Crave

  Ernst gave Gabriel a rough push. He saw Sam partway down the tunnel, waving him on. But the blood. The smell. It was the blood of his family. Lysander, Philo, Lizette, Alejandra. He could smell each of their scents. He could smell their terror. And he could smell death.

  Gabriel turned his head, his eyes fully opened, his mind finally clear. Blood soaked the floor of the sleeping cave. It was still warm, giving off steam in the cold air of the caverns. Reluctantly, Gabriel moved his gaze a little higher, and a guttural moan split the air. It took him a moment to realize it had come from his own mouth.

  Lizette’s throat had been sliced open, more than once. Blood streamed over the phoenix tattoo that marked her as one of them. Her beautiful lips were twisted in a silent scream.

  And Lysander. Sander was—

  “Gabriel!” Sam shouted. “Run. Don’t look. Run!”

  Ernst gave him another push, then Gabriel was running. Running away from his family, the bodies of his slaughtered family.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTEEN

  GABRIEL LEANED HIS HEAD BACK as Shay fed on him. He felt a hot line moving from his wrist, up his arm, across his chest, and into his heart. It was the path his blood was taking from his body into hers. Sweet pain.

  Dizziness swept through him. His head felt like it was a balloon hovering over his body. Taking too much. I’m letting her take too much. Gabriel pulled his wrist away. Shay gave a little moan of protest and used both hands to pull his wrist back to her. “No,” he told her. He twisted his free hand in her hair and gently urged her lips away, breaking the connection between them again. His skin felt cold in the spot where her mouth had been.

  He ran his fingers over the wound on his wrist. It was already healing, but his skin was wet, not with spilled blood, but with tears. Shay was crying. How long had she been crying? Her shoulders were heaving with sobs.

  “What?” he asked. What? As if he hadn’t chased her across the field, tackled her, and dragged her back here. As if he hadn’t made her his prisoner. “Are you hurt? Did I hurt you?”

  Shay raised her eyes to his. “I saw— In the sleeping cave—” She couldn’t continue, not until she’d pulled in a deep, shuddering breath. “I saw what happened to your family, back in Greece. I saw them slaughtered.”

  Gabriel stared at her. That night had near destroyed him. Thinking about it, he felt tears burn his own eyes and bile rise in his throat.

  “Did anyone else get out?” she whispered. “Anyone?”

  He shook his head. “Ernst and Sam were old enough already that they could fight the death sleep. I couldn’t resist it on my own, but I could be roused. The others—” he fought back a sob. “Sander and our sisters … and those in the chamber next to them … they were all asleep. Nothing could wake them, only death.”

  Shay retched, tears running down her cheeks as if she’d known them, any of them.

  “Now you see. You know what humans are capable of. The same thing would happen if anyone discovered our existence now. The only reason I was spared was to keep you alive.” Gabriel spat.

  The fury felt good. It felt righteous. It reminded him of the truth. After what humans had done to his family, they were his enemy, all of them, for all eternity. Their capacity for cruelty was staggering. “Get up,” he told Shay. He would take her back to his family, then when the other humans came for her, they would be destroyed for what they had done to him, for what they’d been doing to him ever since that night in Greece.

  Gabriel stood. The look he gave Shay was an order. She slowly got to her feet. He saw that she had a rivulet of blood running from her mouth and down her chin. “Clean yourself up,” he told her.

  She raised her fingers to the corner of her mouth, then brought them up in front of her eyes and gazed at the blood. Her mouth twisted into a grimace.

  Hypocritical bitch. Gabriel wanted to hold on to his anger. He needed it to do what had to be done. “You couldn’t get enough of it a few seconds ago. You would have drained me if I hadn’t pulled you off me.”

  Shay wiped off her face with her sleeve, removing most of the blood and the tears she’d shed as she watched the mass murder of his family. “You’re the one who made me feed. Dead bait wouldn’t be nearly as effective.”

  She was right. He’d had to force her to take the blood, and once she’d begun, it had overpowered her. He understood that. It had happened to him many times when he was young. If Ernst hadn’t been with him each time Gabriel had fed until he’d learned to control the blood rush, Gabriel might have— He pushed the thought away.

