“If she were vampire or immortal, I would understand what she is saying.”
“I can’t decipher her speech either and I know almost as many languages as you do. Hers doesn’t sound at all familiar.”
“Well, we’ll know the answers soon enough.”
David nodded slowly. “This is going to get ugly.”
“Most likely,” Seth agreed. “Be careful not to let any of the bullets pass through you and hit our mystery lady.”
“Of course.”
“Shall we?”
While the guards continued their slow stroll about the building, oblivious to the encroaching menace in the shadows, Seth’s and David’s silhouettes blurred, then shifted, becoming something altogether different.
Sarah jerked awake, heart pounding as it often did when something yanked her out of a sound sleep.
What had done it?
Rolling onto her back, she turned her head.
Roland was sprawled on his stomach, arms tucked beneath his pillow, sound asleep. He looked so sweet, so boyishly handsome, she had to smile.
Until a thunk came from the front of the house.
Roland didn’t stir as she slipped out of bed and hurriedly donned her T-shirt and jeans.
It was probably just Marcus up and about or Nietzsche getting into something he shouldn’t, but she wasn’t going to take any chances. She would check just in case.
Opening the bedroom door, she crept down the hallway.
A quick peek showed her an empty living room. Sarah continued through it and into the dining room, then the kitchen, keeping an eye out for Nietzsche.
Another thunk sounded, louder this time. It was the sound of a car door closing.
The sun had been up for at least an hour, so it wasn’t vampires.
Sarah told herself not to panic. It could always be UPS or FedEx or the postman making a delivery.
Two more thunks sounded.
Or not. Postal delivery men and women did not arrive in groups of four.
“Pop the trunk,” a man called out.
Gravel crunched as another car pulled up out front.
Oh, crap.
Grabbing the butcher knife from the dish drainer, Sarah ran for the bedroom. She could hear multiple male voices now as four more car doors opened and closed.
Roland’s enemy worked with humans (if you could call those two flunkies she had hit with her shovel humans). He must have sent more here to kill Roland while daylight weakened him.
“Roland!” she hissed in a loud whisper, hurrying into the room and around the foot of the bed. “Roland, wake up!” Grabbing his shoulder, she shook him hard.
Oh, no! She’d forgotten about Marcus!
She glanced toward the bedroom door, then squeaked when Roland turned onto his back, grabbed her by the throat, flipped her over him, and slammed her down on the bed so fast her head swam.
His hand tightened, robbing her of air. His face, above hers, was twisted in a snarl, fangs extended, eyes glowing brightly.
“It’s me,” she croaked, struggling to breathe.
He blinked. The snarl vanished. “Sarah?” His grip loosened abruptly. “I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?” His fingers stroked her abused throat. “I should have told you that I sleep much more deeply when I’m healing from an injury and don’t react well to being startled awake.”
Before she could answer, his gaze strayed to the knife she clutched, then returned to hers filled with betrayal.
Okay, he had woken up with her standing over him with a knife in her hand. It looked damning, true. But the fact that he thought her capable of killing him really pissed her off. Especially after what had passed between them last night.
Sarah placed her empty hand in the center of his chest and shoved. “I didn’t come in here to kill you, damn it!” she whispered with a snarl of her own. “I came in here to warn you!”
Rolling out of bed, he rose smoothly to his feet.
Far less graceful, Sarah scooted off the bed beneath his watchful gaze. “I’m pretty sure your enemy has found you. A noise woke me. I went to check it out and heard two cars pull up out front. At least eight men got out, by the sounds of it.”
“How did they know where to find me?” he asked, the implication being she had told them.
“Ooh, I am so going to kick your ass for that later. I don’t know how they knew. I don’t even know where here is. I was unconscious when you brought me here. Remember?”
Roland had forgotten that. Grabbing the slacks and T-shirt he had discarded last night, he tugged them on and crossed to the armoire. Uncertain what to think, he yanked the doors open and began plucking weapons from the substantial display within.
Sarah joined him, stiff with indignation. The part of him that felt remorse for accusing her vied with that which silently suggested she could have seen his address on a piece of mail and called someone while he slept.
“They’re human,” she snapped, tossing the knife inside and grabbing a Sig Sauer P226 X-Five Tactical 9mm and two twenty-round clips. “Use guns.”
Lips clamped tight with fury, she turned and stomped toward the door.
He grabbed a Glock 10mm. “Where are you going?”
“To warn Marcus.”
“The hell you are.”
The front door could burst open at any moment. He wasn’t about to let Sarah put herself in those men’s sights. Catching up with her before she could take another step, he curled a hand around her upper arm.
Jerked to a halt, she turned on him and growled, “Don’t touch me.”
Oh yeah. She definitely had a temper and he had clumsily ignited it.
But now wasn’t the time.
Roland yanked her toward him. “Look, this isn’t the first time I’ve awoken to find the woman I care about standing over me with a knife in her hand. I drew a faulty conclusion. I was wrong. Be pissed at me later. Right now you need to get your ass in the bathroom, put your back to the wall either in the tub or behind the toilet, and shoot anyone who comes through the door who isn’t me or Marcus.”
