Ripper (46 page)

One down, two to go. The crowd seemed to finally understand this wouldn’t be an easy kill for the alpha. I wouldn’t go easy.

Hell, I thought looking at Castle as he managed to pull himself off the spike, I wasn’t going down at all. He was going down.

The second beta howled his displeasure at his friend’s death. He lost his discipline and came after me with no thought but to get his jaw wrapped around my neck. Castle barked and I knew instinctively he was trying to order the beta to stop. He needed a moment to heal the wound in his shoulder. He wanted to face me two to one, but the beta was so far gone in his rage that he didn’t listen. He pounced, his weight shoving me down into the sand. His claws sank into my shoulders. The pain was blistering.

“Forget it,” the voice said. The pain didn’t matter. I could deal with it later.

The pain receded and I used my legs to roll the wolf off and over me. My feet sank in the sand as I ran for the other side of the arena. The wolf nipped at my heels. I sped up, knowing exactly what I wanted to do. I reached the side of the arena where silver chains hung. The wolf was too close. I turned and he was coming at me. I reared my fist back and hit him straight in his snout. He whimpered as he went down. His big body hit the sand.

When I looked at the other side of the arena, Castle was changing. He took human form again. It would help him heal quicker.

“I am going to kill you, bitch!” Castle screamed across the arena.

I picked up the chain in my free hand. “That’s what your son said.” I couldn’t help it. I really can be a bitch.

Castle’s scream might have curled a lesser woman’s toes, but I had other things to do. His wound was healing before my eyes and that beta was already getting up. I hefted the heavy rope and slung it at the downed beta before he could rise. The chain was thick and heavy, but I lifted it easily. I caught him across the legs. The flesh immediately started to smoke and the wolf howled. He tried to move, but the chain weighed a ton and the silver sapped his strength. The crowd roared as Castle changed again. Magic filled the air and knew I had very little time before he reached me. I didn’t need much.

I shoved my bladed hand across the wolf’s throat and punched into it. I dragged it through his flesh with strength and will. The cestus on my hand didn’t bother me anymore. I’d worn it many times before. In my mind, I thought about all the battles I’d fought and won, the cestus cutting through my opponents’ flesh. My memories were meshing with Marcus’s, but it gave me a confidence I wouldn’t have had. It filled me with experience. I pulled my hand out of the beta’s throat, but Castle was already on me.

The force of Castle’s big body shoved me against the arena wall and my head slammed against the big silver hook. I saw stars for a minute and went on my knees. My peripheral vision started to get hazy.

“Kelsey!” I heard my brother yelling. Nathan was throwing one leg over the railing and I was glad to see Scott stopped him. He couldn’t do anything…

“Get up,” Marcus barked the order in my head and my legs didn’t dare refuse. “Turn.”

I spun around as Castle bore down on me. Despite the throbbing pain in my head, my right arm came up instinctively to block his gnashing teeth. The blades on the cestus cut into Castle’s jaw and he jumped back. It gave me enough time to shake the cobwebs out. Castle’s next attack went straight for my thigh. I jumped, but he managed to catch my left side and sink his powerful jaws into the meat of my leg right above my knee. The teeth burned as he sank them in and I knew if I didn’t throw him off, he could break my femur and then I would go down. I didn’t heal the way he did. If I couldn’t run, I couldn’t fight. I went for the softest part of him I could reach.

I shoved a blade into his eye.

He immediately let go and before I could blink, he’d changed forms. His left eye was a bloody, mangled mess. He stared at the blood pouring onto his hands then with a growl, he reared back and punched me straight in the face. I hit the side of the arena again, this time the back of my head smacking into the wood.

Castle pressed his advantage. He used his powerful fists in a way he hadn’t been able to use his claws. He punched me in the face, the stomach, the chest. I felt like a body bag. I might have fallen over, but Castle kept me upright with the force of his blows. Pain as I’d never imagined ripped through my body. As I absorbed the agony from one blow, another landed. It seemed to never end. The crowd was chanting, screaming something, but it was a distant thing. Marcus was trying to tell me something, but even his voice was far away. I felt his panic. There wasn’t a lot I could do about it.

