It felt like his chest had collapsed. He couldn’t breathe. There was a ringing in his ears. Kel carried her phone with her. She lived her job. She even slept with it at her bedside. Why wasn’t she answering it?
“Marshal, are you listening to me?” The Irish doctor’s voice snapped, bringing him back. “The young girl was completely drained of blood. I don’t know why I didn’t think of this. It was so obvious.”
“Tell me.” Gabe growled.
“Your killer has the disease. No healthy Sanguen would be capable of draining an entire body. Only a Sanguen with the disease would need to drain the host. This is why they cannot drink directly from a female…”
Gabe didn’t hear what else the doctor was saying. He tried to shimmer directly to Kel but he couldn’t sense her. His heart pounding in his chest, he dropped the receiver on the floor and shimmered to her apartment.
“Kel?” he roared as he ran from the main living room to her bedroom. The balcony doors were open and he shimmered out onto the balcony.
His entire body clenched in fear. On the smooth tile next to her chair was her cell phone. He could have checked for her at the office or at Haven House but he knew he wouldn’t find her.
The bastard had gotten her.
Gabe reappeared back in his father’s hospital room. His mother sat in the chair, holding his father’s hand between hers. He looked around the room. “Where is Uncle Maxim?”
“He left, dear. Your Uncle Maxim does not cope well with loss. After his dear Mary…left us, I thought he was going to go mad. He just could not bear to see your father this way.”
Gabe felt his stomach drop. “Mary?”
“Oh, that was years ago, dear, while you were away at school.” She dabbed at her eyes with her tissue. “It was such a tragedy. Her daughter was kidnapped and she just could not live with the loss. She killed herself. Your uncle was beside himself. He tried for months to find the girl but she was gone. He boarded up their cottage. No one has lived there in more than ten years. Your father wanted to have it torn down but your uncle just could not bear it.” She sniffled and looked up at her son. “Is everything okay, dear? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Uncle Maxim.
“Mother. I need you to stay here with Father. I will have the elders come in with you. Do not leave this room.”
Gabe shimmered into the waiting room where the elders gathered in wait. When they saw him they came to their feet as one. His grandfather took one look at him and started to tremble.
“You knew,” he accused. “You protected him.”
“Now see here, boy,” one of the elders began.
“He was my son.” His grandfather defended him, laying a hand on the other man’s shoulder to quiet him. “He was ill. I couldn’t let him be executed. I sent him away to that Disease Research Center. They promised to help him. Then when your father ascended he insisted Maxim be brought home. He seemed so much healthier. I thought he was better. I wanted to believe.” He shook his gray head, tears glittering in his faded green eyes.
“He killed five little girls. Drained them. That was how he was improving, by drinking the blood of crossbreed children. He must have realized when he bled Kel all those years ago,” Gabe muttered. When the blood dealer brought him the sample of Kel’s blood he must have discovered that her blood was so much more potent. Permanent.
Fury burned through his veins. When he turned them back on his grandfather, the blood aurora shone brightly in their depths. The elders stepped back. “You abused your power as an elder to protect a killer in our House. For that you will be judged.” Gabe’s voice was cold. “For now go to your son. Protect him and my mother from the monster you created. And pray that he has not killed my bloodmate.”
Gabe shimmered into the shadows behind the boarded cottage. Fury and fear pumped through his body with every beat of his heart. He tried to reach out for her but he was only met with emptiness, a yawning chasm of dark emptiness. It was a glimpse into what his life would have been without her. Endless and cold, with nothing but duty to keep him. She had changed all that and if she left he would follow her without question, without hesitation. He wouldn’t consider it. She was alive. She had to be.
Crouching down, he carefully held himself in a state of suspended materialization. Gabe would be all but invisible unless his uncle had already bled Kel. Then Maxim would have enhanced vision. And strength.
The cottage was dilapidated from years of neglect, the windows carefully boarded up. There wasn’t another house in this corner of the complex. It would be the perfect place to bring his victims. And Kel.
