Blood Traitor

by Kim Loraine

  I shook my head. She was the tenderest of us all. Her heart couldn’t take killing if it was avoidable. Even during her adolescence, when her hunger first manifested, she refused to drink from the vein. “Not from the source.” She relaxed a fraction at the promise in my words.

  “And not Olivia’s blood. We can’t risk using what we have. What if you don’t find her?”

  That sent a wave of frustration through me. “Sorcha and Lucas found her once. If they can, so can I.”

  “But do you really want to? What if she’s happy? She’s free. She’s alive.”

  I clenched my teeth and fought my instinctive reaction to her questions. “She’s mine. I…I love her.”

  “Then you should let her go.”

  “I can’t.”

  Her sad eyes found me, the dark purple shadows under them betraying her illness. “I know.”

  Then, I took my sister’s arm and led her to the back of the King’s rooms, where I helped her to bed. “We will cure you,” I said.

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

  7

  Cashel

  “Callie is worse every night,” Sorcha said, twisting the crystal decanter filled with blood around and around in the firelight. The liquid glowed red with every turn, but it wasn’t what I wanted. It wouldn’t soothe the ache in my belly or the itch in my veins to taste Olivia again.

  “I won’t leave you here to meet Anne alone. When she returns, when I’m assured she won’t hurt you, then I’ll go find Olivia.”

  “She needs to come willingly. If she doesn’t, that hunter will ruin everything.”

  “That hunter has no claim on her.”

  She filled a wine goblet and drained the contents in one swallow, then let out a long sigh. “That’s not how humans work, Cash. They love without strings tying them together. They don’t have mates like some of us do. They choose who they bond themselves to.”

  “We have a choice.”

  She shook her head and offered me a placating smile. “If you think that’s true, you haven’t met any mated pairs of vampires. I have. I’ve seen the made vampires whose hearts began beating again after finding their mate. They lost all ability to choose in that moment. Full-blooded vampires who are so connected to their partner that when the other is killed, they die right along with them. Their lives are literally entwined. You haven’t traveled the world and met enough of our kind.”

  My chest tightened. “How did the full-blooded vampires know?”

  She shrugged and poured herself a second glass. “Uncontrollable need? A change in who they were before? I don’t know.”

  “You really think Olivia loves him?” I hated asking the question, but I had to put the words out there, make it a possibility.

  “I don’t know. I couldn’t get into her head. Someone showed her how to hide. All I saw were glimmers of worry for him, anger at you. Fear.”

  I had been gone too long. She probably thought I’d abandoned her. But it wasn’t safe to bring her back to the house yet. Not until I had earned Anne’s trust and could convince her to let me keep Olivia safe in my rooms.

  “Well, look what we have here. The errant daughter.” Anne’s voice sent a chill through the room, pulling our attention from our conversation to the vampire standing in the doorway. How much had she heard? How much of my thoughts had she been able to glean from my unprotected mind?

  She stood with one hand on her hip, the other toying with a beaded choker laced across her throat. To anyone who didn’t know her, she’d appear beautiful and glamorous, but to us, she was like a poisonous flower. She could kill us at any moment.

  Stepping forward, I cleared my throat and said, “Mother, may I present Sorcha Blackthorne. My sister.”

  Sorcha shot me a look of absolute incredulity. I knew the fact that I’d called Anne my mother had cut deep. But she didn’t understand the game I had to play.

  Anne smiled, her fangs exposed, and held out a hand for Sorcha to take. My chest seized when I caught sight of the large oval-cut red diamond ring on her finger. My mother’s ring. The Blackthorne family heirloom we’d thought lost when our mother died.

  “Where did you get that?” I asked.

  Anne raised her palm and turned her hand this way and that, letting the diamond catch the light. “Oh, after your mother died, I had it returned to me. Such a pity I’d lost it for so long.” She giggled, and a low growl rumbled in Sorcha’s throat. “Of course, I had to sterilize it before I touched it. Wouldn’t want to risk contracting that vile disease. Whores always carry disease.”

