And gaining.
Brendan redoubled his efforts, sprinting. His lungs were a burning inferno, begging him to stop. But this was where it counted. This is what he'd trained for, he wasn't going to give back this precious cargo. She was the final hope for his people.
The brush crashed behind them as they reached their transport. The night's coolness had moved in and he could scent the exhaust that plumed into the air like a spiral of smoke before he saw it. Brendan instantly identified it as theirs.
The door was already flung open, Michael screamed, “They're up your ass!”
Thanks for the clue, braniac! Brendan thought.
He reached the open door, slid open to accommodate the Singer, shoved her into waiting arms and turned, a downward arc of talons making a breeze next to his face.
Hell! That was close. There was no fighting at close range unless Brendan had the element of surprise.
He didn't. That was long-gone. A big monster was coming for him now, half-wolf form, all the dexterity of full human shape, but the strength and speed of pure wolf form.
He was up shit creek, then Jen was there. Her face was a sweaty mask as her palm was straight out in front of her body, her arm plank-stiff.
She held back the first siege of the Were by her will alone. Her body trembled with the effort, sweat gliding down her neck and soaking her shirt.
“How long?” Brendan shouted beside her, trying to light as many on fire as he could. They all got nailed at the feet. It was a temporary measure at best, he was a Tracker, not a Pyro. The secondary ability was awesome sometimes. For deflection.
Like now, when they needed a mondo distraction.
“Get in!” she hissed.
Okay, hell... so touchy.
He saw around ten more burst out of the woods. As he got in he grabbed Jen around the waist and hauled her against him, slamming the door closed. He banged on the drivers seat, “Go!”
Rafael floored it even as the van rocked with the first Were hitting the side with enough force to partially lift the wheels off the trail.
Shit! He looked down at Jen, swiping hair away from her temple. She was totally spent.
“Can she?” Michael asked, an unconscious Singer in his lap.
“Nah!” Brendan shouted over the gnashing of teeth and talons on the exterior of the van, nails on a chalkboard of metal. “She's totally gassed!”
“Dammit!” Michael laid the Singer on the blanket at his feet and got busy. Throwing himself in the front seat his face mired in concentration... and ten vamps appeared in front of the van.
Rafael had laid on the gas but the wheels were spinning without purchase. The Were crawling over it like their own anthill. He hissed in a breath, “What the hell?”
“It's okay, it's me,” Michael said. “Just drive!”
Rafael did, even as the Were slid off the van to deal with the perceived threat of their primary enemy.
The Were attacked the vamps even as the van slid through them like ghosts. Because that's what they were. Michael had executed his tactical advantage to perfection.
He was one of their best Illusionists.
The van screamed out of the Were stronghold, spinning up dirt as it roared off. The four Singers and their treasure, barely hanging on to tenuous liberty.
CHAPTER 26
Singers
Julia felt like she'd been run over by a truck. A couple of times. She cracked open one eyelid, feeling the heat of the sunlight before it fell on where she lay. She looked around at yet another bedroom, her surroundings different than the vampire, than the Were.
She was in a funky-shaped room. The bed stood in a portion of room that jutted out, three windows facing the outside, her headboard against the central one. She rolled over, gazing outside. She moved a gauzy white curtain aside and sunlight struck her like a weapon. Julia squinted.
Rolling hills of green carpeted valleys that kissed a far away forest greeted her stare. It was beautiful. A small lake or pond shimmered in the distance, swans floating on the surface like feathered jewels.
Julia sat back on her haunches, her heels digging into her butt. She looked down at what she was wearing and was beyond thrilled to see that she was still wearing the white gown. So... they'd dumped her in a bed with the dress on and the whole deal.
Perfect.
She swung her feet over the bed and stood on a wood floor that had planks that were five inches wide and very red in color. Her gaze swept the room and she noticed two doors. Julia guessed one led to a bathroom. As she approached them she tried door number one and turned a crystal knob, faceted like a large diamond. It turned smoothly, slightly loose in its brass housing and swung it open.