  “Do you want to try to escape again? Or are you going to get in the car?” Gabriel asked.

  Wordlessly, Shay got back in the Range Rover. Gabriel slid behind the wheel, hit the master lock, not that he was really worried about her making another escape attempt tonight. She looked beaten down. Maybe she’d accepted that he was stronger than she was and that it was hopeless to fight.

  “You’re no better than they were,” Shay said as he started the car. She was gripping the dashboard with both hands, kneading it with her fingers. “I love my mother as much as you loved anyone in your family.”

  “You don’t know that.” Gabriel pulled out of the parking lot, going too fast, the tires spitting gravel.

  “When I have the visions, I don’t just see what you see. I am you. I feel your emotions. Why do you think I was crying like that?” Her voice was edged with hysteria. She swallowed hard. “I know exactly how much you loved them. And when you kill my mother, I’m going to feel it the way you did. I’m going to feel like someone reached inside me with a cold, cold hand and scooped out everything.”

  That was how it had felt. After the pure horror of the massacre, Gabriel had been left dead and empty. It had been years before he truly felt anything, even grief. Finally, it came, and after yet more time, he’d begun to feel happiness again. When they’d come to America, when he and Sam had—

  Gabriel wasn’t going to think about Sam now. If he could, he’d wipe every memory of his friend from his mind. What had happened to Sam had proved that emotions were a burden. Emotions made you weak. And yet, he suspected that even if he were able to scrape every bit of emotion out of himself, he’d still feel the ache of guilt.

  I did the right thing, he told himself, the right thing for my family. I will never lose another family, no matter what it costs me to keep them.

  “You’ve got nothing to say to that?” Shay asked. “It doesn’t bother you that you’re going to hurt me the way you were hurt?”

  “My family was innocent.” Gabriel re-entered the highway. “You can’t say the same. Can you?”

  Shay didn’t answer for several moments. “You drink from us,” she finally said.

  “Not enough to kill. Not enough to even cause much pain. I know. You’ve drunk from me,” Gabriel told her.

  She turned away from him then, pressing her forehead against the window, staring out into the darkness, the way she had begun this ride.

  Which was the best thing she could do. He didn’t want to hear her voice. He wanted to pretend she didn’t exist. But he couldn’t block out the soft sound of her breathing or the intoxicating perfume of her blood. She got to him. He’d managed to keep his sensations mostly dull. It was part of keeping his emotions in check. But she got to him.

  Gabriel focused on the road as much as he could. About an hour before dawn, he began looking for what he needed. Another small, no-name motel, where the employees weren’t paid enough to give a shit.

  Along I-81, a motel like that wasn’t hard to find. He parked on the all-but-deserted street, just in case the night desk clerk was ambitious enough to wonder why there was a new vehicle in the lot when no one had checked in. “Do I have to gag you, or are you going to act like you have some sense this time?” Gabriel asked.

  “I’m not going to do anything. I know I can’t get away,” Shay answered.

  “You start to scream, you aren’t going to be happy,” he warned her,
although he doubted there was anyone who’d hear her if she did cry out for help. Gabriel got out of the Range Rover and walked around to Shay’s side. He had about forty minutes of darkness left. He believed she wouldn’t try anything right now. But when the daylight sapped his energy, and he fell into the death sleep, she could do anything she wanted to. Gabriel had never acquired Sam’s and Ernst’s ability to fight the pull of that sleep at will, and after so long without fresh blood, after being chained to a table so long, he was too weak to even try.

  He opened the door for Shay, the courtly gesture getting a mocking smile from her. She might be beaten down, but she hadn’t given up. Gabriel took her by the arm, circled around, and opened the SUV’s trunk.

  It was well equipped. No surprise, since it was the car of someone like Martin. A first-aid kit. Thermal blanket. Jumper cables. Jack. Some basic tools. And, yes, what Gabriel needed—a length of rope. He picked it up.

  He saw Shay’s eyes widen, and her pulse began to beat faster. He was hyper-aware of the blood now rushing through her at a higher speed. She was scared, but she didn’t say anything. He understood that. Admitting her fear, even asking a question, made her more vulnerable to him. During his weeks in that room, he’d never spoken to his captors, not even when Martin had tried to force him to. Gabriel had worked hard not to let even the twitch of an eyelid show his emotions.