  My sister leaped, her form a blur in the corner of my mind. “Sorcha, no!” I caught her in midair, knocking her back to the ground. “You will not harm her. She’s our queen.”

  The hatred in Sorcha’s gaze was leveled on me. “You are a traitor.”

  “So, where is your other sister? Calliope, isn’t it?”

  “I’m afraid sun sickness took her during their exile,” I answered, keeping my tone calm and colorless. “And Lucas has been taken hostage by a coven of witches who seem to have a grudge.”

  “Oh, well, then it looks like I have all the Blackthornes who matter. Lucas isn’t pure. He won’t be an asset aside from providing a pretty face.”

  “Cashel, why—” Sorcha began, but Anne held up a hand.

  “Silence. I think a bit of time in the well would do you some good, Sorcha. Think about where your loyalties lie. Because without me, you’ll die. I’ll ensure it.”

  Three vampires I’d never seen before walked into the room, all stern-faced and strong. They wore all black with the exception of blood-red ties, and I smelled Anne all over them. She’d turned them. She was building her army of expendable vampires to do her bidding. “Take her,” she said.

  Sorcha screamed and fought, her skin burning as silver shackles were placed around her wrists. They took her out of the room, her shouts of protest echoing off the walls as they went until finally, I couldn’t hear her any longer.

  “Stop this. She’ll come around.” Forcible removal of my sister wouldn’t change the way Sorcha saw Anne. In fact, it would do more damage.

  “Don’t dare to question me. I’m doing what a good mother does. Punishing her for wickedness. She’ll learn to behave, and then we can be a family.”

  A family. I wasn’t under any assumptions that this woman truly wanted a family. She wanted power. “Where have you been spending your time?” I asked. “If I’d known you were going to be gone, I could have done a better job of preparing my sister for you. She might have handled your arrival better.”

  “It’s a true test of her will to get to see me like this. She doesn’t have to like me. She has to fear me.”

  She strode so smoothly it appeared as though she was gliding across the floor toward the fireplace. Eerie and a blatant display of her power. Her fingers traced the rim of the wine glass Sorcha had been drinking from and she sneered. “Bottled blood? Why would you drink this when you can have pure blood from the source any time you wish?”

  “My sister…hasn’t hunted since Callie became ill. She doesn’t like the addiction to the vein.”

  “It’s not an addiction. It’s nature. We are predators. We hunt to not only feed, but to feel the fear in the fluttering pulse at our prey’s throat, to taste the heat of their heart’s blood. Drinking bottled blood is weak.”

  I shrugged. “I told her the same. She doesn’t understand. It wasn’t something I wanted to fight.”

  “Go then, you need to hunt. I’ve been depriving you of the thrill for too long by providing a donor each night. As soon as your sister bends to my will, she’ll be free. Don’t worry. She’ll break before long.”

  I was out the door and in the woods before her last statement could echo off the wood-paneled walls. I didn’t need to feed. That was the last thing I wanted. I needed to find my little bird and make sure she hadn’t forgotten me.

  Olivia

  A week had passed since Sorcha and Lucas had fo
und me, and Logan wasn’t ever far from my side. And he didn’t even know the depth of the dangerous situation I was in. The bruises on my arm from Sorcha’s rough grip and the one in the crook of my elbow from the needle that took my blood had finally begun to heal. Now they were turning a sickly yellowish-green. I’d done my best to hide them, keeping my long sleeves rolled down at all times. Even now, in the makeshift pump shower I made sure to pull my shirt over my head before opening the curtain. Usually I braved the short walk to my tent in a towel because I took my showers after most people went to bed. Training all day made showering in the morning a waste. I squeezed my hair with the towel after drying my body, wringing out as much water as I could before sliding a pair of thin sweatpants over my hips.

  When I slid the curtain along the line mounted between trees, I let out a squeak of surprise to find Logan leaning against a big pine. He wasn’t looking at me. Instead, the man had a knife in one hand and a wooden stake in the other. He worked the blade over the tip of the stake, sharpening it until the wood was a deadly weapon.

