by Nicola Rose
“You need the key, Anna,” I urged.
She looked down at William and he twitched, a small groan escaping his lips.
“Check his pockets,” Alex called out.
William groaned again and Anna jumped. She shook her head violently from side to side.
“Fangsgiving,” she shrieked.
I swear I heard Zac snort, but when I looked there was no sign of acknowledgement.
“You need the keys, Anna.”
She stepped down from the stool and cautiously moved towards William. He groaned again and kicked out a leg. She yelped in fright and backed away.
“Now, Anna,” Alex ordered.
“Please,” I said. “Hurry, Anna. But release Zac first, before William wakes up.”
She jolted at the sound of William’s name and finally looked into my eyes. Her face crumpled. The normally rosy-red cheeks were deathly white, teeth chattering.
“It’s OK,” I said gently, the pain in my belly begging to differ. It didn’t seem to have gone too deep, and I was pretty sure I’d have bled out already if it had hit anything major. But still, the blood trickled away. “Quickly.”
She took a deep breath and thrust a delicate hand into William’s pocket. He grunted.
Alex watched her like a lion, ready to pounce. Zac was practically unconscious. She should release Alex first, he was more able-bodied, but I couldn’t go along with that notion. I needed Zac free from those hideous chains that were sizzling into his perfect skin.
“Why does Dracula have no friends?” she trilled, her hand fumbling deeper into his pocket. She drew out a set of keys and made back towards me. William mumbled and rolled over.
I shook my head frantically at her and she looked from me, to William, and back again… before grabbing the stool and hurrying over to Zac. He lifted his chin to re-assure her as she climbed up and fumbled with the lock.
Before I could comprehend it, William was back on his feet and lurching towards her. Alex growled and yanked on his restraints.
William grabbed Anna and dragged her down from the stool, pressing the blade against her throat.
“I warned you not to let me down, Anna-doll,” he groaned into her ear.
“Because he’s a pain in the neck,” she screamed as he threw her against the altar.
“Let’s use your blood for this next spell,” William hissed, raising the blade above Anna’s trembling body.
The static noise inside my head exploded… along with the small window at the back of the room, and the chains around Zac’s wrists. Fragments of the metal flew through the air, some of which embedded into my skin with a brief, searing pain.
“Fucking cunt!” Zac scrambled across the room, the silver stake still protruding from his chest. William slashed out with the knife and shouted random magical words that didn’t make sense to me. They came out in a desperate chant, but they didn’t help him.
Zac got hold of his throat and snapped his neck without a moment’s hesitation. Quick and easy like he was a ragdoll. William lay face down, except his head was twisted the wrong way on his body, staring up at me.
Then Zac fell to the floor at my feet, gasping for air. I yelled at Anna to get me down. My blood dripped onto Zac’s leg.
He was a mess. I was a mess. Fucking hell, everyone was covered in blood.
“Thank fuck he’s dead, that magic was a bitch,” Alex growled, staring at Anna. She took a step towards me, but he called her name and she faltered. Even my own stomach dropped at the low, icy voice he used.
He cocked his head and she hesitantly walked over to him with the stool. She was shaking her head, like she didn’t want to do this, but one foot kept going in front of the other. The zombie-shuffle step continued, her glazed eyes locked onto his, even with me shouting at her to stop and let me free first.
She wobbled around on the stool, trying to release Alex from his shackles, and all the while he stared forward; serene, patient, a lazy smile on his lips. Double-skewered. One stake through his heart, the other through his stomach. He hadn’t lost so much blood, the puddle beneath him was meagre compared to that where Zac had been.
With a final clank, he was free. Anna jumped back and cowered in a corner, sobbing. Deep, red stickiness covered the whole of her right side where she’d landed beneath Zac. She was the only one of us without any major injury, and yet the most covered in blood.
I expected Alex to release me right away, since Zac was still slumped and gasping in shallow half-breaths at my feet.
