Vincent (Vampires in America Book 8)

by D. B. Reynolds

  Knowing this, she kept the 9mm with its silencer in her right hand. If someone opened the door unexpectedly, she wanted a quick, quiet reaction. She didn’t want to raise the entire compound because the sleeping guard outside woke up and got a bug up his ass to check the prisoners.

  And then, as prepared as she figured she could be, she settled back against the wall next to Vincent and waited for sunset.

  Chapter Ten

  VINCENT WOKE WITH the perfect, instant memory of where he was and what had happened. He remained still, his eyes closed, breathing slowly. There were others nearby and he needed to know who they were before he gave himself away. It took only seconds to identify . . . Lana? What the fuck was she doing here? He’d warned her off as best as he could last night and had thought she’d acknowledged the warning. He’d seen her fade back into the crowd. Had they caught her anyway?

  But even knowing it was Lana sitting closest to him, he didn’t move. There was another vampire here, someone he didn’t know. There was no reason he should personally be acquainted with every vampire in Mexico, although as Enrique’s lieutenant, he knew more than most. But this one . . . he drew the other vampire’s scent into his nostrils. Vincent didn’t know his physical age, but as a vampire, he was young, turned no more than a few years ago. And since he was locked in this crappy prison, he probably wasn’t all that powerful either.

  Granted, Vincent was in the same crappy prison, and he was certainly powerful enough. But he’d been taken by trickery. And, besides, this prison wasn’t going to hold him for much longer.

  He also knew that the other vamp hadn’t been taken by violence the way Vincent had, not recently anyway. The only strong scent of blood—other than Lana’s enticing and readily available supply—was the blood soaking Vincent’s clothes, and that was easily identifiable as his own.

  So who was this guy? Enrique hadn’t created any new vampires that Vincent knew of, and he had spies close to Enrique who reported to him on just that sort of activity. So, was there a master in Enrique’s territory who was siring new vampires without the Mexican lord’s permission? And, if so, why would that master go to such lengths to take Vincent? The woman’s sneak attack in the bar—the soon-to-be-dead woman—would only work once, and anyone strong enough to be a master vampire would know that he couldn’t hold Vincent. Whoever had orchestrated the assault last night had wanted him taken alive. If they’d wanted him dead, they could have shot him, to much greater effect.

  But Vincent was very much alive, and he had to wonder what the mastermind behind his capture was hoping to accomplish. Even weakened, Vincent was still a match for almost anyone in Mexico. Excepting Enrique, of course, although at full strength, Vincent was a match even for him. That parity in strength was part of why Vincent and Enrique didn’t get along. The Mexican lord wanted a powerful lieutenant, but not one who could best him in a challenge.

  But Enrique wasn’t behind last night’s attack. If he’d wanted Vincent out of the picture, he’d have killed him directly—or at least tried. There was nothing about this situation that made sense. But of all those senseless things, the only one that truly worried him was the fact that Lana was imprisoned next to him.

  He opened his eyes. What a dump. Block walls and a dirt floor. He glanced around, moving only his eyes. Shutters with nothing behind them but the last gasp of daylight. The sun was already below the horizon or Vincent wouldn’t be awake. The little bit of light left was simply the gleam of sunlight over the curve of the earth. For most vampires, even that remnant of sunlight would have kept them asleep, but the more powerful vampires, like Vincent, could rise as soon as the sun itself dipped below the horizon. He still couldn’t walk into that light, but it didn’t keep him down either.

  Those shutters, on the other hand, told a different story. They were designed to torture vampires. He’d seen something like it once, but it was so long ago that he couldn’t bring the memory into focus. He would have, with a little concentration, but there were more important things to worry about right now.

  Lana was sitting between him and the door, her head against the wall, her eyes closed, but with gun in hand. Her arms were bare and he realized he was lying on her jacket. He smiled. She was guarding him and she’d given him her jacket as a pillow. She cared. He’d known he would win her over eventually. Although he could think of a hundred better ways to do it.