He pushed her none too gently in that direction as Marcus hurried into the room, hair tousled with sleep, completely naked. “What’s going on?”
Sarah stopped and gaped.
Roland grimaced and threw up a hand. “Put some fucking clothes on before I go blind.”
Marcus rolled his eyes. “My clothes are a torn, bloody mess. I was hoping I could borrow some of yours.”
Grumbling, Roland crossed to the closet, displeased to notice Sarah still staring. “Sarah, get in the bathroom.”
He almost smiled when the abrupt command yanked her attention back to him.
“I’m not your dog to do your bidding,” she snapped.
Well, hell.
Marcus raised one eyebrow. “Trouble in paradise?”
A pair of jeans and a sweatshirt hit him in the face. “Shut up.”
While Marcus bent to pull on the jeans, Roland returned to stand in front of the petite, seething beauty he was so smitten with, effectively blocking her view.
“I’m trying to protect you, Sarah.”
Some of the anger left her face, allowing him to see the fear beneath. “I know you are, but I’m not going to cower in the bathroom and let you two take on all of them yourselves when I can help. I told you, I’m very good with a gun.”
“How many are we talking?” Marcus asked as he zipped his pants.
“At least eight,” Roland told him.
Sarah took a step closer, her body nearly touching his, and tilted her head back to look up at him. “Let me help you, Roland. Please.”
He couldn’t bear it. He had to touch her.
Slipping his free arm around her waist, he drew her up against him, dipped his head, and took her lips in a long, thorough kiss that resurrected memories of the previous night.
Her face was flushed, her pupils dilated, when he released her.
“Stay low,” he instructed. “And remember that bullets go th
rough walls. You don’t have to be exposed for them to shoot you.”
“Or vice versa,” Marcus added, dragging the sweatshirt over his head and raking a hand through his hair. “Oh shit. Do you smell that?”
Roland had caught the pungent scent a half second before Marcus had spoken. Fury swept through him. “Yes.”
Sarah inhaled deeply. “What is it? I can’t smell it.”
“Gasoline,” they both answered grimly.
Roland urged Sarah over to the wall beside the door frame. “Remember what I said. Stay low. Shoot as many as you can. If they set the place on fire, go out the window and hide in the forest.”
“What about you? It’s morning. The sun’s up.”
“We’re both back to full strength. We can tolerate brief exposure to sunlight.”
Marcus stuffed his pockets with knives, throwing stars, and ammunition, grabbed a shotgun, and left the room.
Roland returned to the armoire, stuck several daggers into his back pockets, added several clips for the Glock, then headed for the doorway.
Sarah watched his approach with wide eyes full of trepidation.
As he drew even with her, he paused, kissed her again, then pressed his forehead to hers. “Don’t get hurt.”
“Be safe.”
Roland could hear the men speaking in low murmurs as they doused the exterior of his home with gasoline. They must think immortals lapsed into the same near comatose state vampires did when the sun rose.
“Don’t light it yet, man,” one said. “Remember? We’re supposed to go in and get the Guardian’s whore out first.”
“What for?”
“Hell if I know. But no way am I fuckin’up the way Derek and Bobby did.”
Leaving Sarah, Roland strode down the hallway and entered the living room. His eyes met Marcus’s. This was sounding more and more like a personal vendetta.
He had assumed that, like the rest of his kind, Bastien simply despised all Immortal Guardians and had thought to bag himself one. But this vamp had tried to kill him two nights in a row, tenaciously tracked him to his home so he could send his human minions to finish the job, and now he wanted Sarah because he thought she was Roland’s woman?
“What are you doin’?” another asked.
“Pickin’ the locks.”
“I thought we were just gonna break the door down.”
“Nuh-uh. These guys are supposed to be dead to the world, but I don’t want to take any chances. We’re goin’ in quiet.”
Roland held up his left hand, fingers extended, touched the tip of his middle finger to his thumb, indicating eight, and pointed to the door. Then, pointing to the east side of the house, he held up two fingers.
Marcus nodded and held up two, pointing to the west side.
Melting back into the shadows, they waited.
Chapter 10
Sarah’s heart was racing, her hands clammy, as she listened to the front door creak open. Two men cried out simultaneously. Victims of knives or throwing stars?
Gunfire erupted, so loud she jumped a foot. (She always wore protective earmuffs at the firing range.) Squatting with both hands wrapped tightly about the Sig Sauer’s grip, she peeked around the doorjamb.
What she could see of the living room was utter chaos.
No wonder Roland and Marcus had looked more angry than concerned that they might be killed. The two of them moved so swiftly that, in the split second it took the humans to aim their weapons, the immortals could leap across the room, leaving them firing either at empty space or their own men.
A tall, thin man stepped into view and stayed there. Sarah raised the 9mm, sighted down the barrel … but hesitated to pull the trigger. Roland and Marcus kept swooping past in a blur and she was terrified of accidentally hitting one of them.
Her target glanced up, saw her, and yelled, “She’s in the back!” over the nearly constant gunfire. He took a step forward and went rigid, the hilt of one of Roland’s daggers protruding from his throat.
