by Alicia Rades
I liked to think I sounded terrifying, but I must’ve not looked the part, because he didn’t seem particularly scared of me. When his eyes darted to Venn, though, he sure looked wary.
“I hardly knew the guy,” Dracula admitted, still looking at me like he’d enjoy me for his next meal. “He was just a roommate. He left a few months after I moved in.”
“Were any of your other roommates close to him?” Venn asked.
The vamp rolled his eyes and turned to the car beside us on the curb to climb inside. “I’m not some messenger boy. If you want to know more about him—”
I grabbed his door before he could slam it. He sat in the driver’s seat, trying to wrench it out of my grasp, but I had a firm hold on it. The vamp looked up at me in shock, like he thought I’d been bluffing when I said I was strong.
“My boyfriend asked you a question,” I stated in my most intimidating voice. “I suggest you answer.”
Dracula hesitated. “I don’t know anything about Cowen, and I doubt my roommates do, either. The most I know about him is what’s in the box he left behind.”
Every word sounded genuine, but I wasn’t ready to accept we’d hit a dead end. If only he’d given me a reason to beat the answer out of him…
I think I enjoyed confronting vampires a little too much. If I treated humans half as bad as I treated vamps, I’d already have my ticket to Hell in hand. I was about to give up and let the vamp go, ready to call this mission officially a bust, when Venn quickly stepped in.
“Do you still have the box?” he asked in a rush.
Dracula’s jaw tensed. He was totally over this interrogation. “I might know where it is.”
“We’ll buy it from you,” Venn offered.
The vamp’s eyes lit up in intrigue.
“How much do you want for it?” Venn asked.
“I don’t want money,” Dracula declined, his silver eyes staring greedily at me.
Seriously? Another lonely bastard looking for a good time? He’d be sorely disappointed.
“What do you want?” Venn asked.
Either he was dumb or blind. It was obvious by the way the guy eyed me like a piece of meat. I was his price.
Screw him. Wait, no. Not what I meant.
“I just want a taste,” Dracula said, like it wasn’t a big deal.
He can shove his offer—wait… a taste? As in, my blood? Okay, not as bad as I thought, but still…
“No,” I answered automatically, my voice filled with disgust.
“Then I think we’re done here.” Dracula reached for his door handle.
“Wait!” Venn insisted, catching the door again before he could close it.
Dracula looked up with a sardonic smile. “You seem to really want that box.”
Venn hesitated.
What was Venn hiding? He did really want that box, but I wasn’t sure why. He didn’t think the thing Cowen stole from him was in there, did he? I mean, this vamp said Cowen had left here years ago. Unless he thought there might be something in there that could help us track Cowen down.
Tracking…
Of course! A tracking spell required an object belonging to the person you were trying to locate. We could use anything in the box to track Cowen, as long as no one else had claimed ownership of the objects inside since he’d abandoned them.
“I lied,” I said quickly. “I’ll do it.”
The vamp smirked the same time Venn spoke.
“No, Rae,” he objected. “You don’t have to.”
“I do,” I countered. “We need that box.”
Venn whirled toward Dracula. “Feed on me instead.”
The vamp stood in the grass beside the curb and shut his car door behind him. He shook his head. “No. I named my price, and I asked for the girl.”
His nostrils flared, inhaling my scent—not that he could smell me well considering I was a shifter. He must’ve really had a thing for female shifter blood. That wasn’t surprising, though, since shifter blood tasted best, or so I’d been told. Vampires could feed on animals, but I’d heard it compared to the taste of dirt and the energy boost of an ice cube when you’re craving a double bacon cheeseburger. Human blood did the job, but it was like eating salad when shifter blood was a triple-layer chocolate cake with ice cream on top. Vampires didn’t get many chances to drink shifter blood since most of us weren’t up for donating it. Not to mention that shifter blood slaves were rare. Vamps only took the ones who couldn’t fight them off.
