Blood Knot

by Cooper-Posey, Tracy

  “You’re not dying.”

  “You’re saving my ass again.”

  She smiled. “You’re welcome.”

  “And I’m lying here wondering how I can get to keep you right here next to me. Forever, Winter.”

  Her heart hurt, so hard did it squeeze. She looked at him. “What exactly are you proposing, Bastian? And here? Now? In the middle of a job?”

  “Where else?” he asked. “I’ve been lying here for ten minutes begging whatever entity would listen for another chance to touch you, kiss you, speak to you. I’m not throwing it away now I’ve got it.” His hand cupped her face and his gaze was steady, determined. “I don’t know how we work it, Winter, because Nial is part of whatever we do. You know that, don’t you?”

  She nodded.

  “I love you.” His thumb stroked her cheekbone. “I think I crossed two centuries just to find you, Winter Manon Kennedy. I want you in my life irrevocably. The human part of me wants the human symbol, Winter. I want to marry you.”

  Winter pressed her hand against the back of Sebastian’s. “If you can figure out a way to do it, Sebastian, I’ll marry you.” She kissed him, and then tugged on his jacket. “But you have to get on your feet now.”

  He hauled himself to his feet and stood swaying. “Damn, you’re good,” he murmured.

  “I was inspired.” She pulled him to the door, opened it and looked out. The corridor was shadowed and quiet. They eased out and she locked the door once more. She turned left and headed toward the apex of the building and the senior partner’s office where Nial and Shakeel would be.

  They met the pair heading back down the corridor, Shakeel lumbering happily along.

  Nial pointed past them silently and Winter turned and headed back again. Time to leave.

  She stopped at the vault anteroom door and unlocked it, intending to let Nial shepherd Shakeel inside, then dose him with his own injector pen, before stealing his memories, so he could wake as clueless as Teddy.

  As soon as the door opened, though, Teddy charged through, his gun out, the broken off mop in his other hand. His trousers were fastened once more.

  His eyes were wild. “Nobody moves!” he yelled.

  “Sure, Teddy,” Shakeel agreed happily.

  “I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t like it!” Teddy declared, moving the gun to point at all of them one after another.

  “Teddy, what are you yelling about?” came a call from further down the corridor.

  “The other guard,” Sebastian murmured.

  “Harvey!” Teddy called.

  Nial swung his arm and buried the injector pen into the side of Shakeel’s thigh. Shakeel gasped, then his eyes rolled in his head and he crumpled to the ground. Teddy tried to line the gun up on Shakeel, until he realized the man was no threat.

  Nial pushed Winter down the corridor. “Run!”

  The second security guard, Harvey, was pounding down the corridor now, drawing out his gun, as Teddy brought his own around to bear upon Nial.

  Nial turned to Teddy. “Sebastian, take her and get out!”

  Sebastian didn’t hesitate. He picked up Winter’s hand and began to run down the corridor. But Winter dragged at his hand, reluctance dogging her every step.

  “Sebastian!” Nial called.

  She turned.

  Nial threw the memory stick to Sebastian in a powerful overarm toss that sent the little piece of metal hurtling like a bullet across twenty yards straight into Sebastian’s chest. He clapped his hand over it, gripped it and stuffed it into his jacket pocket.

  Then he dragged Winter over to the fire exit.

  “No!” she cried as Teddy and Harvey landed on top of Nial, their night sticks out and raised.

  “Move it!” Sebastian yelled.

  The wall where the vault room was located blew up and out, spewing fire, wall, heat and g-force into the corridor where Nial and the guards struggled and the forgotten Shakeel lay. They were instantly consumed by the fireball and ash cloud, as the floor of the corridor heaved and buckled.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  WINTER SCREAMED AS she watched the fireball bellow and race toward them down the confining corridor.

  Sebastian yanked her off her feet and shook her. His green eyes were glassy with shock, but his voice was a growl. “We go now, Winter! There’s no point in all of us dying! Move your ass! Now!” She could barely hear him above the noise of the fire, the fire alarms that were sounding, and her throbbing ears. Her hearing was muffled from the explosion.

