Andi sat too and Mac lifted her up and
sat her on his lap after taking her chair. That’s when she noticed that the
house was closed up. She looked at the windows and wondered out loud if she’d have
to stay out of the sun as well.
“No. You shouldn’t. Mac is the vampire
and you his mate. You’ll have to eat more, drink more juices, but that’s about
all,” Sara said as she came into the room. “Aaron can withstand more of the sun
than most. One, because of his age, and two, because of my magic. I’m very
powerful and my blood, given to him freely, gives him things other vampires
might not have.”
“And, in turn, Mac and Lizzy have them?”
Sara nodded at her question. “And he’s immortal. I guess I know what that word
means, but I have a feeling that it’s different than what I think.”
Sara got up and took a knife off the
counter. She handed it to Airic, who stood up. She sliced it at Sara’s neck so
quickly that no one could have reacted if they tried. All that happened to Sara
was a drop of blood was spilled and nothing more. Andi looked to the door to
see if Aaron would burst through.
“I kept him from feeling it. You can do
that as well, but for now I’d not. You might need Mac and if he doesn’t know
you’re really hurt he might not know to come and get you.”
Andi looked at Sara.
“Yes, I can read your mind. Anyone in
this room can. We normally don’t, but you looked terrified and I didn’t want
you to be. Aaron is very protective of what’s his, as is Mac. Either of them
would kill for you, as would anyone in this room.”
“And that man? That vampire? What’s
going to happen to him? I got the feeling from him that he’s been at this for a
long time. Why hasn’t he been killed by now?” She flushed with embarrassment. “I’m
sorry. I know that I shouldn’t be saying anything, but he hurt that girl.”
“Yes, he did. And now he’s fucked. No
one, not anything, touches you and lives. He’s as good as dead.” She looked at
Mac when he spoke. “I’m in love with you and want to protect you, but I think
you and I together were meant to take this prick out.”
She kissed him. “Yeah, but then there’s
my stepdad. What the fuck do I do about him?” She looked over at Bradley when
he cleared his throat.
“Don’t worry about him. He’s on my list
now.”
Andi shivered. She had a feeling it
wasn’t a Christmas list either. She didn’t want to think about what he was
planning to do to the man and nearly warned him to be careful. She decided that
her stepfather was in for it, if the look on the wolf’s face was any
indication.
~~~
Zachariah looked in the mirror again. He
was ruined. That fucking woman had ruined him. He turned his head, trying to
see if there was any angle he could stand and not have his face noticed. He
roared when he realized that no matter what, he was hideous.
His cheek was burned away. Not only that,
but most of his nose, as well as his upper lip. He had no idea what she’d put
against his skin, but whatever it had been had been painful and thorough. Zachariah
put the bandage back over his face and turned away. He wasn’t even able to bite
right now; his canine, the one on the ruined side, was loose and had been
broken. He would starve because of her.
Going into his lair he sat on the only
chair in the room and glared at the fireplace. No one had come down and started
his fire, nor had anyone cleaned up after him when he’d been resting. He kicked
ineffectively at the clothes on the floor. And who the hell was going to wash
his clothes?
He thought about finding the girl and
bringing her back here. He’d have her clean up then he’d kill her. Zachariah
thought it was a good plan. However, he had no idea who she was and, for that
matter, what she looked like. He’d seen her shadow right before she’d touched
him, but little else. There had been someone else there, a male, and he was
pretty sure it was the one from the hotel, but not positive. He wasn’t positive
of anything anymore. He stood up to pace and got a glimpse of himself in the
picture glass above the fireplace.
He was ugly. Not that he’d been a
handsome man before, he knew that, but now with his fang nearly useless, his
cheek hollowed out, and the scars he’d been so proud of before now were all but
puckered skin, he looked positively ugly. There would be no way to get a woman
to come to him even with compulsion. He walked up to the glass and pulled the
framed art down. He decided that he’d do that to all the mirrors and glass in
the house until he could find some way to fix this.
“Or her.” He looked around the room when
he heard the voice. Laughing a little, he realized it had been him. “Not nuts
just…lonely. Yes, I’m lonely. I miss Gregory that’s all. He was a good
companion as well as a helper. Now…well, now I’m alone and I shouldn’t think
less of myself just because I’m talking to myself.”
Satisfied that he was okay and that he
wasn’t going off the deep end, he moved to the upper level of the house. He
could smell something off even before he made it to the door. He moved through
it and then the smell assaulted him, so much so that he put his hand over his
mouth to stop the reaction to throw up. The pain made him see stars.
“Fucking bitch,” he screamed to the
empty room. “Gregory. I forgot to dispose of his corpse. Now I have to do that
as well.”
Moving toward his office, the odor only
got stronger. By the time he made it to the office he was holding his belly and
cursing a blue streak. The body, now there for several days, had bloated, and
flies had gotten to it. It took him nearly two hours to get the body wrapped in
the rug, one of his favorites in this room, and out of the house. He nearly
only put it outside the door, but figured the neighbors would call someone and
report the odor if he did that. Taking it to the very back of the property, he
put it under a tree and left it thinking to come back to it later. He had to
feed.
But how? He could go out and get blood
from a blood bank, but there was no fun in that. Plus, there was no added spike
he liked so much. He had to feed; there were no two ways about that, but he
hated that he’d been reduced to something so mundane as a bag.
Going out also posed a problem. He knew
that even with a bag over his head, not that he was going to do that, people would
keep away from him. He had to do something. Glamour wouldn’t work. It was
exhausting and he didn’t have time for it. The sun would be up in a few hours
and he needed to get out. He went to his room and put on his best. Then, going
to the upper floors again, he opened up all the doors to air it out and left. Shifting,
he took to the skies and looked for an easy, lone mark. It took him nearly as
long to find a person as it did to get what he needed to live.