  Gabriel led Shay across the motel parking lot and over to the room farthest from the office. He broke open the door with one sharp jerk of the handle and guided Shay inside. “If you have to use the bathroom or anything like that, do it now,” he told her. “I’m going to tie you up while I sleep.”

  Shay nodded. She crossed the short distance to the bathroom, stepped inside, and shut the door behind her.

  Gabriel ran his hands through his hair as he paced back and forth in the small room. He couldn’t wait to be home. And tomorrow, he would be. Ernst would be elated to see him. By now, he must have come to believe that Gabriel was dead. Would the effects of the hawthorn ever fade? The idea of living without his psychic bond to his family made Gabriel feel cold.

  Soon I’ll be with them in person, he reminded himself. And after the elation faded, Ernst would be incensed over what had been done to Gabriel. All that would calm him down was the realization that Gabriel had already begun a plan for vengeance. Ernst and Gabriel would come up with the details together. Shay was the important element. They would figure out the best way to use her to make his captors pay.

  Gabriel crossed to the window. The curtains were shut, but he pulled them tighter together. “Door,” he muttered. He moved back across the room and fastened the chain. He left the DO NOT DISTURB sign where it was, hooked over the inside doorknob. It would just advertise their presence. No one should be trying to come in to clean. The room was already prepped. In this place, a cigarette burn in the bedspread and a water stain on the ceiling with a matching stain on the carpet below still counted as ready for guests.

  Shay came out of the bathroom. “Lie down,” Gabriel ordered her. He nodded to the double bed in the center of the room.

  “There?” Shay asked.

  “Or we can both lie on the floor,” he told her. “I’m tying you to me. You’re not going to escape again.”

  Shay hesitated, then lay on her back on the bed, as close to the edge of the mattress as she could get. Gabriel measured out a length of rope, then he released his eye teeth and sliced through it. Shay’s head jerked back a little. She shouldn’t be surprised. She’d seen how easily he could tear open his skin.

  It wasn’t because she was surprised; it was because she was scared. The thought was unwelcome. She was a hostage, nothing more.

  “Don’t do anything stupid, and you won’t get hurt.” He ran his eyes over her, thinking. “Shoes on or off?” he asked.

  “I guess off.” Shay sat up to take off her boots. Gabriel was faster. He quickly slid them off. He started to bind her feet together, then hesitated. The rope was rough, and her socks were more like stockings. He didn’t want her skin to get rubbed raw.

  He strode into the bathroom, grabbed one of the pathetically thin towels, then returned to her. He ripped the towel into three strips, and used two of them to wrap her ankles before he tied them together with the rope.

  Then he sat down on the bed next to her. He used the last strip of towel to wrap the wrist closest to him, then tied his wrist to Shay’s. She kept her eyes squeezed shut the whole time. It was as if she were a little kid who thought if you didn’t see something, that meant it wasn’t happening.

  Gabriel stretched out, keeping to his side of the mattress. He reached out his free hand and flicked off the light switch. It wasn’t much longer till daybreak. Sleep would overtake him soon. He welcomed it. He didn’t want to be aware of Shay lying so close to him, so warm, her smell so intoxicating. His hand was tied so tightly to hers that he could feel her pulse fluttering. He knew drinking her blood would poison him, but his body craved it anyway.

  “Don’t bother trying to untie the ropes while I’m asleep,” Gabriel told her. “The knots will hold. And even if you did escape, as soon as darkness fell, I would come after you. Your scent would lead me straight to you.”

  That same scent that was driving him near to madness right now. He closed his eyes and waited for relief.

  Shay’s back hurt. She couldn’t get into a comfortable position. She felt hyper-aware of each tiny sensation as she lay next to Gabriel. And that included the heat coming off his body. His warmth was soaking into her skin, and it was almost as if he were touching her.