  Sebastian pushed and half carried her into the stairwell. She tripped over her heels and kicked them off. He was dragging her toward the iron stairs.

  “I’m coming,” she told him. “I’m coming.”

  They moved halfway down the flight, then vaulted over the rails, down onto flight of stairs beneath, watch their landing. Then they stepped down another three steps and vaulted over that railing.

  By using their arm as a vaulting pole, it gave them time to spot their landing and get their feet down.

  It was a technique that allowed them to dropped the twenty or so floors to the basement in about forty-five seconds.

  Sebastian disabled the alarm at the bottom, pulled her wig off and stuffed it in his pocket, picked up her hand again and pushed out into the night. “Wish you’d kept your shoes,” he murmured.

  She was shivering.

  Alarms were sounding all around them and there was the distant wail of fire, police and ambulance sirens coming closer.

  Sebastian pulled Winter in against his body and wrapped his arm around her. They began to walk along the sidewalk. It was 22nd Street and temporarily deserted.

  “Sebastian, I need to stop somewhere,” she breathed. “Soon.”

  “I know,” he murmured. “Just a few more minutes, and I’ll hail a cab.”

  They kept walking toward Broadway. The pavement was cool on her feet which made her shiver more. A police car went screaming by, sirens blaring and lights flashing.

  There was a sound of a stressed heavy motor behind them. A slam of a door. Metal runners as a sliding door was thrown to one side.

  Then feet running on the pavement.

  Alarm touched her and Winter tried to turn in Sebastian’s arm just as something black was thrown over her face and hands grabbed her arms and wrists and yanked them back.

  She heard Sebastian swear and struggle.

  She was being forced backwards. Back toward the van.

  Her shins thudded painfully against the edges of the van, then she was hauled inside. Her hands were fastened with rope, behind her back. She was shoved onto the cold metal floor, on her side. She couldn’t tell if Sebastian was near or not.

  The door was slid shut, two heavy bodies got into the van, two doors were shut, and the van put into gear and driven away. Apart from turning right at Broadway and heading downtown, Winter quickly lost track of where the van headed.

  But after fifteen minutes it stopped and the engine was turned off.

  Two bodies got out. The sliding door opened and three more got out. Then the back doors of the van were opened and she was lifted out and put on her feet. Her hood was removed.

  The van had been backed into a badly-lit shed that seemed to be made of corrugated iron cladding and timber frames and not much else. There was a dirt floor and weeds showing at the base of the walls. A fire had been started on the floor of the shed and fold up chairs, some of them with holes in the webbing, most of them dirty and decayed, sat around the fire.

  The men from the van sat down in the chairs, all except two. One grabbed the back of Winter’s head and dragged her over to the fire.

  Sebastian was being manhandled by the other, and forced to squat in front of the fire, too. He hunkered down awkwardly, unable to balance himself with his hands behind his back. He looked at her. “I’m fine,” he said.

  “Me, too.”

  “Shut up,” one of the men growled.

  They shut up.

&
nbsp; So did the men, who started to pass a bottle of Tequila around, sipping silently.

  Winter considered the odds. Five against the two of them. It wasn’t certain enough odds to try something, especially with their hands tied and the men armed. She had already spotted two handguns and a compact submachine gun. Even if it had been just the two handguns, she might have tried, but the submachine gun put the odds out of the question. They’d be cut down before they got close enough to try anything.

  So. She glanced at Sebastian and shook her head.

  He breathed out and relaxed.

  After twenty minutes of silent drinking, while Winter’s calves went to sleep, there was a sound of another car pulling up nearby.

  She tried to see over her shoulder, to spot the newcomers as they entered, but she was at the wrong angle.

  “Butterfly knife and company,” Sebastian murmured. “Betcha.”

  She nodded.

  “How do we play it?” he asked.

  “I just want to go home,” she said. To think about Nial and shore up her shattered defenses.

  “Right.”

  The five men were stirring, watching past the van.