  The other vampire was squeezed into the opposite corner as if to make himself as small a target as possible, and Vincent experienced a surge of raw anger at the way the vamp had been treated.

  “Vincent?” Lana’s whisper was so soft he barely heard it. But he shifted his gaze to her, then reached up and squeezed her arm in a careful warning. She slid down from her sitting position until they were lying face to face, their mouths close enough to kiss. She cupped his jaw carefully, her thumb moving back and forth over his beard. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  Vincent fought against the urge to rub against her hand like a cat. “I’m getting there,” he told her. “Tell me what happened.”

  “That bitch—”

  “I know that part, querida. What happened after?”

  “I faded into the crowd like you wanted me to—”

  Her words sounded more like a question and he nodded to indicate she’d done the right thing.

  “—but as I was walking back to the SUV, I spotted the woman who cut you practically crawling down the street. You tossed her across the room after she attacked you.”

  “I remember that, too. I should have killed her.”

  “There’s time for that later. Anyway, I gave her a ride home in exchange for some intel on who sent her to attack you. She all but admitted that the cartel owns this whole town.”

  “It’s nearly dark, Lana,” he said urgently, wanting her to speed up.

  “Right, sorry. Anyway, she told me where they were holding you and what they wanted. That guy over there—” She pointed at the other vampire who was still sleeping soundly, which only reaffirmed his youth. “—is a vampire, but you probably knew that. He’s been with them pretty much from day one. He thinks he belongs to them, like a slave. And that’s how they treat him. They keep him in this—”

  “I figured that out. What do they want with me?”

  “He knew who you were,” she said, indicating the other vamp with a jerk of her head. “He must have seen us when we first pulled into town or something. He knew you were powerful, and he told them about you. They think they can make you their slave the same way they have him. But with you, they’ll have a lot more power at their command.”

  Vincent stared at her, blinking his eyes against the dust, speechless for once. The local cartel bosses—probably a regional HQ of the larger cartel organization—thought, based on their experience with the newbie over there, that they could enslave Vincent?

  “So much for détente between the cartels and the vamps,” Lana murmured. And she had a point. This shouldn’t have happened. Something was seriously wrong here.

  Vincent started to sit up, but was forced to lie back down when his head spun dizzily. This was not good. He was weaker than he’d expected. He’d lost blood before, but never so much, so fast. A weaker vamp would have been down for days, might very well have died. If the woman had cut arteries instead of veins, Vincent would be dead, too. There was only so much the Vampire symbiote could do to keep its host alive and well in the face of that kind of trauma.

  “Vincent?” Lana had started to sit up with him and now leaned over, her fingers once again soft and warm against his face. “You okay?”

  “Still getting there. I lost more blood than I thought.”

  She gazed down at him, her forehead creased with worry, biting her full lower lip in a way that made his dick hard. Or at least as hard as it could get when he was short a few pints of blood.

  “Do you n
eed blood?” she whispered hesitantly.

  Vincent wanted to grin, but he knew how much it had cost her to make the offer. He gripped her wrist gently. “I hate to ask, Lana—”

  “You’re not asking. I’m volunteering,” she told him. “I didn’t break into this hole just so we could both die here.”

  “Then, if you wouldn’t mind . . .” he said softly.

  “You know . . . this wouldn’t be happening if you didn’t feel the need to seduce every woman who comes within five feet of you,” she muttered as she slid down next to him again.

  “Jealous?” he teased, knowing she was nervous and covering it with irritation.