Instead he stalked silently towards Anna. My blood turned to ice at the predatory way he moved.
“Alex,” I called, but his slow approach in her direction didn’t halt. After the momentary relief from William’s death, fear once again clawed back up my throat.
“Run, Anna!” I screamed, but instead of fleeing she pressed her back to the wall like a mouse trapped by the cat. Nowhere to run or hide.
“Alex, get me down, I’m bleeding out,” I yelled, my head spinning. The pain and seeping sensation from my stomach was nauseating. At least my arms had gone numb, I couldn’t feel anything other than pins and needles there, which was some consolation.
“Alex!” I screamed again. “Zac!”
Standing right before Anna, Alex slowly and deliberately pulled the stake from his heart, and tossed it aside. As it left his body a powerful red stream spurted out onto Anna’s chest. She finally tried to make a run for it, but it was too late.
He pulled her back into an embrace, and in doing so, the bloodied stake that was sticking out of his stomach went straight through her back and out her front. Her mouth opened in a silent and strangled cry.
“No!” The yell got lost somewhere in my constricted throat, coming out as a gargled whisper.
Alex glanced at me, before his teeth clamped into her neck. She carried on screaming in silence as he drank from her. The sound found its way out this time, my own screams echoing around the damp room and making up for her lack of noise. Her terrified and remorseful eyes locked onto mine, begging me to help her. Yet, I could do nothing other than watch.
I couldn’t even muster any of the buzzing energy in my head. There was just helplessness. Emptiness.
He drank, and drank, and drank some more. It felt like the nightmare would never end. I kicked my feet at Zac, shouting at him to do something, but he didn’t show any sign of life.
When Alex finished, he pushed Anna forward so that she came away from the stake with a disgusting tearing sound. Then he dropped her to the floor like she was trash. Her body hit the ground with a strange thunk. Dead meat on a hard surface.
He drew the remaining stake from his stomach and moved to stand before me, pressing a hand to my own abdomen.
“You’re right, he missed vital organs or you’d be dead already,” he said, removing his blood drenched t-shirt and tearing it into strips. He knotted them together and then around me, stemming the blood flow.
Fucking asshole could have done that after unchaining me. Why was I still tethered up?
He was waiting. He cocked his head and wriggled his fingers in a ‘come on’ gesture.
“She was my best friend,” I sobbed.
“She was a traitorous bitch. She colluded with a hunter to set us up in a trap and have us killed. And nearly got you killed in the process. There’s no version of events where I’d have let her live.” His shining, blue eyes had never looked so dark.
Zac groaned at my feet and tried to move. Thank God, he was alive. But holy shit, he did not look good. Nevermind me, we needed to get him fixed right away.
“He’s dying.” Alex nodded casually at him. He reached up and grabbed my chains, snapping them with his bare hands. Guess mine weren’t silver. The numbness left my arms in a vicious barrage of agony. It raced from my shoulders, down my biceps and erupted out of my hands. Alex took hold of me to steady my feet.
“He’s going to die unless he feeds,” he said.
I stared at him blankly. Anna’s blood w
as smeared all over his lips.
A devilish grin crept over his face as he took my chin in his fingers and pressed those lips into mine, forcing them apart with his tongue. The metallic taste of blood made my skin crawl. Not because of his lips, or his tongue, but from the taste of her blood.
Then something even more unsettling happened. A surge of excitement swept through my core and settled in between my legs.
He heaved a satisfied sigh and withdrew. “Welcome to the dark side, darlin’.”
The moment his touch left me the world hammered back in to view with force. The bubble popped. The haze cleared. And I wanted to vomit.
Zac groaned and tried to stand. He half charged and half fell into Alex, but ultimately ended up gasping on the floor again.
“Chill out, brother, I won’t run off with your girl yet. I made a promise, I should at least keep it for longer than a few days,” Alex crooned.
I dropped down, the stone floor biting into my knees, and wrapped myself around Zac. Taking hold of the stake, I was about to start pulling it out, but Alex stopped me.