A tall narrow window with jewel-toned stained glass let in sunlight broken by the colored patterns in the glass. The light cast on the floor looked like a shattered rainbow. Julia spied the commode, a pedestal sink and a sinfully large claw foot tub.
Awesome.
She used the facilities and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and grimaced. That's when she noticed an army of trolls had marched through her mouth and longed for a toothbrush. More than that though, she wanted to know where she was. For the first time, she was happy to be somewhere new.
These were her people.
Julia had finally come home.
Jen folded her arms across her chest. “You're not going up there,” she said, hearing Julia walking around, using the bathroom. Exploring.
Brendan shrugged. “Why not? Don't want me to hog your find?”
They'd been arguing all morning. Which wasn't too atypical because she was so goddamned stubborn. Brendan was busy seething when Michael breezed in.
“Is hotness awake yet?” he asked, rooting around in the ancient fridge for something to snag. He was so hungry, Michael was pretty sure that he was digesting his own spine. His whole head was in the fridge when he heard Jen's reply, “None of you doofuses need to go hassle her. She's new, we... heck, we kidnapped her! Maybe she needs time to... I don't know, acclimate or something?”
Michael jerked his head out of the fridge, banging it a good one on the top. He grimaced, looking at the dent there from the other one hundred and twelve times he'd done it. Huh.
“Listen,” he held up a finger. “We saved her precious ass so she better be grateful. I say socialization is in order. And... who'd want to do the Were Bride routine?” Michael rolled his eyes, gulping juice out of the carton.
Brendan narrowed his eyes on his brother. “Listen, I got dibs. I did all the hard work. You just poofed some vamps to distract the Were. I ran with her!” he rolled his eyes at him.
Brendan's keen sense of smell alerted him too late.
Julia had appeared in the doorway, the most forlorn and sad expression he had ever seen covering her face.
Shit.
They all started to talk at once but she stopped all conversation with, “I'm sorry. I thought that you... that I was...” she burst into tears. Julia thought that they had wanted to rescue her from the Were but from the sounds of it they were pissed to have to deal with her. Someone they had to shuffle around.
Jen glowered at her brothers.
God! They were so inept! And Brendan! He was the big deal Tracker... he couldn't scent her fast enough to curb his words?
Idiots. Jen popped off the kitchen stool, punching Michael as she walked past.
“Hey!” he mock-yelled at her.
Julia looked up, tears shimmering in those eyes. They were like gold topaz Brendan noted, a little dreamily.
Jen grabbed the hands that Julia was trying to use to cover her face. She was so embarrassed to be somewhere that she wasn't wanted, in the ridiculous white dress, her hair six ways to Sunday.
“No, no,” Jen crooned, throwing a dirty glance at the two guys that stood behind her looking contrite. “Don't listen to my stupid brothers...” she looked up at Julia earnestly. “They always sound dumb.”
“Yeah, that's us. Dumb,” Brendan said dryl
y.
“Yeah, that,” Michael agreed, swinging his longish dirty blond hair out of his eyes.
Julia gave a small smile. “So, you guys... do you want me to leave?” Her lip trembled again. “Because I can't go back there,” Julia said in a low voice.
Brendan was alarmed and approached her too quickly. She backed up and he stopped. “No. You don't... we don't want you to go back to the Were... or the vampire. We're all about sucking you into our world. It's where ya belong.”
Michael nodded. “Why would ya think that we wouldn't want you?”
Julia shrugged. “You sounded like... that you were kinda mad?”
Jen shook her head. “Nah! That's the way they always sound.”
“Like smart ass meets anger management?” Julia asked. She was definitely okay now, Brendan noticed with relief, a smile breaking through her tears like they'd never been.
Jen smiled in return. “I'm Jen,” she said, sticking her hand out and Julia shook it.
Brendan and Michael came forward. “And these are the dummy duo, who you've had the misfortune of meeting already,” she said, but the humor in her voice took away the sting.
