by Laura Wright
She felt the moment he’d placed a child in her womb.
Tears flooded her cheeks. He was responsible for this, what she was going through. And yet he was completely at peace. His brain turned off to any and all emotional connection. She didn’t know if she was grateful or pissed off at the Roman’s for striking the bargain between Cruen and Synjon. She’d hoped for so much more than just being free, her balas momentarily out of harm’s way as she’d watched his emotions being bled from his body on the dungeon floor of the mutore Erion’s castle a week ago.
She’d hoped for something of the male who’d held her, kissed her, cared for her once upon a time in the treehouse she’d yet to return to.
Petra swiped at her eyes and whimpered. As she leaned into the cool, hard rock, growing more and more lost, but still blindly determined to do anything and everything to protect her child, Synjon Wise was out there in the world somewhere, devoid of care, of concern. The balas and its mother the farthest thing from his mind.
* * *
Within his sprawling penthouse of glass and brick, Synjon Wise sat comfortably at his Bösendorfer, his fingers moving quickly across the keys as he played something light and pointless.
The party guests circulated through the 6,000 square feet of interior space, leaving the wraparound terraces and 360-degree views of Manhattan to the shard of moon and the cold December night. It was his third party in seven days. The first being the very night he’d bought the place. The small crowd had been courtesy of his realtor. Broadway actors, artists, financiers, pureblood and impure vampires. He’d never thought much about owning a flat, or dipping in to the massive wealth he’d accumulated over the years. He’d been far too busy working, spying, following the trail of vengeance...
This was so much better.
This was a blissful nothingness.
And the vengeance? It would be coming to him now.
He glanced up from the sheet music he didn’t need to read. The dull hum of conversation, the deep thirst of those who continued to empty glass upon glass of Dom Perignon White Gold, and the females who he’d instructed not to come near him until he ceased playing. It was a far cry from the manic scene in the mutore’s dungeon a week ago. Here, no pleas for mercy pinged off the walls, no shocking secrets were revealed, and no blood was being extracted from his person.
In this house, he did all the drinking.
A flash on the terrace snagged his attention even as he continued playing. Three massive, fanged blokes appeared on the flagstones, their eyes narrowed, their expressions grave under the bleak moonlight as they quickly assessed their surroundings, then headed for the glass doors. Synjon knew them, of course. One far more than the other two, and although the memory, the history, he shared with them held a good amount of tension and heaviness, he knew absolutely that they were not his enemy.
Dressed in black and taller, wider and far more fearsome than any of his guests, the three males entered the Great Room, bringing with them, the winter chill, and a swimming pool’s worth of testosterone. Every set of human eyes widened, every pair of human feet drew back. His fingers still sliding over the keys, Synjon tracked the males, waited for them to spot him, scent him. It took no more than a moment before they did, before a pathway was created across the polished stone floor.
Syn continued to play as the Roman brothers moved toward him, almost stalking him like prey. They appeared rather tense. Syn wondered what that felt like.
“Welcome,” he said as they came to stand before him.
The one he knew best, a nearly albino vampire male with a perpetual sneer, spoke first. “Nice party. But I think our invitation got lost in the mail, Brit Boy.”
There was a time Syn had risen to the male’s caustic play. Reveled in it, in fact. He had no interest now. “You weren’t invited, Lucian. In fact, none of you were.”
The male turned to his skull-shaved brother, Alexander, and snorted. “Good to know the guy still has some asshole left in him.”
Alexander didn’t respond. His focus was entirely on Synjon, his tone serious as he spoke. “We have a problem.”
“We?” Synjon asked, his fingers moving into Bach’s concerto in F minor. He used to despise the piece, but now he felt only the smoothness of the keys against his skin.
Alexander’s voice dropped, and his eyes narrowed. “The veana who carries your child—”
“Petra,” Syn supplied, picturing the dark haired veana and feeling...nothing.
“Yes,” Alexander ground out. “She hasn’t gone through her meta. We didn’t know that before. When we brought her back home... And we didn’t know a veana in swell who hadn’t gone through her transition would react... She’s losing her mind, Syn.”
Synjon looked up, assessed the male. He couldn’t imagine why Alexander was telling him this. “Now that you’re here, would you like to stay? Join my guests?”
A growl rumbled in Alexander’s chest. “No.”
“Perhaps you’d like something to drink?”
“Christ,” Lucian uttered, leaning against the piano.
“Someone to drink, then?” Synjon caught the eye of one of the humans who enjoyed feeding his vampire guests. She grinned hopefully at him.
“We’re not here for a party,” Nicholas said tersely, moving around to the other side of the piano. “Petra is ill, Syn. She can’t control her emotions. She’s in pain. She’d going out of her mind. It happened soon after she returned to the Rainforest. You have to—”
“Attend to my guests,” Synjon said evenly. There was so much to do; select his blood donor for this evening, and his sexual conquests. He had discriminating tastes in both. But first, a little Prelude in C-sharp minor. Rachmaninoff used to make him snarl.
Times changed, it seemed.
Arching an eyebrow at the three males, he said, “If you’ll excuse me.”
“Excuse me?” Lucian repeated, giving Syn a disgusted look. “Whatever happened to get the fuck out of my way, you bleeding tossers?”
Useless. Words with emotions attached.
“I don’t react to people and problems with threats and anger anymore, Lucian,” he said, his voice even. “I take care of them quietly, quickly.”
“That’s too bad,” Lucian muttered. “Merry fucking Christmas.”
“We should go, find another way to help her,” Nicholas said tightly. “This paven doesn’t give a shit about anything. And it’s our fault. We made him that way.”
“Cruen made him that way,” Alex amended.
“At our suggestion.”
“At his agreement.” Alex’s gaze slid away from Synjon. “No one wanted Petra or the child harmed. Including him.”
Lucian growled, pushed away from the piano. “Now he feels nothing for them, and Cruen got to run free.”
Not free, Synjon mused, closing in on the final seven-measure coda. “Well, gentlepaven, it was a grand bargain. I’ve never felt better.”
“You feel nothing,” Lucian returned.
“Oh I feel quite perfect where it matters — all things physical. I’m not burdened with tedious, irrational emotions. It’s all very civilized, really.” Rachmaninoff ceased to exist, and Synjon glanced up at Alexander. “I appreciate what was done to me.”
“What about all that is being done to Petra? All she can’t control?” Alexander returned with barely disguised menace. “She needs your blood. Now.”
“That’s unfortunate for her.” Syn jerked his chin in the direction of the Great Room. “As you can see, I am otherwise engaged.”
“He’s lost,” Luca uttered. “Fucking lost.”
Synjon stared at the three faces, all twisted into ravaged masks of worry. It suited them; that intensity, that feral predatory glare. But it held no interest for him. He was rather relaxed - though he could use a pint or two, perhaps a quick, hard fuck as he continued to wait for the inevitable. The one guest he wished to see above all others. The one who would come begging.
Alexander ground his teeth. “S
yn, your child and Petra...they could both die without your help. Your blood.”
Done with this repetitive, pointless conversation, Synjon uttered a smooth, “Then I suppose they will die,” before he returned to the cool, white keys and another song from his past; Nirvana’s Drain You.
Contents
Title page
TALON
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
XAVIER
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
About The Authors
Sneak Peek for BORN IN BLOOD
Sneak Peek for ETERNAL SIN