See, this was why he’d never tried to be noble before. Noble sucked.
* * *
Melissa woke in the darkness, the rocks beneath her digging into the bare skin of her shoulders above the back of her gown. She reached instinctively for Theo, and he grasped her hand.
“Stay calm,” he whispered.
“Are they coming for us?” she whispered, trying to keep the terror out of her voice. The stiff fabric of her ball gown rustled as she sat up cautiously.
“I’m not sure,” Theo said as he, too, sat up. “But don’t worry, Mel. We’ll get through this.”
“I don’t think I can go through it again,” Melissa whispered, ashamed to admit her fear, her lack of courage. She swallowed. It had hurt so much...she hadn’t been able to do anything to stop them, there had been too many of them.
Where was her mother? Or Dave? Surely they should have been rescued by now. She and Theo had been snatched as they’d left the Reform ball—what, nearly two nights ago? She shivered, and Theo took his jacket off and slung it around her bare shoulders.
“We’re going to get through this,” Theo whispered, staring straight into her eyes. She nodded. “You and me, Mel, we’re strong together. We can han—”
“Oh, it’s so sweet, listening to these two lovebirds,” a feminine voice purred in a soft, Baltic accent, and the cellar door creaked as it opened.
“Yeah, so sweet, I think I might throw up,” a masculine voice responded, the accent slightly stronger, harsher. Melissa flinched as the two vampires descended into the root cellar. She knew them. Had encountered them several times at the Reform balls and other Prime families’ events. Natalia and George Petrovski. Melissa gazed past them. She’d counted seven vampires since their capture. Most were of the Saltwash colony, just like the Petrovskis, but two were from the Iron Peak colony, and she didn’t know their names. Two colonies separated by hundreds of miles, yet united in their torture of her and Theo. She didn’t know where they were being held. She’d just glimpsed a decrepit farmhouse in the darkness when she and Theo had been taken from the car and forced to enter the root cellar.
George Petrovski lifted a lantern, and beckoned to them. “Come, come closer.”
Theo edged between her and the vamps. Melissa swallowed as the other five vamps climbed down the rough steps into the root cellar. No, not again. They’d fed on her and Theo until they’d both passed out, then had fed them vamp blood to heal their bite wounds so they could start all over again.
“Stay back,” Theo warned, holding his hand up.
“Or what?” Natalia asked, then laughed, her eyes flashing red as she stepped closer. “You still have vamp blood in your system. Your magic is useless until your enzymes break down the V-juice.”
“And then we’ll just feed you some more, and then some more, and then...” one of the Petrovski cousins interjected from behind, then chuckled. “Well, you get my drift.”
Goose bumps rose on Melissa’s arms as she stared at the advancing vampires. Two of them held lanterns that they hung up on hooks from the low ceiling. They were right. Both she and Theo were powerless against the vamps. She glanced wildly about the root cellar. The only way in or out of their prison was up the flight of rickety stairs to the double doors that hung open. They’d have to get past the vampires first, though.
Melissa slowly clutched hold of her skirts. The fabric was stiff from the dried blood—so much blood, but she was ready to run when Theo gave the signal.
“Why are you doing this?” Melissa asked, gazing at Natalia. She had no quarrel with this woman—at least, not until now. But these vamps had broken the sanctity of a Reform ball. “My mother will—”
“Your mother will negotiate for your release,” George interrupted. “Everybody knows Eleanor Carter will work a situation to her advantage.” He shrugged. “Sure, we’ll get a slap on the wrist, something that will make it look like we’re not getting away with...” He smiled, his incisors lengthening, as he finished, “...what we’re getting away with.”
Theo kicked the lantern out of George’s hand, and Melissa sprang at Natalia, hands fisted as she punched the vampire in the jaw. She kept swinging until her arms were caught, and she screamed as fangs sank into her neck, and more fangs sank into her wrists. Her pulse pounded in her ears as she tried to struggle, tried to thrash against the vampires holding her. With every beat of her heart, though, she could feel herself weaken, feel the chill creep into her limbs, feel the blood draining from her.