He shimmered in closer, silently circling the small structure. His uncle couldn’t shimmer, so how was he getting inside? All of the entrances were sealed. His eyes searched the property. There was a small shed. With a frown he noticed that it seemed to be in better condition than the cottage itself.
Gabe shimmered into the shadow of the shed cast by the moon. And listened. Nothing. He slipped around to the doors and pushed one in just enough to fit his body. His enhanced eyes immediately adjusted to the darkness. It was empty. Except for the cellar doors in the center of the floor.
Moving stealthily, he lifted the doors to reveal stairs. The cellar doors were silent, well oiled, not doors that had been left unused for fifteen years. The pungent smell of earth met him on the cool air that rose from the opening. He descended the stairs and saw that they led to a small room with packed dirt floors. Drawing a deep breath he closed his eyes and concentrated. He could smell the acerbic smell. Maxim had passed through here not long ago.
The tunnel narrowed to an opening held up by wood timbers and he immediately ducked into it. Kel had to be here. Here there were cement floors. This had to be directly beneath the cottage. Listening he could hear whispered voices and the whimpering of a young girl. He slid his blades from their sheaths with a deadly hiss.
Then he heard the most beautiful sound in the world.
“This isn’t an all you can eat buffet, you sick bastard.”
NAUSEA SWELLED UP and over her with a cold rush as she faced him. She was as weak as a babe but she was on her feet and she intended to stay that way. Madison clutched at the back of her tank top, the warmth of her young body strengthening her. Gabe’s uncle would have a hell of a time controlling her now that she had Madison. Just knowing she was all that stood between this monster and the young girl infused her waning strength with determination. Her claws prickled beneath the skin at her fingertips.
“You think you are so funny, my dear. We will see who laughs last when I taste the last beat of your heart on my lips.”
“I bet you think that was eloquent, too.” Kel blinked her eyes to clear them. She thought she saw movement in the shadows but the room around her spun so she couldn’t be sure. The air slowly diffused with the scent of heat and spice and she’d never been more relieved to feel his scent surround her.
Gabe stepped from the shadows. He looked like an angel of death. His hair fell in disarray around his shoulders, the writhing red rings in his eyes promising death. He held one of his blades in each hand, the metal glinting in the darkness of the cellar. The muscles of his thighs and chest bunched in readiness. His eyes swept over her, his nostrils flaring. His eyes jerked back to his uncle.
Madison gasped and wrapped an arm around her waist when Kel swayed. She was trembling, and Kel dropped an arm over her shoulders.
“Maxim Ferrar. You are charged with murder; your punishment is death as sanctioned by the elders and our House doyen.”
“YOU’RE TOO LATE, Gabrial. I’ve already tasted her and now I know why you were attracted to the little crossbreed. She feels like heaven pulsing through my veins.”
Gabe felt the darkness swell in him, closing in around his vision when he thought of anyone blooding her. It seethed with violence as he imagined his uncle’s mouth on her smooth skin. She belonged to him.
Breathing deeply, pulling in her fresh scent, he was able to control the rage. Kel was alive. That was all that mattered.
“It’s over, Uncle Maxim. The elders know.”
“The elders are foolish old men. Once I kill you, I will easily manage the elders.” Maxim pulled a knife from his shirt, touched it lovingly. “I used this on your father. He never even fought me. I’m going to love using it on you.”
Maxim shimmered, reappearing off to Gabe’s right, swinging the knife before shimmering away. Gabe heard Kel’s gasp as blood welled from his arm. A slow smile turned the corners of his lips as he lifted his blades.
His uncle was strong, his hatred strengthening the vitality of Kel’s blood in his veins. They each swung their blades and disappeared only to reappear again for another strike.
His uncle had caused so much pain. His sick appetites had put that unending desolation in the eyes of those parents, who would have to live with the knowledge that their babies had suffered at the hands of a depraved monster before their death.
Gabe spun and slashed, feeling the thin slice of his uncle’s knife across his chest.
Maxim Ferrar had been the reason Mary Mackinaw had left her daughter in that hellhole. All these years Kel had been blaming a Ferrar for all the terrible things she’d been through. It had been the wrong Ferrar. His father was not responsible for the shadows that filled Kel’s life. His uncle was.