I took a step back to distance myself from him. Dracula looked two seconds away from pouncing on me and sucking me dry. He almost had me second-guessing the deal, but then I reminded myself what would happen if I refused. We really would hit our dead end, and I’d be no closer to finding Jenna than I was the night the Soulless took her.
“I’ll do it,” I said, “but you only get five seconds—”
“A minute,” the vamp countered.
“You’d have me drained dry! Five seconds,” I replied firmly.
“That’s barely a sip!” he complained, like I was being totally unfair.
Frankly, I thought I was being awfully generous for a box of junk that didn’t even belong to him.
“Thirty seconds,” the vamp negotiated.
I crossed my arms. “Ten, and that’s my final offer.”
His eyes locked on my jugular as if he could hear my blood pulsing through my veins. I knew he couldn’t, not like he could with humans.
Finally, he scoffed. “Forget it. I can buy blood for less than that box of crap is worth.”
“You and I both know that my blood fresh from the source is a heck of a lot more valuable than what it sells for at a blood bank,” I countered.
Blood from the blood banks was like eating that chocolate cake after it’d sat on the counter for three days—dry and stale. He knew my offer was well worth it.
“Rae,” Venn said sternly, trying to talk some sense into me, but I’d already made up my mind. We needed something of Cowen’s to track him down.
Dracula’s lips tightened. “Fine,” he caved. “Ten seconds.” He stepped forward and reached out for me.
I quickly dodged out of the way. “Whoa. We get the box first.”
Dracula glanced to Venn, as if to ask, Is this girl for real?
“And if you try anything,” I warned, “you’re dead. If you release venom, take longer than your ten seconds, anything… my friend here will make sure it’s the last drink you ever take.”
Dracula gritted his teeth. “Yeah, I get it. No tricks.”
“Rae, come on,” Venn protested, his voice growing harsher with each passing second. “We’ll find another way.”
I ignored him. We might find Cowen eventually through other means, but this was our quickest option. “Let’s do this,” I said to Dracula, sealing our deal.
“No,” Venn demanded like I didn’t have a choice. He grabbed me by the arm and pulled me away from Dracula.
On instinct, I ripped my arm out of his grasp and swung my fist at his nose. He stumbled backward from the impact, his hands immediately covering his face.
“Damn, Rae,” he said with a mixture of anger and amusement in his tone. “You have one helluva swing.”
Dracula laughed, but I ignored him. I wasn’t amused in the slightest.
“Let’s make something explicitly clear,” I said, my eyes trained on Venn’s. “Just because I asked for your help does not mean you own me. I’m doing this on my own, so you can either stay and help or leave without answers.”
Silence settled over the lawn.
A muscle fluttered in Venn’s jaw as he considered my words. Finally, his shoulders relaxed. “I’ll stay.”
Dracula smiled triumphantly. “The box is in the garage.”
He gestured for us to follow him, but my feet remained firmly planted in the grass. Venn didn’t move, either. Dracula glanced back and frowned, like he didn’t have all night.
“I said no tricks,” I told him.
“This isn’t a trick.” The vamp sounded annoyed. “I’m upholding my end of our deal.”
Maybe he was telling the truth, but how could I trust that there wouldn’t be twenty vampires hanging out in the garage waiting for us?
“Bring the box out here to us,” I demanded.
Dracula shook his head, like I was being completely ridiculous.
“Do you want my blood or not?” I asked. The truth was I’d follow him into that garage if I had to, but I hoped it didn’t come to that.
“Fine,” the vamp sighed. “Wait here.”
He hurried off toward the side of the garage, leaving Venn and me alone on the dark sidewalk.
I turned to Venn, who stared after Dracula with a hard expression. “He’s not coming back, is he?”
“That, or he’s bringing a bunch of vamps back with him,” Venn said. “We should leave before he comes back. This is a bad deal.”
“No,” I insisted. “We need that box to track Cowen. Don’t you want to save Sondra?”
Venn hesitated. Before he had a chance to answer, Dracula had already emerged from the garage. He carried a white cardboard box not much bigger than a paper grocery bag.
Maybe there are vampires out there worth their word.