“Not yet,” he said. “He has little more than an ounce of blood left, you pull that out now and he’ll lose it all.”
I felt him hovering over us while I tried to cradle the slippery, bloody mess of Zac’s body, tears blinding me. I let the sobs drown me, choke me. All of our pathetic fights seemed so insignificant in that moment. There was no life without this man.
“Fucking hell, Jess! Do I have to go out there and grab a random girl off the beach to fulfil his need?” Alex stormed.
It finally clicked what he was waiting for. Jesus. How stupid was I?
I moved my wrist in front of Zac’s face. He made a feeble effort at pushing it away, but his head lifted and his eyes changed, darkening with hunger. A low hiss came from somewhere deep inside him and I pressed my wrist to his lips again.
A sharp pang shot through me when his teeth sank into the delicate skin, immediately followed by a pleasing sensation. It ebbed throughout my being, this bewildering mix of sensual pain, as if it were me being healed. His body began to straighten, his muscles tightened. Strength eased its way back into him.
I watched, fascinated by the sight of him drinking from me, but his face became more blurred as humming filled my ears.
“Alright, Zachariah, stop. She’s already lost too much blood herself,” Alex said, placing a hand on Zac’s shoulders.
Zac gave an angry shrug and grabbed hold of my arm tighter. He buried his fangs in deeper and growled like a fucking lion. I pulled my arm back, but his grip was too tight. He yanked me closer. Shit. He wasn’t going to let go. The room spun, the whooshing in my ears intensified.
I kicked and wriggled, bucking my whole body away from him. The pleasure diminished and left a burning ache through my arm as tightness closed in around my chest.
“Enough,” Alex bellowed, this time landing a fist into the back of Zac’s skull and pulling him away. He stood over him, a foot pressed into his ribs, and a hand on the stake. They stayed like that for a while, neither moving, a silent conversation passing between them.
“You got your shit together?” Alex still had a foot pressed firmly over Zac’s chest.
Zac nodded, wiping a hand across his mouth.
“Good, because our men are arriving and they are confused as fuck about what they’re suddenly sensing. William was fucking powerful if his spell only just dropped. I’m out.”
And with that he was gone.
Alex fled from one door, as Eva and Leon burst in through the other.
47
Jess
Zac ran his fingers tenderly over red marks where the chains had cut into my wrists. Of course, he’d healed now, back to full vitality in a matter of hours, and there I was a week later; still struggling with the stab wound to my abdomen, and covered in cuts and bruises. If only I had some of that magical regeneration power for myself. I was sure I could take a little of his blood and be healed, that’s what happened in the books, right?
But instead of offering me his vamp juice, he just apologised for my pain and refused to try it. What was it William had said? About kinky blood-letting and having to kill me again? I knew that was the reason he wouldn’t do it – too risky, too possible that he could make me a vampire if he did.
At least I was out of the horrific hospital bed and back to the comfort of Zac’s mansion. His round-the-clock care was nothing short of doting.
I didn’t know what to make of William’s ‘witchcraft in my ancestry’ revelation, so I decided to file that away for now. It made a little too much sense and brought back terrible memories of the fire that killed my parents. Remorse, uncertainty, anguish. I’d spent long enough trying to convince myself that maybe my unnatural outbursts were coincidental, nothing more than freakish events in nature.
Sure, deep down I’d always known. It was obvious that I was far from normal, and that I was dangerous to be around. But now William had cemented it into some sort of reality and it delivered me a fresh wave of soul-crushing guilt.
Don’t even get me started on the Morena coven thing. I’d mentioned it once and Zac tensed up so much I thought he might combust. I didn’t know if I wanted to hear it, anyway, because if I really was related to someone important to his past, then maybe the whole ‘fated to be together’ thing was a little too real. And twisted. Another notion to keep locked away for now. At least until these damn wounds healed. Jeez, if I really was a witch, shouldn’t I be able to speed up that process by myself?