Gabe spun and buried his blade in his uncle’s chest.
As his uncle slid to the floor, blood bubbled from his mouth. Gabe stood over him as he slowly bled out, standing vigil to the end of a nightmare.
Maxim Ferrar wouldn’t ever hurt another person.
Without giving his uncle’s body another glance, Gabe shimmered to Kel, who was sitting propped up against the damp cement wall of the cellar, with Madison kneeling next to her, crying. Kel met his eyes over the young girl’s head.
“Eat it up, Ferrar. I won’t always let you play the hero,” Kel said weakly.
Gabe gave a shaky laugh and fell to his knees, pulling her into his arms. “I was never so scared in my life than when I thought I’d lost you.” Gabe murmured the words against her neck.
Kel clenched her fists weakly in his shirt and he let himself take her in, feel the heat of her body against his and just be grateful.
It was over.
Kel slid the needle into the tube and slowly depressed the plunger. She watched the crimson flood of liquid disappear into his vein.
Then she looked down at the Ferrar House doyen as he slept. For so long this man had played the role of the bad guy for her. Liam Ferrar hadn’t been responsible for what had happened to her. He’d even tried to find her when she disappeared.
Kel sighed. She might actually have to apologize for punching him in the face.
Gabe lay back in a chair next to the bed, his head tilted to the side, his hard muscular arms folded across his chest. He thought she was back at Incog letting Dr. Mahoney transfuse her while he kept the death vigil with his mother.
Stupid man.
When she looked back at the doyen his eyes were open and gazing directly at her. The room was silent but for the beeping of the machines as he held her stare for a long time.
“Your son is a good man and he loves this House. He shouldn’t have to choose.”
Liam Ferrar looked like he wanted to say something; the beeping of the machines quickened. Kel turned a panicked look up at the monitor and she laid her hand over his. “Sshhhh. Don’t worry about the blood. It’s not enough to change you, just help you heal.” Kel glanced back at Gabe, closed her eyes against the deep ache in her chest. It felt like it was caving in on her heart. “Take care of him for me.”
She left as silently as she had appeared. Liam Ferrar was released from the hospital two days later.
KEL LOVED THE feel of the sun on her. It was soothing, as was the sound of the girls laughing as they played in the yard. Madison had rebounded with the resilience of a young girl and had developed quite a crush on Gabe. Kel smiled when the girl talked about him but thoughts of him made her ache in a way that was nearly crippling.
She loved him.
Loved him enough that she couldn’t bear to see him have to choose between her and his House. The emotion wasn’t as debilitating as she thought it was going to be. It filled her, gave her the strength she needed to leave him.
Mae was lounging next to her, leaning back with a small smile on her weathered face, silver eyes closed. “Mmm, finally,” she murmured. “I wondered when you’d show up.”
Kel shot a look at the woman just as awareness curled around her on the breeze. He was here. That heat and spice scent surrounded her, and she closed her eyes.
“What’re you doing here, Ferrar?” Kel asked softly, her throat constricting around the emotion rising in her at having him near. God, she just wanted to touch him, to feel the heat of his hard body pressed against her again. The need was a living, breathing thing.
Kel trembled. He was standing over her. She could feel the cool weight of his shadow blocking out the sun. She squeezed her eyes tighter. If she looked at him it would be over.
“Look at me, baby.” His voice was a low rumble that rolled through her, leaving a trail of heat and need in its wake. A tear escaped from under her eyelid.
His lips touched her cheek, tasting the salty drop with his tongue. When she opened her eyes the sight of him was like being punched in the stomach. He was so beautiful. The dark gold of his hair fanned out around his face; the silky fur of his goatee made his lips look so soft by comparison. But it was his eyes that made the ache in her chest crushing. The deep green intensity of them burned her, making her feel raw and open.
His fingers trailed tenderly down her cheek as his eyes searched hers. “I never give up what is mine.”
Kel felt her entire world shift as he repeated those words he’d whispered so fervently to her mere days ago. Hope flared wildly through her, dangerous in its reckless flight. He had so much to lose. She searched his eyes.