Castle finally decided to let me hit the ground. I tumbled to my knees and I realized my right eye must be swollen because I couldn’t see out of it anymore. My left shoulder screamed and was kind of stuck at a weird angle. It must have separated at some point. My whole body was on fire. The pain was so bad I started to hope Castle got this thing done soon.

I pitched forward and felt the sand against my swollen face. Marcus was pleading with me and the wolf inside was howling for me to get my ass up, but I thought about Gray. He was going to be sad when he found out. I wondered if he would blame himself. I wished I’d never gone after those class rolls. If I’d done what Gray had asked, I would be planning the menu for our reception. I would be arguing with Gray over fish or chicken, and when we got sick of fighting, he would take me to bed. If I’d chosen him over my stubborn instincts, I wouldn’t be dying in this terrible place.

Castle was enjoying his fans. He kicked me a couple of times, but I hurt too much to even grunt. I’ve heard that when pain gets to be too much, the body shuts down and a blissful numbness takes over. I didn’t get that. I got misery that seemed to never end.

Finally, he kneeled down and lifted my head up by the hair. From my angle, I could make out the queen weeping openly and pleading with her husband. Donovan looked like a man who wished he’d never put a freaking crown on. Zack and Jamie were moving toward the front of the crowd.

Castle leaned down. “I think I’m going to like killing you most of all, little girl. Do you know what I’m going to do when you’re dead? I’ll give it a month or so, but I’ll kill every single bitch who works in those clubs and I’ll pin it on a vamp. I’ll have my war, you understand? You changed nothing.”

He dropped my head and reared back to change. He would kill me in his wolf form. It was traditional. He took his wolf form and howled before he pounced, his teeth going for my throat.

I used every bit of energy I had left to flip my body over, ball my good hand into a fist and shove my right hand up. I saw the look on Castle’s face when he realized what was going to happen. There was nothing he could do. He couldn’t change course and his own heavy weight helped me. My claws sunk deeply into his chest. I fought to shove them in further even as his big body fell onto me, forcing my arm to go into an odd angle. He landed on top of me and he snarled as my claw found his heart. Even as the light went out in his face, he growled at me.

The arena hushed. Our final moments had been a close battle. I wondered if anyone really knew what had happened. The wolf lay on top of me, his snout in my neck, my hand in his chest. The crowd seemed to be waiting to see who got up.

“Very good,
cara mia
,” Marcus whispered in my brain. He knew what had happened. He would have felt me die. “You’ve done well, but you must finish. Listen carefully. I want you to…”

He gave me the words to use. I had to follow both wolf and vampire traditions. Marcus talked me through everything. He let me know he would be with me after I finished, but I had to get through this part by myself. I rolled the wolf off of me, shoving his body to the sand with as much strength as I could muster.

There were shocked cries as the alpha of the Dallas pack slumped over in the sand and I struggled to get to my knees. I didn’t feel that overwhelming urge to continue my kill the way I had before. Marcus gave me the strength to force my wolf to calm down. She gave me the strength to stay on my feet and do what I needed to do, but I was in control.

Some of the wolves began crying, but I saw many seemed relieved. I leaned exhausted over the carcass to fulfill the last of my duties. Donovan was on his feet, looking down on me with satisfied relief and something like respect. He nodded as I reared my good hand back and punched through Joseph Castle’s chest. I had to work at it and it wasn’t pretty, but I claimed the heart and managed to get to my feet. My left hand dangled. I couldn’t see out of one eye. I saw the horror in Liv’s eyes as I walked past her on my way to the king. I knew I must be really fucked up to get that look.