Dracula dropped the box beside Venn’s feet. It landed with a smack on the sidewalk.
That was… too easy. We could’ve just walked in there ourselves and taken it. A minor breaking and entering charge was nothing, and I wouldn’t have to give up my blood for it.
I stared into the silver eyes of this Dracula-Cowen look-alike, praying to God—or Synchrony or whatever—that he’d keel over and die right there so I wouldn’t have to go through with this. But I knew praying wouldn’t do me any good.
“I’ll take my payment now,” Dracula said, licking his lips.
My skin crawled, and every fiber of my being told me to take the box and run, but I found myself stepping toward him anyway. I wasn’t the type of person to go back on my word. I know… shocker. Rachel Collins actually had morals.
But when Dracula took my wrist in his cold hand, I wasn’t sure I could go through with it. Suddenly, I wanted to hurl.
I hope my blood tastes like horse shit.
“Wait!” Venn couldn’t take it. He threw himself between us, forcing Dracula’s hand off mine. “Don’t, Rae. You don’t want to become a blood slave, believe me.”
“Hey!” Dracula rose his voice and shoved Venn aside with his elbow. “No one said anything about blood slaves. We had a deal. You’re not trying to double-cross me, are you?”
Venn held Dracula’s gaze, his lips tight and nostrils flaring, but he couldn’t come up with a rebuttal.
“Are we going to do this or not?” Dracula’s teeth gritted. He looked at me in a way that told me that one way or another, he would receive his payment.
“Venn, I told you this was my deal,” I said.
“Watch out,” Dracula warned. “You don’t want to get punched by a girl again, do you?”
I almost struck Dracula for the insult. I wasn’t just some tiny, weak-ass girl, though he had to know that by now.
I placed a gentle hand on Venn’s arm. “Ten seconds. That’s it. Ten seconds, and it will all be over.”
I stepped toward Dracula before Venn could respond. My hands shook. I knew it wouldn’t be anything compared to the pain I felt when Cowen stabbed me with vampire venom, but I still wasn’t looking forward to vampire fangs sinking into my neck.
Ten seconds. Then we’re out of here.
I ignored Venn and nodded toward Dracula.
“Rae—” Venn started, but I didn’t hear the rest of what he said.
Dracula wrapped his arms around me possessively, and a sharp pain shot across my neck. My breath hitched, and my entire body tensed.
Ten… nine…
I started counting down in my head, but two seconds in, I’d already lost track of the numbers. It only took a moment for the initial shock to fade and the pain to go away. Instead, a light tingly feeling danced across my skin, melting away all the tension in my muscles. I forgot about Venn’s protests, about the fangs in my neck, about the box near my feet that could hold the key to finding Cowen… all that mattered was the feeling of euphoria filling my body.
Had I really only offered this guy ten seconds? If this was what being fed on felt like, he could take me for ten goddamn years. The pleasure only built within my body each passing second. I yearned for more, but I never got a chance to learn what that might feel like.
My mind was instantly pulled back to the present, to the reality that a vampire was sucking my blood, when the deafening roar of a massive beast cut through the night.
8
A moment of disorientation overcame me as the fangs in my neck drew away.
“Step away from the girl,” a threatening female voice met my ears.
The pressure around my middle disappeared. I hadn’t even realized there’d been pressure on my body until it was gone. My legs felt like noodles. Without the strength to hold me up, they crumbled beneath me. A pair of strong hands caught me before I slammed to the ground. It took only a split second for my head to clear, as if I’d just broken the surface of a very deep lake and taken my first life-saving breath.
The first thing I noticed was that Dracula had dropped me. He stared with wide eyes at something beyond me and backed away slowly. The faint scent of cinnamon filled my nose, and I realized it was Venn who had caught me.
A second chilling roar filled the air just feet away from me. I steadied my feet and turned to see Ryland in bear form, glaring at Dracula and poised for attack. Fiona had shifted into a fox, and Teagan was ready with her knives out.
This was bad. Ryland had to know this wasn’t at all what it looked like.