“Enough,” Natalia shouted. “We want her conscious.”
Hands dug into her hair, and she winced as her head was roughly turned so she could see Theo.
She was held by Natalia and two of her cousins, while Theo was held down on the ground by the other four vamps. He cried out in agony as they ripped at his flesh with their teeth. Melissa screamed, trying to go to him, to help him, but the vamps held her back. He glanced at her, his complexion sickly white, his lips gray, his blood a dark crimson against his white dress shirt. George looked up, grinning when he saw he had Melissa’s horrified attention.
“Hold,” the vamp told the others feeding on her fiancé, and the other vamps reluctantly stopped, their eyes flashing red in the dimly lit room. They hauled Theo up to his knees, supporting him when he would have collapsed. Theo tried to talk, but only a garbled groan emerged. George smiled as he peered over Theo’s bloodied shoulder.
“We don’t think this witch is the right match for you,” George said, grinning.
Melissa shook her head. “No, please don’t.” She could feel warm liquid streaming down her cheeks, her neck, confused between tears and blood. “Leave him alone.”
“Should have thought of that before you accepted his ring,” Natalia crooned in her ear. “We don’t like the Sassafras Coven. Nobody likes the Sassafras Coven. Hawthorns are much better.”
Melissa’s jaw clenched. The Sassafras Coven was good enough for Theo, it would be good enough for her when she married him and left White Oak. There was no way she’d go anywhere near the Hawthorns after this.
“Let her go,” Theo croaked. “Please, take me, but let her go.” He looked so broken, yet he’d never seemed braver to her, there on his knees, his blood draining from him as he pleaded for her life.
“Theo,” Melissa cried, again trying to reach him, again being held back. His blue eyes met hers, and she could see the glassy stare, the weakness creeping over him as his wounds continued to bleed.
“But we’re not cruel,” George whispered. “We’ll put him out of his misery.” He reached for Theo’s head, and twisted his neck. Melissa flinched at the audible snap and screamed as the man she loved fell to the floor, dead. If it wasn’t for the vampires holding her up, she would have collapsed.
“Tut-tut,” Natalia tsked. “Now look what you’ve done. You’ll have to fix that.”
George nodded, then bit at his own wrist, tearing at the skin. He knelt down to Theo’s corpse, and placed his wound against Theo’s lips.
Melissa’s eyes widened, and she shook her head. “No. You can’t.”
George stood, the wound on his wrist healing so quickly he could pull his shirtsleeve back down without staining it with blood. “I just did.”
“But—oh, God, what have you done?” Melissa yelled. “You monsters.”
Theo’s body flinched, his back arching as the vampire blood worked its way through his system.
“Have you heard of the old story, Romeo and Juliet?” Natalia inquired politely. “This is our version of it.”
Theo’s eyelids opened, and his blue eyes stared blankly up at the ceiling for a moment, then he coughed, dragging in deep, ragged breaths.
Melissa shook her head in denial. Oh, please, no, no, no.
“Did you know, the metamorphosis kicks in quicker, the sooner after death you receive our bl
ood?”
She could hear various cracks, and she shuddered when she realized Theo’s vertebrae were slipping back into place. Theo sat up, rubbing his neck, and frowned.
“What the hell?”
“It takes a few minutes for the memory to kick in,” George explained to Melissa in a conversational tone.
Theo glanced at George, then his eyes widened. “Why, you bastard!”
He launched himself at George, but the vamp tossed him off easily. “Easy, buck. You’ll need a feed before you can fight a vamp.”
“And fortunately, we have one here for you,” Natalia said.
Theo stared at Melissa and shook his head in horror. “No.” He rose to his feet, glancing around at the gathered vamps. Melissa trembled as she watched her fiancé’s wounds slowly close, until not so much as a scar remained to tell the sordid story of his death.
“Yes,” George said, grabbing on to Theo’s shoulders and forcing him to face Melissa. The vamp tilted his head at his sister. “What say we make this interesting? Our new baby should learn to hunt, yes?”