Donovan walked down the steps to the edge of the railing. He stared across the arena to where McKenzie sat. “The battle is done. I declare the killing of these wolves to be righteous. I need to know this is done, John.”

McKenzie’s low voice carried across the arena. “The Packs are satisfied that justice has been done. I will select another alpha after I speak to the pack. I’ll choose carefully, Your Highness.”

“And I will trust your judgment,” Donovan promised and then turned his attention back to me.

I held the heart out to him and he took it with no hesitation. Daniel Donovan wasn’t afraid of a little blood. I braced myself because it wasn’t easy to stay upright. I gave him the ancient words between a king and his death machine. “Your Highness is satisfied with his
Nex Apparatus
?”

Donovan’s face fell and then hardened. His words ground out of his mouth. “I am. You’re dismissed.”

Suddenly the queen was by his side and Quinn was close behind her. Their faces registered shock.

“Daniel,” the queen said, putting a perfectly manicured hand on his arm. “You have to heal her.”

Quinn shook his head. “She won’t let him.”

He was a good judge of character. I wasn’t letting that vampire anywhere near me.

I began to turn to leave the arena when a small face caught my eye. He was trying to hide behind a pillar at the top of the arena, but when he saw me looking, he stepped out. Lee Donovan Quinn had avoided his bed again. He was dressed in pajama pants and a T-shirt. He looked down on me and smiled, holding his small hand up in greeting. I tried to smile back, but before I could he was gone again. The kid was fast.

Marcus’s hand was on my elbow. “Brace yourself, Kelsey.”

He held me tightly and shoved my shoulder back into place. I screamed as the pain threatened to take me under again. I could move my left arm, but I didn’t particularly want to. Every muscle in my body ached, but I was going to walk out of that arena. Marcus seemed to sense it and took a step back.

“Marcus,” Donovan shouted as I started to stagger out. “I’ll send a doctor to her room.”

He’d probably send Sharpe. It would be just like that bastard to send Jack the fucking Ripper in to examine me. I held up my good hand as I walked out of the arena and managed to give the king my happy middle finger.

Chapter Eighteen

Marcus held his hand out and I let him lead me onto the water taxi. It was private, of course. Marcus liked to have the best. I was rapidly learning that Marcus Vorenus was a legend in Venice. The minute we’d stepped off the plane he’d been inundated with admirers who were thrilled the vampire had come home.

They knew what he was. Venice is a tolerant city. I’d been promised many new experiences as he taught me about my power. I breathed in the air from the Adriatic Sea as the boat took off. We had no luggage with us. We were fugitives. I was wearing clothes Marcus had bought in New Orleans, where we’d hidden for two days before taking the plane across the Atlantic. Marcus had spoken to Zack several times and been assured that while the king was furious with us, he was calming down as Zack and the queen worked on him. They’d talked him out of hunting us down and dragging me back.

I went to stand with Marcus, who was gazing at the ocean over the cabin of the water taxi. He looked and felt so peaceful. I let my hands go around his waist. I was getting used to my desire to be physically connected to the vampire. It was an impulse between a Hunter and her trainer. Marcus didn’t mind and it made me feel better, though not as good as his blood had made me feel.

We’d fled in the car Zack had left for us and driven immediately to a hotel in Fort Worth where Marcus convinced me to take his blood. I’d been hesitant when he cut a place in his chest and urged my mouth to it, but once I tasted it, I’d been ravenous. That blood was better than any drug I’d ever encountered. It healed me and made me feel warm and safe. It connected me to Marcus, who in the course of a measly few days had become everything to me. He was my teacher, my protector, my only friend in the world. He was not my lover, but that was my choice for now. I wasn’t sure how long I’d hold out because I slept beside him at night. I started out on the edge of the bed, but before too long I’d rolled and tossed until I curled against him. He would chuckle and put his arms around me, pulling me close. He’d held me that first long night after the arena when I’d finally given in and cried. The experience had been purgative and healing and not possible without him.