“The vampire is in the room,” he said quietly. “I can’t see anyone else.”
“Leave her to us,” Luke said.
JD nodded. Luke took hold of the door handle and slowly turned it. It made no noise. He pushed the door open and Gabriel ran into the room.
The vampire turned in surprise. When Gabriel saw her face, he froze.
He could not believe what he was seeing. Unable to prevent himself from doing so, he called out her name.
“Vivien?”
She deserves to die
Gabriel couldn’t move. He just stared at the woman in front of him; the woman he had fallen in love with nearly a century ago and had given up all hope of ever seeing again; the woman who was staring back at him, the same look of wonder on her face.
“Gabriel?” she whispered so quietly it was almost as if she was afraid that the sound would take away the vision before her.
Gabriel couldn’t breathe. The cold part inside his heart that he had lived with for as long as he could remember suddenly burned so hot it was beginning to physically hurt.
Luke watched him carefully, wondering what he was going to do. He knew that his cousin, despite his love for Anna, had never stopped yearning for Vivien. Now she was the enemy and Luke had no idea how he was going to cope with that.
All JD saw was the woman who had kidnapped his wife. He had no idea who she was and he didn’t care. Unable to stop himself, he drew his sword and ran at her.
Luke intervened, pushing him against a wall and holding him in place. “Let Gabriel and I take care of this,” he said.
“She took my wife. She must pay.”
“I understand, but she is our problem not yours.”
“Let go of me,” JD said. “She deserves to die.”
Luke then spoke to JD in a way he had never done before. His voice was full of power, of the promise of utter destruction if he was crossed. “You will not harm her. She is under our protection.”
JD had to suppress a shudder. If he did anything rash, Luke would kill him.
Luke let himself relax. “Leave her to us. Go and find your wife.”
JD nodded. He had no choice. He left the kitchen, Jane and Anna following him.
On the other end of the phone, Craig heard everything, but understood nothing. He wanted to ask JD what was going on, but JD wouldn’t be able to hear him.
Luke watched as Gabriel walked up to Vivien and gently ran the back of his hand down her face. He was shaking. A tear fell from her eye and he wiped it away.
“Go,” he said to Luke, without turning around to look at him. “I’ll stay here with Vivien.”
Her bottom lip began to tremble. “Oh Gabriel,” she cried out and threw her arms around him. Then they were kissing, passionately, their hands wandering all over each other’s bodies. Luke took this as his cue to leave.
Gabriel pulled away from her. “Why did you leave me?” He let all of the pain and betrayal he had felt when she disappeared show on his face and in his voice. He held nothing back.
Vivien flinched. She knew her departure would have hurt Gabriel, but not this badly. “I had no choice,” she said. “I was taken. My brother laid a trap for me and I walked straight into it. It took me twenty years to escape from him again. I looked for you, but you had moved on. Nobody could tell me where you had gone.”
Gabriel sat down and pulled Vivien onto his lap. She was back in his arms and he never wanted to let her go. He looked at her closely. She had not changed at all, other than the deep sadness the seemed to surround her. And her eyes had lost their sparkle. He once could spend hours just gazing into them. Now he could hardly bear to look at them, to see the pain they contained.
“I searched for you every day,” he said softly. “I looked everywhere, but there was no sign of you. I couldn’t bring myself to believe that you had left me. Eventually I lost all hope of finding you and despair set in. Luke kept me alive. He made me move away, to start over again.”
“He did the right thing,” Vivien said. “I have missed you so much.” Then she was kissing him again. Gabriel should be questioning her about where Sarah was and why she had kidnapped her, but nothing seemed to matter to him other than the fact he was with Vivien again. Questions could wait. They had the rest of eternity to talk. Right then, all he wanted to do was touch her, to feel her skin against his, to hold her, to protect her and let her know that he was hers.
Gabriel had no idea what Vivien’s plans were and he didn’t care. He hoped she would stay with him, but if she wanted to leave, he would go with her. He would leave Luke and the rest of his family behind without a second thought. Even if it meant killing everyone in the house and hunting down every hunter in the country.
————————————-∞————————————-
Luke, Anna and the two hunters had searched all of the downstairs rooms by the time Jonathon had the front door open.
“You’re getting slow,” JD said to him.
“Found anything?” Gavin asked.
“The rogue vampire,” Luke said. “Gabriel is taking care of her.”
“On his own?”
“It’s Vivien.”
Gavin thought he had misheard. “The Vivien?” Luke nodded. “My God. That is going to make life interesting.”
“When you two have quite finished,” JD hissed, “we have a job to do.”
With his sword held out in front of him, he climbed the stairs. There were a number of doors on the second floor and JD signalled that the hunters should split up to check them. Light was coming from under the one at the end of the corridor and it was to this one that he headed.
Luke moved in front of him and took hold of the door handle. JD positioned himself then nodded at Luke.
Luke swung the door open then moved out of the way so JD could enter first.
JD quickly glanced around the room, taking in everything.
He was in a bedroom, which was badly in need of new wallpaper. It smelled of old people. The wooden furniture was worn, but serviceable. Sarah sat on the bed, a look of joy on her face. Beside the bed, sitting in a chair, was Sandra. She was holding a gun and pointing it at Sarah.