  He had talked about tracking her by her scent. If she had his powers, she knew she would be able to track him, too. The smell of him—salty and musky, with a hint of motel soap—was imprinted on her memory. No, more than that. It was coded in her blood. Maybe it was more than his scent. Maybe drinking from him had somehow made him part of her, forever and always.

  She wished she could drink from him now, feel the power flooding her, escape into the life of the visions. Shay was repulsed by the thought. True, the blood had saved her life, but she didn’t want anything of him in her. He hated her. And, now, she hated him. The little boy in her visions, the teenager who had been such good friends with Sam, the man who had appreciated every streak of color in his last sunset—that wasn’t Gabriel. Not anymore. It couldn’t be. Shay didn’t believe that person, the person she had been so many times, could use her the way this Gabriel was. He could never kill for vengeance the way this Gabriel was planning to do.

  She wanted to check her watch, but it was on the wrist tied to Gabriel’s. It had to be eight or nine. Shay wished she could fall asleep as deeply as Gabriel had. Even a light, half-awake and half-asleep nap would be a relief, but she didn’t bother to close her eyes. Sleep wasn’t going to come.

  Shay rolled onto her side, which brought her right up next to Gabriel. She immediately returned to lying on her back. She tossed her head back and forth on the pillow. She needed to move. The thought took her over. She started to feel panicked, frantic. Her heart was racing, and the skin around her mouth was starting to feel numb.

  She bit her upper lip lightly, then a little harder. Numb. That was bad. She’d never felt numbness like this during any of her million and two self-checks. Was this it? Was she dying right now? Sweat popped out between her fingers.

  Stress mask. The phrase just popped into her head. One time her mother had been seriously freaking out because Shay’s white blood-cell count was extremely low. Martin had sat her mom down, taken her pulse, and asked her if she was feeling any facial numbness. When she said she was, he said she had what was called a stress mask.

  Okay, see, you’re just stressed, Shay told herself. Not dying. At least not yet. Just stressed.

  She pulled in a deep breath, then another. It was taking a while for her body to get the message that there was no need for a meltdown. She took another breath, as deeply as she could, then held it for a five count, and released it slowly. It w
as a relaxation technique she’d learned on one of her hospital stays.

  Better, she thought. That’s better. Although she still had hours to get through before Gabriel awoke and untied her. If she could drink, the blood would bring her to another place where she could run and—

  No. God, it was like she was addicted. Her brain kept saying, No, I don’t want to drink his blood. He’s evil. But her body—her body didn’t care about good and evil, right and wrong. It just kept chanting, Give me, give me, give me. She could roll over, sink her teeth into his neck—

  She needed a distraction. She was completely losing it. Why hadn’t Gabriel turned on the TV or the radio? Her cell rang, pulling her attention away from her thoughts. It was way over on the dresser across the room. No way could she get it. Gabriel would have to be pretty stupid to tie her up and then leave her cell in reach. And stupid, he wasn’t.

  The cell rang and rang. It has to be Olivia, Shay thought. Okay, Liv. Do what you do best—worry about me. Call the police. Call my parents. Call the cavalry. Please, please, please, just get me some help.

  Martin and her mother had captured Gabriel once. They knew his weaknesses. If Olivia could get them here, they’d have a chance against Gabriel. Much, much more of chance than if they were lured into a trap at Gabriel’s compound with all his family to back him up.

  The cell started to ring again. Shay gave a low groan of frustration. Olivia wouldn’t be able to send help. She had no idea where Shay was. If Shay could talk to her for just one second— But her cell might as well be across the country as across the room.

  Distraction. She needed distraction. If she was at home, she would write in her journal after a transfusion. After a vision.

  She could do that now. She could do a head journal. Shay closed her eyes and tried not to feel stupid as she imagined she was back in her room, sitting at her desk, her journal open in front of her, her favorite green pen in her hand.

  Okay, here goes. I’ve drunk from Gabriel two more times since the last time I wrote. I don’t know if it’s because I need the blood more to function, or if I just want it. Once I read this article about some celeb’s addiction to pain pills, and he said after a while his body kept telling him he was in pain, because he needed to think he was so he could have a justification for taking the pills. The pain was mostly in his mind by that point. When he got off the pills, and stayed off for a while, he realized it.