“Wait!” I cried.
I rushed out of Venn’s arms and threw myself between Ryland and Dracula. But Ryland was quicker than me. He’d already leapt into the air, his sharp teeth bared toward Dracula’s throat. Ryland’s massive paws slammed into my chest. I fell to the ground, feeling as if I’d just been hit by a truck. Ryland quickly righted himself and shot me a glare as if to ask if I was insane.
Possibly.
I sucked in a heavy breath and tried to force out an explanation, but the words didn’t come before Dracula had already ducked into his car. Ryland rushed forward, and his heavy shoulder connected with the driver’s side door. It crumpled like a soda can. Dracula quickly shifted into drive, flipped us the finger, and sped off down the road.
“Ryland, stop!” Venn yelled to get his attention.
Ryland was already racing after the car, but he didn’t get far before realizing he’d never be able to keep up with Dracula’s increasing speed.
Teagan rushed over to me to help me to my feet. My chest heaved as I struggled to inhale steady breaths, and my head swam in a lightheaded daze. A warm sensation rushed across the skin on my throat. My hand slapped to my neck and came away sticky with blood.
Great.
I pressed hard over the vampire bite to stop the bleeding. My eyes remained fixed on Ryland as he abandoned the car chase and raced back to the lawn. Even in his bear form, he looked pissed.
“Ryland,” Venn and I said in unison, in a matching tone that said we had a lot to explain.
But we never got a chance. Fiona’s scream of terror ripped across the lawn, startling all of us. Venn, Teagan, and I whirled around, only to be met by half a dozen pairs of silver eyes. Six vampires flooded out of the house. The first vamp already had Fiona by her hair. He was tall, with skin as dark as Venn’s and arms as big as Ryland’s.
Ryland showed no signs of slowing down.
“Ryland, stop!” I shouted.
He was already flying through the air.
I was so over this act first, ask questions later thing.
Alpha Vamp dropped Fiona and ducked out of the way before Ryland’s claws could catch him. Ryland’s massive bear form flew over the top of him and sla
mmed into the petite female vamp behind him.
“Stop!” I screamed again, but no one listened.
The female vamp was already back on her feet. She drew her arm back and smashed it into Ryland’s nose. Ryland swiped his paw out at her, but she ducked. Her clothes fell to the ground as her body shrank to the size of a medium dog. There was a distinct pattern to her brown fur. A wolverine.
Whoa. I was totally not expecting that. Vampire-shifter hybrids were rare, especially since shifters weren’t common in the general population to begin with. Unlike witch magic, vampires kept their shifter magic when they changed.
Venn shifted and sprang forward to defend Ryland. Teagan grabbed a fistful of Ryland’s fur and hoisted herself onto his back. In the blink of an eye, one of her knives flew from her hand and landed square in the center of the female shifter-vamp’s chest.
Terror entered the woman’s eyes, but it was gone a moment later as the magic keeping her alive left her body and reduced it to a pile of ash.
Me? I was still holding on to my neck, trying not to bleed out the open wounds Dracula had left. I needed to perform a healing spell—and fast.
What’s the incantation? Come on, Rachel, you can do this.
I racked my brain, thinking back to the words I’d uttered only earlier today.
The incantation is only four lines. It shouldn’t be this hard to remember. Just start somewhere.
I began muttering the first words I could remember. No, that wasn’t right. That was the second half of the spell. How did the beginning go?
Three of the remaining vampires had Ryland and Teagan surrounded. Another had chased Fiona up onto the porch, and though the vamp was fast, Fiona was agile enough to avoid getting caught. The vamp was probably a total newbie still getting used to his supernatural speed. Nearby, Venn’s wolf claws sank into a vampire’s arm. The vampire bared its sharp fangs and hissed.
They need help. I need to get in there.
Suddenly, the incantation clicked. I whispered the four lines from memory under my breath. The moment I finished, Alpha Vamp leapt on top of Ryland and sank his teeth into the back of Teagan’s neck. An invisible force slammed into my gut.
“No!” I shrieked.