“I’ve been expecting you JD,” Sandra said. “Ready to watch your wife and child die?”
JD ignored her; his attention was fully on Sarah. “Are you alright?”
She nodded. “I’ve been well cared for. How’s Craig?” She knew he would blame himself for her kidnapping.
Sandra didn’t like being ignored. “Didn’t you hear me?” she yelled out.
Again JD ignored her. He would be able to get to her before she could get to Sarah, so his wife was in no danger.
He moved slowly forward, toward the bed. “Craig’s fine. In order to retrieve his memory, Luke put nearly enough venom in him to turn him, but he survived it.”
“Stay where you are,” Sandra screamed out, standing up as she did so.
“Or what?” Jonathon asked as he walked into the room.
JD almost made it to the bed before Sandra said, “Or a greater vampire will come and kill you all.”
“Vivien is being taken care of,” Luke said. He didn’t say exactly how Gabriel was taking care of her.
“We don’t want to hurt you Sandra,” JD said as he reached the bed. “But we will if we have to.”
Sandra’s eyes darted from JD, to Luke, then back to JD. “Don’t go any closer to her,” she said. “Or I will shoot.”
JD was still not worried for Sarah’s safety. If Sandra pulled the trigger, he could put himself between Sarah and the bullet before it reached its target and it wouldn’t do him any permanent damage.
Sandra fired. JD heard the shot and moved fast, covering Sarah’s body with his own. But Sandra had purposely aimed high, hitting the wall above Sarah’s head. It had been a warning shot, nothing more.
“We have you outnumbered,” Luke said. “Why not put the gun down? What do you hope to achieve by continuing to threaten us?”<
br />
“I can take some of you with me.”
“Your little toy won’t hurt me,” Luke said and showed her his fangs. If she didn’t know before what he was, she did now.
“No, but it will hurt those you care about.” Sandra moved the gun to point it at Jonathon.
Anna saw Sandra with the gun and suddenly she was back in the restaurant again, with a madman pointing a gun at her parents. The image of them being shot before the man turned the gun on her filled her mind once more, as it once had every night for month after month.
Terror filled her. It was happening again. She was going to be forced to watch as the trigger was pulled and the bullets found their targets.
She forgot where she was and why she was there. All she knew was that someone was threatening someone she cared about, only this time she could do something about it. She didn’t think; she just reacted.
Faster than any human could have, she ran at Sandra and pushed her backward into the wall with such force her skull was smashed open, killing her instantly. Her lifeless body fell to the ground.
Luke’s attention had been on Sandra, not Anna. He hadn’t realised that she was moving until it was too late for him to stop her.
He grabbed hold of her and pulled her close, holding her tightly to his body. “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God,” she said. “What have I done?”
“It’s okay,” he whispered into her ear. “Everything is going to be okay.”
She was trembling. “I just killed someone.”
“It’s not your fault. You saw the gun and freaked out. Anyone would have done the same thing. Even if they hadn’t been through what you have.”
‘Anyone else wouldn’t have been able to kill someone so easily,’ Anna thought to herself, but didn’t say it.
“Get her out of here,” Gavin said. “I’ll deal with the fall out. Take her home.”
Anna began to cry. She was scared. She had lost control and had become a killer. Luke picked her up, cradling her gently in his arms. She buried her head in his neck and sobbed.
He carried her from the room and down the stairs. The other greater vampires had arrived and were just walking into the house.
“It’s over,” Luke said. “The human is dead and Sarah is alright.”
“And the rogue vampire?” Helen asked.
“In the kitchen with Gabriel. I would not recommend going in there.”
He didn’t explain why and nobody asked. “I need a lift home,” Luke continued. “Anna is rather shaken up.”
“No problem,” Brian said. “Will Gabriel be alright on his own with the vampire?”
“Yes. Trust me. He’s not going to want anyone interfering.”
————————————-∞————————————-
JD was sitting on the bed, holding Sarah close to him and whispering in her ear, when Jonathon walked up to them. He didn’t say anything; he simply unzipped one of the pockets in JD’s hunting suit and removed his phone.
“Craig,” he said, after checking that the line was still open. “Sandra is dead. Sarah is fine.”
JD heard Craig exhale in relief.
Sarah held out her hand and Jonathon handed her the phone. “But she’s pretty pissed that you risked your humanity for her,” she said.
“You would have done the same for me,” he said. “It’s so good to hear your voice. Come home as soon as you can. There are others here who want to see you.”
Sarah promised she would, hung up and handed the phone back to JD. “I really want to go home,” she said.
“Your wish is my command.”
He helped her off the bed, then looked down at Sandra’s corpse. “What should we do about her?”
“I’ll take care of it,” Jonathon said. “I will call Sanctuary 1. Get home.”
“And I will call the council to explain what happened,” Gavin said. He knew why Anna had reacted the way that she had and he was confident that, once he told the council her history, they would be sympathetic and would take no action against her. If he was wrong, he would place himself between Anna and any hunters they sent against her. The hunters would not survive.