  The two newcomers sidled past the van like they didn’t want to touch it. They were human and much neater than the five slouched around the fire. They wore business attire and one had close-cropped hair that screamed military, and faded blue eyes.

  Both had the still, contained movements that spoke of men used to defending themselves physically. They placed themselves between Sebastian and Winter and the firelight, which should have given them the advantage of hiding their features and highlighting Sebastian’s and Winter’s, except they didn’t know that both Sebastian and Winter had enhanced night vision.

  “They don’t look like much,” Blue Eyes said.

  The other man, who had salt and pepper hair, and was slightly shorter and stouter, shrugged. “For all his reputation, Nathanial didn’t look like much, either.”

  “Nathanial’s dead,” one of the roughnecks said, from around the fire.

  Winter clamped down on the reaction that leapt inside her and kept her expression neutral.

  Blue Eyes glanced over his shoulder. “He’s a vampire. Don’t count him dead until you see his body turn to ashes.”

  “He got blown up in an explosion in the Flatiron. Is that dead enough for you?”

  Blue Eyes massaged his chin. “Is that so?” he said, studying Winter and Sebastian. “These two don’t seem to be too cut up about it. And all the reports say they were living with him.”

  The roughnecks stirred. “They barely said nothing or stirred since we brought ‘em here. Real creepy pair.”

  Salt & Pepper laughed. “I heard that about these two. Read each other’s minds while they work. Best team in the business.”

  Blue Eyes was studying them carefully. “Try the woman first,” he decided.

  The five in the chairs behind them stirred and sat up, their interest piqued.

  Salt & Pepper moved to stand in front of her. “Where’s the memory stick?”

  “Nathanial had it when he died,” she told him.

  His backhand caught her square and solidly on the cheekbone and sent her sprawling across the dirt.

  She picked herself up slowly, letting her calves uncramp and internally fixing the damage to her cheekbone. Bruising, mostly. The ache, she could do nothing about.

  “Christ, he didn’t even flinch,” Salt & Pepper complained. He grabbed Sebastian’s hair and yanked his head to make him look at up. “Doesn’t bother you seeing her slapped about?”

  Sebastian managed to shrug despite his awkward stance. “It’s all the same to me. The bitch fucked up the job from the start.”

  Blue eyes laughed. “Harmony among thieves. Don’t you love it?” He turned to look at the five men in the chairs around the fire. “They’re untouched? You didn’t search them?”

  The one who had dragged Winter from the van spoke up. “You said not to touch ‘em. Not until after. Not after last time.” He seemed peeved.

  “You’ll get your goodies,” Blue eyes assured him. “For now, I want you holding them down and searching them. Just searching.”

  The five got out of their chairs. They split up, so that two each held down their arms and legs on the dirt. The fifth man, the spokesman, started searching while Salt & Pepper and Blue Eyes watched.

  He found the memory stick in Sebastian’s jacket pocket and held it up with a grin.

  “Christ, they didn’t even try to tuck it away anywhere,” Salt & Pepper said in disgust.

  “Best place to hide things. Out in the open.” Blue Eyes clicked his fingers. “Get my laptop,” he told the head of the gophers.

  The man sauntered over to a laptop case sitting against the wall of the shed and carried it back. He held it out silently, his face stoic.

  The two minions that had been holding her down let her go, so Winter sat up again. Salt & Pepper walked over to her and viciously slapped her face again.

  She fell back on one elbow, jarring it and her shoulder. Her head was ringing and her face throbbing.

  Distantly, she heard Salt & Pepper say, “That was for lying.”

  After a few minutes, she let herself sit up again. She could taste blood in her mouth and realized she had bit her own tongue. It didn’t improve her mood.

  Blue Eyes was sitting on one of the chairs now, the memory stick inserted in his laptop. He was frowning at the screen, sliding his finger across the mouse pad. “Fuck, it’s got a security password!”

  Salt & Pepper took two giant steps sideways so that he was standing in front of Sebastian. Then he punched him in the face.