“We're not always dumb,” Michael said, taking her hand and giving it a gentle squeeze, then dropping it.
“I wouldn't know how to be dumb,” Brendan said and winked. But he didn't shake her hand, instead he drew her into a hug which pressed her against his body, melding her form to his. He said against her hair, “We've been looking for you for a long time.” He drew away, the happiness radiating from every pore.
“Me?” Julia asked, putting her hand to her chest, trying to let the heat from his embrace fade like a still-hot brand.
They nodded.
“Why? I mean, I don't know you guys.” She looked at them expectantly.
“It's not who you are it's what you are,” Michael explained cryptically.
Julia folded her arms, impatience seeping in a little. “Okay, I give. What am I?”
They looked at each other uneasily and Julia asked again, “Come on, spill the secret! I know I'm a Singer...” she threw out her hands. She'd known that for awhile. “I know I'm the 'Rare One',” she said, her hands dropping against the fabric of the dress after the air quotes.
“Rare One?” Michael shook his head. “I don't know what that is but you're not that to us.”
Jen said, “You're more than that.”
Julia looked at them. She opened her mouth, impatience on her tongue when Brendan spoke, “You are Queen.”
Julia staggered back a step. “What?” she asked dully, her voice coming from a distance. “Queen of whom?” Julia heard herself asking.
“The Singers. You are Queen of the Blood Singers.”
The room began to tilt and she heard many voices at once. She fell into strong arms.
Fainting for the second time.
It was becoming a trend.
Brendan looked down at the girl in his arms and felt his heart clench. He hated feeling weak.
She already had a piece of it.
His heart. It beat slower for the loss of that chunk.
Brendan didn't even know her name.
Not that it mattered. Love was an errant master, choosing who it would without reason.
Without rationale.
****
pack
Adriana screamed at her brother. For him, at him.
“Hold still, Adi!” He jammed his leg into her armpit and wrenched the arm back in before she could stiffen up more than she already was.
Tears of pain rolled down her face and Joseph swiped them away with the pad of his thumb. “Shhh... it's okay,” Joseph said, gathering her against his chest.
“It's not okay, Joseph and you fucking know it!” Tony paced and Joseph felt the small bones of his face shift. That was automatic when an Alpha felt challenged. The Change asserted itself subtly beneath his skin.
Adi felt it and looked up at her brother.
“It is at your feet where the fault lies. You insisted that Lawrence give her the worst punishment!” he responded, his anger roiling underneath his skin with weight, with purpose.
Tony turned to face him, his posture wary and tight.
Joseph carefully untangled himself from Adriana, shifting her weight against the acrylic wall that had held the feral.
But no longer.
He faced Tony, walking toward him on a slow prowl.
Adi watched as her brother's body shifted to bursting, the moon's power waning but not enough. Not nearly enough.
“Me? She is the one that pushed the boundaries! It's always her. And she is always coddled. Now the Rare One has escaped with the Singers, the feral has escaped and that vamp runner killed five of us! Five!”
Tony's scathing stare burned a pathway across Adriana and she growled low in her throat. She didn't care that he outmatched her by a hundred pounds and a foot of height. She hated Tony.
He smelled bad.
She smacked her palm of the uninjured side of her body against the clear wall and boosted herself to standing. “I will take responsibility for the feral, I panicked. I thought he'd already escaped. But,” her stare gave dominant weight to her words and she watched Tony visibly bristle at its significance, “I will not accept the strange shit that went down while I was injured substituting for you so you could fight my brother and also stick me with that chore on the full moon!” Her eyes shifted from one to the other. “I am not a 'favorite',” Adi said, using air quotes. “I was pressed to do the worst chore at the worst time because I let my alligator mouth overload my canary ass.”
Joseph barked out a laugh. “She's right.”
The tension in the empty holding cell slipped down a notch.