JD took Sarah down the stairs and through the kitchen. He wanted to know what had happened to Vivien. He really hoped that Gabriel had killed her, but the way he reacted when seeing her suggested that he knew her and knew her well. Gabriel had been shocked to see her and Luke’s comment that she was under their protection had JD worried. He had become good friends with the two greater vampires and didn’t want this to come between them.
Gabriel was sitting in a chair, with Vivien on his lap. They were still all over each other. Sarah raised a questioning eyebrow.
“I think they know each other,” JD said. It was the only explanation he could give as he had no idea who Vivien was or what she meant to Gabriel.
Gabriel and Vivien had not heard anyone enter the kitchen and the sound of JD’s voice made them both jump. They pulled away from each other, a little embarrassed about having been caught making out so passionately.
“Let me introduce Vivien,” Gabriel said, settling her back down on his knee as he spoke. “Vivien is the vampire who turned me. Vivien, meet JD and Sarah.”
Sarah was going to say something when pain shot through her. She had to grab hold of the table to keep from falling. She gasped and struggled to breathe until the pain ceased.
“What’s wrong?” JD asked, taking her arm so he could support her.
“I think my contractions have started.”
“We need to get you to 14. Now.” Sarah almost smiled. JD was panicking. JD never panicked about anything.
She took one step toward the back door then felt wetness running down her legs. She looked down and saw a pool of liquid forming on the ground beneath her.
Her face was full of concern when she looked at JD and said, “My waters have just broken.”
It’s too late for that
“What do we do?” JD asked.
Vivien took charge. She had been present at a number of births over the many decades she had been alive. “The first thing to do is keep calm. How far away is 14, whatever that is?”
Gabriel had to answer the question. JD seemed to have lost the ability to think.
“Alright. We can get there in time. Hopefully. Gabriel will have to drive. JD will need to be in the back of the car with Sarah.”
The fact that Vivien had kidnapped Sarah and JD had tried to kill her left everyone’s minds. Nothing mattered now except Sarah.
With JD’s assistance, Sarah almost made it to the car before she had another contraction. Vivien looked at her watch. “This baby is in a hurry,” she said.
Once Sarah was able to move again, JD climbed into the back seat of the car, positioning himself so Sarah could lay against him.
He took out his phone and dialled a number.
“Liz, where are you?”
“At home,” the midwife said.
“Good. Get to 14 now. Sarah’s in labour.”
Vivien held out her hand for the phone and JD handed it over.
“Her waters have broken and her contractions are three minutes apart,” she said. She had taken the phone from JD because she knew he had no idea what information to give.
“Why didn’t you phone me as soon as her contractions began?” the woman on the other end of the phone asked. “I could have been there by now.”
“We just did,” Vivien said. “They have only just started. For some reason she didn’t have any mild contractions. It’s probably the stress of what she has been through.”
‘What I made her go through,’ Vivien thought, but now was not the time for self-recrimination.
“We’re in a car en route to 14,” she continued, though she still had no idea what 14 was. “It should take about half an hour, if she can last that long.”
“Alright. I’m on my way. I’ll be there as soon as I can. If you can’t make it to 14, call me back and give me your locat
ion.”
Vivien heard the click of the call being disconnected.
A little over a minute later, Sarah cried out as another contraction took hold of her.
“Breathe,” JD said. “Remember what you have been taught. Everything is going to be alright.”
Sarah was gripping his hand tight. If he had been human, it would have hurt.
When the contraction was over, Sarah was left panting.
“Drive faster,” JD shouted at Gabriel.
“Calm down,” Vivien said to him. “Let Gabriel worry about getting you to where you need to go. You just concentrate on your wife.”
She glanced at Gabriel. “He’s right. You need to drive faster,” she said so quietly that only Gabriel could hear her.
The journey felt like it took hours. Sarah was screaming out at regular intervals. Her contractions were only a minute apart by the time Gabriel pulled up outside the Sanctuary. JD had phoned Doc so both the gate and the front door were standing open.
JD helped Sarah out of the car and carried her through the house to the medical unit. There was no sign of Liz.
Silvia had a bottle of gas and air ready and handed the mask to Sarah as soon as she was placed on the bed.
“Breathe deeply,” she instructed as pain tore through Sarah once more.
“Liz is on her way,” JD said. Then he noticed how many people were in the medical unit. Their presence irritated him.
“Get out,” he yelled.
Natalie, Craig and Gabriel fled. Vivien stayed. “I can help,” she said.
JD nodded. Doc moved out of Vivien’s way and she removed Sarah’s underwear.
“This is going to hurt,” she said and gently inserted her fingers into Sarah. She needed to feel how dilated she was.
Sarah screamed out.
“I need to give her an epidural,” Doc said, but Vivien shook her head.
“It’s too late for that.”
JD looked lost. He had no idea what to do.
“JD,” Vivien said firmly. “I need you to take Sarah’s hand and talk her through each contraction.”
Sarah cried out again and again. JD talked gently to her, telling her how brave she was being and that everything would be alright. Silvia was monitoring the gas and air, while Doc stood aside, waiting in case he was needed.
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