The fucking bitch was going to pay for
this.
His mother was at his home when he
arrived. This was not going to go well, especially when the first words out of
her mouth were something about the wedding and the odor his house had taken on.
“Where is Gregory? He needs to be fired
for this. I’ve never seen such, what have you been doing? Partying?”
“Yes, Mother, I’ve been having parties
every night.” He sat in his chair and waited for her to say something. Her look
was all the opening he needed. “Say one word, one single word about my face,
and I will kill you. I will gladly be tied to the ground to meet the sun rather
than hear whatever you have backed up in that tiny little brain of yours.”
“But the wedding? How will you give her—”
He was across the room in a heartbeat. With
his hands around her throat he squeezed as hard as he could for several minutes
before he let her go with a toss across the room.
She sat where she landed without a word,
only holding her neck where he’d bruised her. He knew that she’d be healed in a
few hours, less if she fed, but he would kill her if she said anything right
now.
“Now. The wedding, of course, will have
to be canceled.” He found he wanted her to speak, but she only glared at him. “There
is no reason for you to look like that. You had to know that I didn’t want this
to happen in the first place and this just seals the deal.”
“You did this so that you didn’t have to
host your sister’s wedding?” He glared and she snapped her mouth closed. He hadn’t,
but if it got him out of this mess then he’d be slightly less pissed about it.
“As I was saying, this will cancel any
and all wedding plans this minute. I will not have people trying to guess what
might have happened when frankly, it’s none of their business. If you’d like to
continue with this stupidity, then by all means do so. But without my backing
and certainly not within this household. Have I made myself clear?”
“Yes,” she hissed at him, and finally
stood up. “Where is Gregory? I need to get the information he has on your
sister’s wedding so that I may proceed without you.”
“Gregory is dead.” He waited for her to
say something again, anything that would take him over the edge. He could see
her questions, millions of them if he was right, but she only nodded, turned on
her heel, and left. He heard the front door slam hard and nearly wet himself
with laughter.
“Ah well, there goes my birthday gift
from her, I suppose.” He laughed again at his humor. “Of course, she never got
me anything anyway so I’m not out much.”
The sun was cresting the sky when he
made his way down to his lair. He was still sore, hurting in places he’d never
thought he would, but he had gotten something accomplished today. No wedding. He
was nearly in his coffin when he remembered the dinner. He smiled painfully.
“No help for that either. I’m just going
to have to beg off and tell them that…tell them that I’ve met with a horrible
disease and won’t be able to entertain. Fucking bastards only want this thing
so they can show their power. I’ll fucking drain them if it comes to that.”
Zachariah closed his eyes and felt his
body relax. He loved this part of his rest. His body nearly shut completely
down and he was, for all intents and purposes, dead. He liked that. And every
night he’d rise with the moon and be as good as new. Yes, he hoped so this
night more than ever.
Chapter 14
“My name is Reginald Wall, Officer
Reginald Wall.” He looked at the girl’s face to see if she was impressed. She
didn’t seem to be. He put his hand on his gun and smiled at her. “I’d like to
speak to the man who owns this business. It’s about a fugitive that I’ve been
chasing across three states.”
“The owner can’t be bothered right now. Maybe
if you leave me your name and a phone number, I can get him to call you back. I
wouldn’t count on it. He’s not calling a whole lot of people back these days.”
Reggie looked at her name tag, thinking
he’d complain, but all it said was, “fuck off.”
“Maybe you can simply tell me if she’s
been here. She likes working for construction companies and robbing them before
she skips town. I have a picture of her if it helps.”
He was reaching for his wallet when Fuck
Off popped her gum. “I wouldn’t know if she worked here or not. And as for
robbing the place? I’m pretty sure my boss has done a fine job of that all by
himself. My last three checks have bounced. You got a beef with Mr. Rich then
good luck trying to find the prick.” She nodded toward the door. “Don’t let
that hit you on your way out, mister. And have a great day.”
Reggie stood there for several seconds
while she went back to polishing her nails. He wanted to pull his gun and wave
it around to impress the bitch, but had a feeling that she probably had one
under the counter she wasn’t afraid to use. Not to mention his didn’t really
work and he was sure hers did. He left the tiny, smelly office and went to the
car.
He’d had to improvise with his
transportation. Stealing this car hadn’t been what he wanted, but he’d needed
something quick and that was all he could lay his hands on at the time. It had
proven to be better than it looked, and it looked like the worst POS he’d ever seen, and he’d seen a great many pieces of shit in his time. But the thing ran well
and had enough horse power under the hood that he felt marginally better about
it. He pulled out of the parking lot and into the drive-thru across the street.
He took out his list.
Brandi tended to stick with what she
knew. And she knew construction. He’d never figured out what she knew, only
that everywhere she’d been, he’d heard nothing but rave reviews about her work,
her integrity, as well as her honesty. He’d have to come up with a more
plausible reason for trying to find her. Telling people that she robbed them
wasn’t working so well any more. Who would have thought that a doormat like her
mother would have raised someone with a little bit of backbone? Getting his
dinner and pulling into a parking space, he marked off Rich Construction.
There were only two names on the list. One
he’d been to the day before yesterday had been closed. Who closed up on a
Saturday? The other had moved and he’d yet to find the address. He decided that
he’d go to Wolfe Construction today. He finished up his burger and fries and
dumped the trash on the lot.
He was pulling into traffic when he saw
some guy in a uniform come out of the restaurant and stare at him. Reggie
flipped him off as he drove away. What the fuck was his problem anyway? Reggie
figured he was helping the pimple-faced brat in a job by dumping his shit out
for him to clean up.