  She gave a ladylike snort of dismissal. “As if.” She tugged at the neck of her T-shirt and said, “How do we—”

  Vincent could have told her that her wrist would do just as well as her neck . . . but he wasn’t that good of a man. He’d wanted a taste of Lana Arnold from the moment he’d met her. She wasn’t that wrong about him seducing every woman he met, but that wasn’t why he’d wanted to taste her. He was willing to admit that part of it was precisely because she’d been so completely immune to his charm. The thrill of the chase and all that. He was a predator, after all. But it was more than just the drive to hunt. She was like this self-contained little universe, traveling through life all alone, letting no one truly touch her. She cared about people, like her father and mother, and the men she’d called uncles. But she kept herself apart. It was about responsibility, more about duty than love.

  He wanted to know what it was like to be loved by such a woman, wanted to be the flame that finally warmed her heart.

  And besides, she had a killer body and all that silky hair.

  He rolled up on one elbow, cupped her hip in one hand and gave a tug, pulling her beneath him. Her eyes widened in surprise and maybe a touch of fear.

  “Don’t be afraid, querida, I would never hurt you.”

  “I’m not afraid. Just do it.”

  Vincent smiled. Not the most romantic offer he’d ever received, but certainly among the most inviting. He brushed a few loose tendrils of hair away from her neck, lamenting the necessity that had her hair bound into its usual braid. The next time he took her vein, her hair would be spread around her like a silken sheet.

  “Vincent?” she whispered, and there was the tiniest tremor in her voice.

  “Lana?”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing at all.” He touched his mouth to her neck and nibbled on the delicate flesh. For such a tough woman, she had very soft skin. His tongue slipped between his teeth for a longer lick. Her skin was salty with sweat, slightly gritty from the dirty floor. It was the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted. He rolled his gaze up and met Lana’s confused eyes. Her cheeks were flushed—it was hot, she was embarrassed, but it was more than that. Her heart was racing and her breathing had grown shallow. She was excited by his touch, by the prospect of his bite. And the faint scent of her arousal was even more intoxicating than that of the blood rushing beneath his lips.

  He held her gaze for a long moment. Forget the dirty floor, the overwhelming heat of their little prison. In that moment, his world collapsed to him and Lana. She made a soft sound, bending one knee so that his leg fell between both of hers. Vincent groaned, nearly swamped by a wave of hunger, and not only for blood. He wanted to fuck her until she screamed, to lap up the cream of her arousal, and then sink his fangs into her thigh as she bucked beneath him.

  He reined in his lust with brutal force. He would have Lana Arnold in every way he wanted. But this was not the place. For now, he would settle for a taste of her sweet blood. If such a thing could be called settling. He lowered his head to her neck, his fangs piercing her skin and sliding into the velvet softness of her vein. A gasp escaped her lips as the euphoric in his saliva hit her bloodstream, followed by a quiet moan as she shivered in his embrace, her bent knee closing over his thigh to hold him close as she flexed against the erection that was straining painfully against his jeans.

  Vincent growled soft and low, his fangs still deep in her vein, the dark nectar of her blood rolling down his throat, just as delicious as he’d known it would be.

  Lana bit back a cry, her fingers digging into his shoulders as she writhed in the throes of the orgasm brought on by his bite. Vincent lifted his head, licking the two tiny wounds automatically, totally captivated by the sight before him. It took every ounce of willpower he possessed to stop himself from taking her right there. She would have let him. Hell, in her current state, she’d probably have begged him to fuck her and to hell with the dirt floor or the crazy cartel guards right outside the door. To hell with the strange vampire in the corner . . .

  Vincent shifted his gaze abruptly and found the other vampire staring not at Vincent, but at Lana. Vincent acted faster than he’d thought possible, jumping up to crouch protectively between Lana and the stranger, growling a soft warning even as he sent a narrow spear of power that forced the other vampire to look at him and not Lana.

  The younger vampire’s frightened eyes met Vincent’s for a brief instant before he lowered them in submission. The vamp was terrified. Hell, living like this, he probably spent most of his waking hours terrified, but he had a particularly good reason to be worried about Vincent. Because this little bastard was the one who’d betrayed Vincent to the local cartel boys, the one who’d set his attempted capture and enslavement in motion. And, yeah, Vincent thought in terms of attempted because, although they didn’t know it yet, his captors’ plan was about to blow up in their faces in a very spectacular fashion.