Natalia chuckled. “You are so twisted, brother, I love it.” She ran her finger along Melissa’s neck, and Melissa tried to pull away, then watched in horror as the bitch vamp walked over to Theo.
“You need to feed,” she told him, and Theo shook his head, gritting his teeth.
“No.”
“You won’t be able to help it,” Natalia told him, drawing her finger along his bottom lip.
Theo’s nostrils flared as he caught the scent of her blood, and Melissa’s horror gave way to true fear as her fiancé’s pupils darkened to crimson.
“Let her go, boys. Let’s give her a sporting start,” George called, and the vamps who still clutched Melissa shoved her toward the stairs leading up from the root cellar.
“Theo,” she cried, hoping she could reach him, hoping she could stop this.
“For God’s sake, Melissa, run,” Theo called to her, and she glanced over her shoulder to see that the vamps were trying to hold him back. From her. His eyes were bloodred, and he cried in pain as his incisors lengthened, his nostrils flaring as he stared up at her. He looked—blood-crazed.
Melissa gathered her skirts and ran up the stairs, sobbing, as she burst out into the night. One shoe fell off her foot, and she stumbled in the dark. She kicked the other shoe off, bundling her skirts in her fists, and pelted across the yard. She winced, gasping as sharp rocks in the dirt poked her feet, but she kept running.
She didn’t see it in the darkness, didn’t know the fence was there until she ran into it, bruising her chest. She wheezed in pain, her fingers reaching out to clasp the wooden railing. Oh, hell. She started to run alongside it, her fingers trailing along the wood. Her skirts were too full to squeeze through the slats. Hopefully she’d find a gate or something that would give her an avenue of escape.
“Run, Melissa,” Theo yelled behind her, and Melissa picked up her skirts and ran. Moonlight gleamed on a metallic surface up ahead. A gate. An open gate.
Her breaths coming in harsh pants, she bolted along the fence line, hearing with every beat of her heart the pounding of her fiancé’s footsteps behind her. She was almost at the gate when something hard and heavy thudded against her, and they crashed through the fence, timber snapping with the force of the hit.
Melissa hit the ground with a thud and wheezed, trying to catch her breath. Theo straddled her legs.
“Theo, fight this,” she begged him. He gazed down at her, his expression tortured, his eyes red with bloodlust.
“I’m trying,” he moaned as he dodged her fist.
“Try harder,” she rasped, struggling beneath him.
“You’re bleeding,” he gasped, and he shuddered as he inhaled. Melissa stretched out her hands, looking for something, anything to slow him down. Her fingers found a piece of the fence, and then Theo’s head whipped down to look at her. She trembled. His skin was drawn tight over his cheekbones, his eyes were red and glazed, and his mouth—the mouth she knew so well now belonged to a man no longer her fiancé.
He snarled, his teeth glistening in the moonlight as he dipped his head down to her neck. She screamed as fangs sank into the tender skin, and panic, anger and adrenaline flooded her as she pushed hard, trying to shove him away.
His body flinched, and he slowly raised his head, her blood dripping from his fangs, a stunned expression on his face. He rose above her, and she looked at him with confusion, until her eyes swept down and she saw the shard of wood she’d thrust into his chest. Her eyes widened in horror as she realized what she’d done.
Theo’s hands shook as he clutched the stake in his heart, his complexion graying as death crept over him, and he slumped over to the side. The bloodlust leeched out of his eyes, returning them to the blue she knew so well, until the eyes staring back at her were once more those of the man she loved, and not the crazed feral creature who’d attacked her.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she whispered over and over as she stroked his cheek and patted his chest so ineffectually. “I’m so, so sorry,” she sobbed softly as her heart broke with remorse, and with guilt.
His lips curled as the gray crept up his neck. “Thank you,” he breathed as the gray stole over him, stealing his dying breath.