Another man dove into the hallway and ran toward her. Sarah fired three shots and he collapsed on the floor. Two more followed. The one in front raised a .45.
Sarah ducked back and sank lower as he fired. Wood splintered from the door frame above her head.
Scooting backward, she aimed at the wall between her and the hallway and fired several shots in the men’s direction. One cried out and created a series of thuds as he went down. The other burst into the bedroom, firing as he came.
Had she been standing, he would have hit her.
Instead, Sarah took him out with a bullet to the head.
“Sarah!” Roland bellowed from the living room.
“I’m fine!” she shouted back, unable to look away from the dead man’s blank stare.
There were tiny pauses in the shooting as the men ran out of ammunition and replaced their mags. These were, more often than not, punctuated by screams of pain as Roland and Marcus took advantage of the lull and the men’s divided attention and struck.
Even though bullets from the other room would sporadically burst through the wall above her with a spray of Sheet-rock, Sarah began to think they might just make it through this intact.
Then the acrid scent of smoke teased her nostrils, spurring an even greater influx of fear.
The house was on fire.
Roland swore as two more bullets ripped through his shoulder and arm. Humans had been a lot easier to defeat before semiautomatic and automatic weapons had been invented.
When the bastards had registered that the two Immortal Guardians they had come to kill were not only awake but also as strong and fast and powerful as they were at night, the minions had decided their best bet at making it out of this alive was to back themselves against the front wall and spray the room with bullets.
It was a very effective strategy. Even with his preternatural speed, Roland couldn’t get near them without being hit. He only hoped Sarah was staying low in the bedroom.
As Roland yanked the gun from one man’s hand, turned it back on him, and fired multiple times, he saw another duck out the front door.
The sun had risen over an hour ago. The last thing Roland should do with blood loss weakening him and his body struggling to heal the eight or nine bullet wounds he now sported was expose himself to direct sunlight. But he had no choice.
In the blink of an eye, he was outside, squinting against the bright light and gritting his teeth as his skin instantly began to redden and burn. The man he had followed gaped at him as flames leapt up from the lighter he had dropped and rapidly spread around the gasoline-soaked side of the house.
“But it’s daylight,” the man blurted stupidly as Roland closed in on him.
“Surprise, asshole.”
The idiot’s cry for help ended when Roland snapped his neck.
Darting back inside, Roland slammed the door shut. The abrupt shift from light to the darkness provided by heavy curtains covering the windows left the humans panicked and discombobulated. Unfortunately, it didn’t last long. Flames snuck in windows shattered by stray bullets and latched onto curtains. The thick material quickly ignited, allowing daylight in and escorting the fire inside. By the time only two humans remained, most of the living room was engulfed, so he and Marcus couldn’t take time to feed and replenish their strength.
Smoke formed a dense cloud near the ceiling as the last human fell. Both Roland and Marcus had been shot roughly a dozen times. Though none of the bullets had severed arteries, at least as far as Roland could tell, some had damaged major organs and were taking their toll.
Marcus was having a difficult time breathing, thanks to several chest wounds. Every cough the smoke spawned was agonizing for both men as they staggered down the hallway to the bedroom.
“Sarah,” Roland called so she wouldn’t shoot them as they stepped over two dead men and approached the doorway.
“I’m here.”
He nearly tripped over a third as they entered the otherwise deserted bedro
om.
Emerging from the bathroom with a damp towel held over her mouth and nose, Sarah stopped short. Her eyes widened as she beheld the holes in his blood-soaked clothing and the sunburn that painted his skin a mottled maroon.
“We have to go,” he rasped. “Now.”
Her heart in her throat, Sarah watched Roland cross to a window and open it, weaving on his feet. He looked terrible. As did Marcus, who leaned against the wall, wheezing and coughing up blood. Hurrying to Marcus’s side, she handed him one of the damp cloths she held.
Nodding his thanks—she wasn’t sure he was capable of speech—he held it over his mouth and nose.
“Sarah.”
She turned to see Roland punching out the screen. At his urging, she swiftly joined him.
He waved away the cloth she offered and took her hand, helping her through the window. Once she was out, he grabbed his cell phone off the bedside table and thrust it at her. “Get to the trees.”
“What about you?”
“We’ll be right behind you.”
“I’m not leaving without you.”
He swore.
The flames had followed the gasoline trail around the house and were creeping closer and closer to the window.
“The fire is spreading,” he choked out and gave her a shove that nearly sent her sprawling. “We’re immortal. You aren’t. Now go.”
Unwilling to abandon him, she backed away a few feet and waited anxiously as he ducked inside and disappeared from view. At least a full minute passed before he returned, helping Marcus through the window.
Sarah glanced up at the smoldering roof. The eaves were narrow, providing not nearly enough shade to protect them as Roland exited the window with a grunt of pain.
Marcus’s skin immediately pinkened. Roland’s, already abused, began to blister.
Hoisting Marcus’s arm over his shoulder, Roland started for the trees, half-dragging half-carrying his friend, every step a struggle.
Sarah ignored his scowl and hurried to his side. Pulling Marcus’s other arm across her shoulders, she lent her own strength and herded them as quickly as possible to the shelter of the forest.
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