  “Logan,” I said, wishing my throat wasn’t so tight.

  He looked up with a smirk. “Liv. How was your shower?” He slid the knife into a sheath on his belt and the stake into a holster on his thigh.

  “Cold.” A shiver rocked me as I said the word, and my teeth chattered.

  “C’mere,” he murmured, stepping forward and pulling me to him without much warning. He felt good. Warm and strong and sure.

  His big hands rubbed my arms, and I pressed my face against his chest, taking in the leather scent of him. Even without the jacket, he smelled good.

  “So, why were you stalking my shower? Hoping to see me naked?” I asked after I stopped shivering. He stiffened against me, his breath caught in his chest.

  “I…wouldn’t mind.”

  I had to fight a giggle at the obvious discomfort my teasing question left him with. “I was kidding.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  Glancing up his tall frame, I stared into his eyes, so warm, so open, and fought against the instinct to compare him to Cashel. He didn’t belong in this moment. Cashel wasn’t real. Logan was.

  Logan’s eyes drifted over me, down my body until they stopped on my breasts. My hair was still damp enough that it left my shirt wet and nearly transparent. I wasn’t wearing a bra. He could see pretty much everything I had to offer.

  I covered my nipples with my hands. “I didn’t… I mean, I thought we were taking it slow.”

  He tucked a damp lock of my hair behind my ear and let his fingers trail down my neck. “That doesn’t change how much I want you.”

  That spark of desire lit inside me again, nowhere near the inferno Cashel caused, but it was there, desperate for care and attention. I wanted it to be the right choice, so badly. I wanted free of the connection to a man who had lied and used me. To a man who’d broken me.

  My hands shifted, and I uncovered the translucent fabric of my shirt. “Kiss me, Logan.” I tilted my head up and waited for his full, soft lips to find mine.

  But they didn’t. A throat cleared behind us.

  “Logan, if you’re done staking your claim on Olivia, I need to discuss our migration plan with you.” Hector’s voice sent heat creeping up my cheeks. Embarrassment made me wish for a hole to open up in the ground. My arms went back to hide my breasts, and I turned to walk away from both of them. “Get to bed, Olivia. It’s after dark. You shouldn’t be out in the open,” Hector called after me.

  I wondered if Logan had told him about the attack on us. If Hector knew that Sorcha had found me even with the protective amulet they’d provided. He must’ve said something, but I was surprised to know it had taken so long for the hunters to move. I was a danger. A target. A sitting duck.

  The nights were the hardest. As I lay in my bed, trying to get comfortable on the foldable cot, I couldn’t help my mind drifting to thoughts of Cashel. Of my time with him. Doubt crept into my thoughts, coloring everything I knew. I’d stopped dreaming of him weeks ago, but tonight was different. My traitorous memories assaulted me with everything I loved about him. The rich, earthy scent of bergamot coated me like a blanket, and I whispered his name while I was still in that twilight between sleep and wakefulness. “Cashel, please touch me.”

  I wanted to push my body’s need for him away, but I couldn’t. This time my dreams were filled with him from the moment I fell asleep.

  Heated kisses worked their way up my legs and thighs; his cool hands were rough and gripped me almost desperately as he whispered my name.

  “Fuck, little bird, I missed you. Your soft skin, your scent, your taste. All of you.” His words nearly had me coming apart. I couldn’t take the reverent tone, the need and raw honesty.

  “I need you,” I moaned when his hands parted my folds and one long finger slid deep inside me.

  His lips closed over my clit without wasting any time. He didn’t want to seduce me. He didn’t need to. I was wet and ready the moment he touched me. One finger became two, and his lips became his tongue. He brought me to the crest of orgasm and backed away, dark eyes staring into my soul. “I told you I’d always come for you. Wait for me, little bird.”