Melissa squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the sightless eyes as she felt the coolness creep into the body beside her. What have I done? She sobbed quietly, trying to deny what she’d done, what had happened. It wasn’t until she felt the ground dampening beneath her with her dead fiancé’s blood that reality intruded, and she tilted her head back, letting out a heartrending wail of agony to the peaceful, moonlit sky above.
“Red, Red, oh, God, Melissa, wake up, honey,” a masculine voice intruded on her grief, and her eyes snapped open. She stared up at a familiar face, a face that didn’t belong to the man she’d killed, but to the man she now loved.
Hunter.
Chapter 19
Hunter swept Melissa into his arms, rocking her as he pulled her out of the nightmare. His heart pounding in his chest, he swallowed as he held her tight, whispering nonsense into the hair that brushed his nose.
Hell. He squeezed her gently, rubbing his hand down her back in soothing circles. “It’s okay, Red. You’re okay.” That dream had scared the crap out of him.
She trembled in his arms, and he heard her gulp. He rose from the bed and hurried into the bathroom, throwing a pale orb of light so he could find a glass and run her some water. He hurried back to the bed, holding the glass out to her, and she accepted it with trembling fingers. He watched closely as she drank the water, then took the glass from her when she was finished. He leaned over and placed it on the ornately carved bedside table, then gathered her in his arms again.
“I’m so sorry that happened to you,” he commented as he rubbed her arms. That had been one hell of a nightmare. He closed his eyes. He could still feel her terror, her sorrow...her guilt. He wished he’d been there for her, wished he could have helped her—and her fiancé. It was a horrific experience to endure, for the both of them. Even if the guy was his mate’s love.
“You saw,” she whispered, tucking her head against his chest.
“I saw,” he admitted. “Not intentionally, though. We seem to be sharing dreams.” He shifted, pulling her into the space between his thighs so she could lean against him, his heart thudding against her back. “I’m glad, though. That’s one dream you shouldn’t have to walk through alone.”
She took a deep, shuddering breath. “I think being around the Darkken triggered it.”
He nodded. He could see why being surrounded and held captive by vampires could remind her of a previous traumatic vampire experience.
“Lance went and tracked each one of them down,” she said into the darkness. “They won’t ever do that to a
nother person.”
Hunter had a new appreciation for the big lug.
“Theo helped me build the apothecary,” she whispered, and he closed his eyes. “It was our vision. We were going to marry, and develop the apothecary so that folks could come and get the help they needed from the witches.” She sniffed.
He gently bumped his head against the massive carved headboard. And he was responsible now for it going up in smoke not once, but twice.
He was silent for a while, then dipped his head to kiss her temple. “I get it now,” he whispered.
“Get what?”
“Why you don’t like us shadow breeds.” She’d lost her lover twice. She’d lost her business. She’d lost the dream she’d worked so hard to achieve. The shadow breeds had taken pretty much everything from her.
“You keep saying that,” she whispered into the dim room, and he frowned.
“What?”
“Us shadow breeds.” She rubbed his arms, and he held her closer. “I—I haven’t really thought of you as one of ‘them’ for a while now.”
He arched an eyebrow. “How have you been thinking of me, then?” Naked, he hoped. Sweaty. He’d settle for naked and sweaty. In each other’s arms would be better. He held his breath, waiting for her answer.
She shrugged, the lightest lift of her shoulders. “Just Hunter. I think of you as Hunter.”
He stared at the tapestry on the opposite wall. Hunter. Just Hunter. Not pyro jerk, or any other name she’d called him since he’d woken up in her cell. Hunter. Not Light Warrior Hunter, not Shadow Breed Hunter, not Tried-To-Kill-Me Hunter. Just...Hunter.
He swallowed. Cleared his throat. “I owe you an apology,” he murmured, and she turned to look at him. Her face was pale in the light cast by the fire, her eyes glittery green from her tears.
“What for?” she asked softly.
Well, he was building quite the list with her, but he needed to set something straight, needed to make right some of his wrongs, especially with this woman. He needed to say it, and she needed to hear it. Not some half-assed, lame attempt, either.
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