“Like any one of us could have known a vamp was skulking around, all Lone Ranger and then the coincidence of the feral escaping? Oh!” she yelled into the strange acoustics of the room, “let's not forget the darling Singers that waltzed in, during the bloodiest and most distracting ritual ever conceived, and snatched Jules right from underneath our very noses,” she seethed, the fingers of her index and thumb a hair's breadth apart.
They'd been that close to not losing Julia.
“And!” she continued to rant and Tony crossed his muscular arms, rolling his eyes, “Shut up and listen!” Tony growled, this female never knew when to shut up. Hell, if that brother of hers wasn't always around, he'd teach her a lesson that'd stay with her permanently.
Tony smiled at his thoughts and her lips pulled away from her teeth, another growl reverberating from between them.
“Enough!” Joseph roared, startling them both. His eyes landed on his sister. “Finish now, then we go to Lawrence. This whole incompetent mess will need to be explained.”
“I was just going to say, that fifteen of our wolves trailed the Singers, and still... we didn't get her back.”
“So?” Tony said with derision.
“So... I think they're more powerful than we've been trying to convince ourselves.”
“Ha! Bullshit. They're human, they can do some parlor tricks. It's not real strength.Who do they call leader?” Tony asked, palms spread with his superior omniscience.
Adi rolled her eyes. He was such a goddamned know-it-all.
“What of the Book of Luna?” Joseph asked into the stillness, Tony's words echoing into silence.
Tony didn't bother with reading that old crap. It was the new order. The only thing he'd wanted was to become a moonless changer. That, he'd believed in plenty. And now that little Singer had slipped between his claws like water through a sieve.
She would be within his grasp again.
Adi nodded. “They are a force of their own. You know that! Look what happened a few hours ago? They fooled you, Tony!”
Tony glowered at her. He'd almost had that Singer but it's as if the Singer had eyes in the back of of his head. Tony shook his head, thinking about it.
“Yeah,” he ground out. “Don't know how, I almost had him.” He
smacked his fist into his opposite palm, his dark eyes flashing.
“Scent Tracker,” Joseph said in a flat voice.
Tony whipped his head in Joseph's direction, his brows raised.
Joseph and Adriana nodded. They'd both been trained in the precepts held within the Book.
Tony threw his hands up. “I give. Drop this secretive shit. Just. Tell. Me.” He pegged his hands on his powerful hips, frowning at them.
“A sense of smell a thousand times more powerful than ours,” Joseph said.
“Impossible,” Tony breathed out, thinking of his multi-layered scent awareness. It was so overwhelming he had trained himself to tune out most scents. It was too much. But one thousand times more sensitive? He couldn't wrap his mind around it. He scoffed at the possibility.
“I know, right? It's...” Adi began.
“Unbelievable!” Joseph agreed, nodding.
“Yeah... okay. Whatever. But what about the ten vampires that just flashed into existence and were ghosts when we attacked?” Tony said like, explain that.
Adriana laughed and the men turned to her. When she finally stopped she said, “Vampire mirage.”
Joseph sighed. Not helpful.
“What was it?”
Joseph shook his head. They weren't sure. But it had been a superb deflection on their part. Too good.
“Don't know,” he answered.
“Well, it was pretty fucking effective!” Tony said. “I could smell the vamps. Smell them,” he said through clenched teeth.
Joseph gave a sound low in his throat. “No, that was the Tracker, assisting... the other one.”
“They can work in tandem?” Adi asked, stunned.
Joseph nodded. “Looks like.” Then he paused. “But a more likely reason for the two is family.”
“What?” Tony asked, his eyes narrowing.
“I speculate for that pair to work as seamlessly together as they did, they'd have to be family.”
“What about the bitch with them?” Tony asked. He conjured up an image of her in his mind. Small, pixie-like features, hair blondish, he guessed. Hard to know with the moon, it silvered everything.
The Blood Bundle, Books 1-2: Blood Singers and Blood Song (New Adult Paranormal Vampire/Shifter Romance) Page 20