It was harder to put my emotions from Anna’s death into a box. Her loss left a raw, gaping hole inside me. The loss of her life was my fault, too and I couldn’t hide from that one. William would have carried out his plan, with or without her help. He used her. Planted fear into her. I had no doubt that she believed she was doing the right thing to protect me. She proved that when she tried so hard to backtrack and stop the shit-storm.
My sweet, funny Anna, with her flushed and dimpled cheeks, always pushing her glasses up her nose. The walking contradiction. The librarian lookalike who could switch to looking like a coked-up go-go girl in the space of two shots of tequila. She shouldn’t be dead. I should have told her about Zac, about all of them. I could have made her understand before William worked his way into her head.
I taunted myself daily, running through every encounter, trying to work out if I could have picked up on what William was. I felt so stupid remembering all the clipped conversations and encounters. All that time he knew what Zac was, damn, he knew what I was.
He played us all. Biding his time, knowing what he was going to do and worming his way under Anna’s skin, confusing her and warping her.
Zac would never have killed Anna, or let Alex, if he’d had any strength to step in. I’d pleaded with him to save her, to make her a vampire so that she’d be back in my life, but he insisted it was too late. She hadn’t died with vampire blood in her system, so he couldn’t help. As if he would have, anyway. Could you imagine trying to deal with that baggage? When he turned my friend into a vampire, but still refused to turn me?!
Instead, he’d been left to deal with the aftermath. He wanted to ‘dispose’ of the body, but I point-blank refused. I couldn’t bear the thought of him handling her lifeless form like nothing more than a problem to be solved. She deserved a proper burial, with respect. If the police and pathologists started digging too deep on cause of death, well, then the vampires would just have to go and put their powers of persuasion to use.
I rolled painfully onto my side and snuggled into his chest. We lay in silence for hours, holding each other, sweltering heat making us stick together wherever our skin touched. My heat against his smooth coolness. Despite everything, he still felt safe. He filled up my whole being with more passion and desire than it could hold. It spilled out of me; in the way I looked at him, touched him, needed him. I’d finally found what I’d been chasing my whole life.
It was madness and chaos and heat, yet unde
rneath all that, when he held me in silence, it was so much more. A calmness. At last I was satiated. I would never let go of that. Not ever.
I’ve spent my life drowning in a sea of boys, barely staying afloat, their weakness dragging me under… but here stood a man, ready to show me how to swim.
“Or die trying,” Zac mumbled, reading my thoughts.
I squeezed him tighter. My life was light and heat. Fire has dominated me from way before I even became a firefighter. The torture of my parents’ death, the visions of burning, the scar on my back. He was the opposite – darkness, and coldness. But together, perhaps we could balance each other out.
As long as there was honesty. No more games, no more fighting.
“Did you know, before all this… that I was a witch?” I asked, stretching out my still aching body on his bed.
His bed. I’d been promoted from the guest bedroom and finally trusted with sleeping in his vicinity.
“No. I mean, yes and no. I suspected, but couldn’t find any link to a coven, and your aura is so different. I couldn’t be sure.”
He’d never pushed me on it. He knew I was different, but he also knew how uncomfortable I was with that, how much guilt and anxiety it brought me. So he never chased me for answers, not directly.
I reached up and stroked his neck, pausing to rub the skin under his ear. He turned his head to the side and kissed my wrist. I felt his chest heave as he sucked in a breath and held it there.
His lips had brushed against the two little scabbed holes in my wrist. I didn’t know what that meant, but neither of us had managed to talk about it yet. He’d fed from me, and I’d survived. Admittedly, Alex had to stop him, but still… it was promising, right?
He’d tasted my blood and he had stopped. He hadn’t fought all wild and crazy once Alex pushed him away. This darkness that he thought would break loose hadn’t appeared. Not as far as I could tell, anyway.
“Exactly,” he murmured, burying his nose back into my hair. “You can’t tell.”