  Sebastian rocked back on his heels and landed on his butt with a soft grunt. Winter saw his tongue push up under his lip to touch his teeth.

  “What’s the password, asshole?” Salt & Pepper demanded.

  Sebastian smiled, showing teeth colored with blood. “I just steal things. I’d be the last to know.”

  Salt & Pepper dug in his pocket and pulled out something that glittered silvery and bright in the firelight. He flipped it open. The butterfly knife. The blade was a good five inches long. Long enough to reach any vital organ.

  He strode back over to Winter and grabbed her by the hair. It hurt her already throbbing head.

  The blade was cold against her chest. He had it resting in the space where her shirt lay open.

  “I’m not going to ask again,” Salt & Pepper said.

  The wall of the shed groaned.

  Blue Eyes looked up from his laptop, frowning. Salt & Pepper cursed.

  The side of the shed ripped away with a shriek of stressed metal, making the fire dance and light flutter. The men around the fire leapt to their feet, all except Blue Eyes, who put the laptop on the ground and pulled out the memory stick and pocketed it.

  Sebastian leapt at Salt & Pepper, his hands free of the rope, one reaching for the knife at Winter’s neck, the other for Salt & Pepper’s throat, bloody murder gleaming in Sebastian’s eyes.

  At the same time, Nial dived through the hole in the shed wall, tucked, rolled and came to his feet. He was dressed as she had seen him last—the black trousers and tank top that revealed his pale flesh. He was holding a flat, short sword in his right hand and a long knife in the other.

  Winter recognized the sword with a jolt. It was a Roman short sword.

  Nial’s eyes blazed as he took in the occupants of the shed in one all-encompassing sweep of his head. He growled, showing his canines.

  And then he and Sebastian moved.

  It wasn’t a fight. It was a slaughter.

  Winter had no doubts about the outcome, so she removed herself from the wreckage, wriggling on her butt closer to the van and well out of the way, as Sebastian and Nial dealt with the seven men in shed, and worked on ridding herself of the ropes about her wrists.

  At one point, Blue Eyes tried to climb through the hole in the wall and escape, with blood pouring from his mou
th. Nial casually plucked him away from his desperate grip on the iron siding as Blue Eyes blubbered and pleaded, tossed him back toward the fire and stalked over to where he lay with his bloody hand up, begging for mercy.

  Winter looked away, trying to find disgust or outrage in her heart for what Sebastian and Nial were doing. She found none. All she could remember was the red scar on Nial’s body, and the blood in Sebastian’s mouth. The chill of the knife blade against her throat.

  After a while, the sounds of the fight ceased and she looked up. Salt & Pepper lay closest. He was quite dead.

  Nial was standing at the far side of the shed, watching her, the bloody knife and sword lowered on either side of him. He was wary and she knew why. This was the first time she had seen him fighting. Witnessed this side of his nature.

  Sebastian was watching her, too. Waiting to see how she reacted.

  Winter got to her feet and started to pick her way across the shed. Before she was half-way across, she was running, relief giving wings to her feet.

  When she reached Nial, she barely slowed. Buried in the back of her mind was the knowledge that he could handle it. She slammed into him, threw her arms around him, and held onto him with every bit of strength she had left.

  She heard the whoosh of his breath expel from his lips as she hit, then the sword and knife drop to the ground. His arms came around her, his hand tangling in her hair.

  “I thought you were dead,” she cried against his neck.

  “Dulcis dilecte mi…” he told her. “I had to let them think that.”

  “Who?” Sebastian asked.

  Nial took a breath. “Everyone,” he declared. “Nathanial had to die tonight. This job—the video, the ramifications—they’re too hot a political potato. I’ve known all along I would never come through unscathed, if I survived at all.” He pushed Winter gently to one side. “We have work to do. Then full explanations, I promise.”

  * * * * *

  Twenty minutes later, from half a block along the dark, narrow alley that led to the shed, Winter stood in the protective and warm circle of Sebastian’s arms while Nial monitored twenty foot flames leaping from what was left of the shed.