.”
“Safe from what?” Josef pressed.
Bile rose in Mia’s throat. “Just safe. Please, can I stay here?”
Roxy put an arm around her. “Of course. Do you have any bags?”
“No.” She had even taken a diaper bag. She swayed on the spot, and her chin fell to her chest. “I need to rest.”
“Of course. I’ll show you to a room.”
***
Mia decided not to tell Roxy and Josef anything. Instead, she slept for as long as she could, before getting up to search for Roxy. She found her sitting with her little girl and Jasper. Roxy looked concerned, but she didn’t press when Mia said she didn’t want to talk about it. The tiger curled up on the couch, feeling utterly exhausted despite her sleep. It was impossible to know how much blood she'd lost, but that wasn’t the point.
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