  “What’s your name, boy?” he demanded, still blocking the vamp’s view of Lana whose orgasm was fading and slowly being replaced by intense embarrassment.

  “Jerry Moreno, sir,” the vamp mumbled, still not meeting Vincent’s gaze.

  Vincent tilted his head curiously and on impulse switched to English. “Who’s your master?”

  “Alessio Olivares Camarillo is my master, sir,” Moreno responded in perfect, unaccented American English, which told Vincent where he’d come from, but little else.

  Vincent frowned. “I don’t know any vampire by that name and certainly no master. Not in Mexico. Is he in the U.S.?”

  Jerry Moreno looked up finally and gave Vincent a puzzled look. “Señor Camarillo is not a vampire,” he said, surprise obvious in his voice.

  “Then he’s not your master,” Vincent dismissed. “I didn’t ask whom you worked for, I asked who your master was.”

  Moreno appeared visibly distraught. “Forgive me, sir. I want to answer your question, but I don’t understand.”

  “Who created you?” Vincent demanded impatiently. “Who made you Vampire?”

  “I don’t know. No one ever told me.”

  Vincent stared. He’d never encountered anything like this. The only way a vampire wouldn’t know his own Sire was if . . .

  “How old are you?”

  “I was twenty years old when I woke up as a vampire. That was two years ago, so . . . I guess I’m twenty-two.”

  “What happened before that? You’re American, right? Why were you in Mexico?”

  “Yes, sir, my family’s in Oregon. I was in the Army. We’d just come back from our second tour in Afghanistan and a bunch of us came down to Mexico on leave. And that’s all I remember.”

  “You don’t remember meeting anyone? Getting injured, maybe dying?”

  Moreno looked shocked. “No, sir!”

  “And have you been here with Camarillo the whole time?”

  “Yes, sir. Señor Camarillo was the first face I saw when I woke as a vampire. He told me I belonged to him, that he was my master, and he gave me my first blood.”

  “Not your first blood,” Vincent muttered to himself. Some master vamp had taken this kid to the edge of death
, fed him his blood, made him a vampire, then essentially bound him to the human drug lord. Had he been the one who killed him? Or had he found him already dying? Either way, he’d turned the boy without his consent.

  Vincent caught the boy sneaking a glance at Lana and snapped a whip of power at him. “If you want to survive the next ten minutes, boy, don’t look at her,” he snarled. “Look at me.”

  The stark fear in the kid’s gaze made Vincent feel guilty, but not so guilty that he was going to let the bastard gawk at Lana.

  “You okay, querida?” he asked over his shoulder, hearing her sit up behind him and begin to gather her weapons.

  “Fine,” she mumbled, sounding embarrassed. “Don’t hurt the kid.”

  “He’s not a kid. He’s a fucking vampire who helped a bunch of fucking humans capture me. Or try to.”

  “Try to?” she repeated, and he was gratified to hear the snap back in her voice. “Seems like they succeeded.”

  “You don’t believe that,” he said confidently. “You wouldn’t be here if you believed that.”

  “Well, don’t hurt the kid anyway. They’ve hurt him enough.”

  Vincent shot a glance over his shoulder at her. “How do you know?”

  “The same way you do, tough guy. Look at the way they treat him, keeping him in this crappy prison, making him sweat all day in the sunshine. And you know they’re not feeding him properly, or it would never work.”

  “He doesn’t have much power,” Vincent informed her, more than a little pissed that she was defending the vampire who could have gotten him killed.

  “But you do,” she reminded him unnecessarily. “If they could do this to you, imagine what they’ve done to him.”

  She had a point. It still pissed him off, but she had a point. He managed not to roll his eyes, but he wanted to.