  Then he returned to my aching pussy and continued sinking those talented fingers deep inside. I was a moaning, writhing mess, hands curling in his thick hair, heart breaking all over again. I cried his name and came apart with his mouth on me, my head tossed back, eyes closed tight. Then there was pressure at the juncture of my thighs, and I was flung off the edge all over again. I was boneless, relaxed and floating on a river of bliss. Until a branch snapped in the distance and everything I’d been feeling vanished. My eyes snapped open in the dark.

  “Cashel?” I whispered, but there was no answer. My thighs trembled and ached, and between my legs, I was soaked. A dream had never done that to me before. Not once.

  Sitting up, I stared into the darkness, willing my eyes to adjust, afraid of what I might see. I grabbed the flashlight from under my cot and clicked it on, prepared for the beam to reveal my vampire. But nothing was there. It had been a dream. Hadn’t it?

  I turned off the light and fell back onto my bed, my chest tightening with apprehension as the familiar scent of bergamot drifted to my nose. It was the scent of vampires. The scent of Cashel.

  Pressing my fingers to my lips, I tried to control my warring emotions. Fear and excitement twisted me in two directions. I should have gotten up. Should have taken my flashlight and made my way to Logan’s tent. But part of me didn’t want them to know. If they thought I’d been dreaming of Cash, they might send me away. And if it hadn’t been a dream… well, Cashel could kill them all before they’d have the chance to defend themselves. I couldn’t bring that on them. In fact. I shouldn’t be here at all.

  I needed to leave before they found me again and decimated this camp.

  Tonight.

  8

  Cashel

  The hardest thing I’d ever done was walk out of Olivia’s tent without telling her that yes, I was there. It was real. I’d come for her. The instant she breathed my name, I couldn’t resist touching her. And when she begged me…I had to take my chance at bringing her pleasure, reminding her of what we had. My cock throbbed behind the fly of my slacks. Living that dream with my little bird may have resulted in release for her, but I was still intensely unsatisfied. I ran hard and fast, my hunger building as my persistent arousal reminded me of everything I had lost. Just a small taste from her femoral artery hadn’t been enough. I wanted her blood almost more than I’d wanted to claim her body again.

  I could have taken her with me then and there, but if the hunters had seen me, they would only come after her. I had enough to worry about with Anne. A war with hunters wasn’t on my list of priorities. I’d just have to return for Olivia and convince her to come with me in secret.

  When I was within five miles of the manor, I stopped and searched with my enhanced senses for the beating heart of an animal I could feed fr
om. I had to stop allowing myself human blood fresh from the source. It was fucking with my judgment and my hard-won control. But Anne left a woman in my room nightly, and it was nearly impossible for me to stop. If I did, she would figure out I still craved Olivia.

  “She’s let you out to play, then?” Eliana’s voice was low and measured, barely a whisper on the wind.

  I turned in the dense woods, searching for her. “Where are you?”

  “Far enough from you to keep you from killing me.” Her voice bounced off the trees, floating in the air.

  “Do you really fear me, El?”

  “I fear what you could do to me. I didn’t survive you last time. I won’t this time either.”

  I shook my head and shoved my hands into my pockets. “I’m sorry. For everything. I shouldn’t have left you alone.”

  “And Olivia? You still love her? Even though she’s with that hunter?”

  My teeth clenched hard enough I could hear them grinding. I spun around, staring from tree to tree. “What do you know of it?”

  Eliana dropped like a cat, landing silently in a crouch at my feet. Then she stood and locked gazes with me. “I’ve been keeping a watchful eye on her and her new love. Oh, his head was filled with all the naughty things he planned to do with her.”

  I took a sharp breath and forced the rage burning in my blood down to a simmer. “Leave her be, Eliana. She’s nothing to you.”

  “Is that what you’re doing, Cashel? Leaving her be looks a lot like stalking her.”

  “I…just needed one more time.”

  Her expression said everything I needed to know. It was filled with pity. “You’re pathetic. She’s killed all the bad boy inside you and turned you into a simpering fool.”

  “What are you doing here? Surely you’ve got some council business to deal with.”

  She frowned and cocked her head to one side. “I’ve been invited to stay and serve at the Queen’s side.”