Authors: Melody Johnson
Walker gave me a look. “I’ve been exposed to vampire blood my entire life, and it’s never become more appealing over time, I can assure you of that.”
“Bullshit,” Bex growled. “There was a time when you pined for my blood.”
“Only to spill it,” Walker snapped.
“You once said that vampire blood
is
addictive,” I hedged carefully.
“True, but you’d need to drink it regularly over a long period of time, several months I’ve been told.” Walker glanced at Bex. “And even then, when your body craves it, the taste doesn’t improve.”
Bex hissed, baring her fangs.
“Quiet!” Dominic bellowed. “Stop bickering. This is serious.”
Bex lowered her head. “My apologies.”
Walker bit his tongue, but not happily.
Dominic focused on me. “You have craved blood and drank from Bex.”
I nodded. “Jillian’s not a picky eater. She encouraged me to drink everyone’s blood, even dried blood at Ronnie’s house and spilled blood at crime scenes.”
“She is desperate for food, no matter the source,” Dominic said thoughtfully. “Jillian may be literally drinking through you.”
“But she wouldn’t gain any nourishment, would she?”
“I don’t know,” Dominic admitted. “If she
is
gaining any nourishment, she may have retained some of her strength even while imprisoned.”
I blew out my breath in a helpless sigh. “So what do we do? How can we cut her off?”
“If Jillian is your brother’s maker, we may not want to,” Dominic said.
A loud slam sounded from the doorway. I screamed instinctively.
Dominic appeared in front of me, his speed like magic.
Walker drew his gun.
“Whoa!” Rene said from the doorway, his arms raised in mid-air. “May not want to what?”
Bex cried out, somewhere between a wail and an unintelligible mash of words that sounded suspiciously prayer-like.
Rene was a torn, bloody mess. His hair was slicked and dripping streams of blood down his temples, forehead, and cheeks. His shirt hung from around his neck in tatters, like he’d been through a grinder, but the exposed skin of his chest and arms were whole and undamaged, despite the blood spatter. He stumbled toward us a few steps and then pitched forward.
In her weakened condition, Bex couldn’t reach him before he fell, and Rene bit stone face first. The crystal on the dining room table shook from the hit. He didn’t move, but he uttered a low, long moan. I winced.
Bex knelt on the stone next to him, turned him over, and held him. She cradled him to her chest, murmuring softly into his ear. Rene nodded and murmured back.
I watched them, frozen by the tenderness of their moment. I was fascinated by the depth of Bex’s emotion, and a small, suspicious part of me wondered if it was an act, if a creature as instinctual and predatory as a vampire could harbor such tender feelings. I did honestly want to know if Rene was all right and thank him for saving Walker, but most of all, most selfishly of all, I wanted to know if all of that blood was his and only his.
Was Nathan still alive?
We waited in silence until Bex lifted her head. “He is no longer injured. He’ll be fine after feeding.”
Dominic nodded. “I’m glad for his safe return. I’m sure he needs nourishment and rest, as do we all. I propose that we retire for the day, recuperate our strength, and reconvene before sunset tomorrow to determine how best to move forward.”
“Agreed.”
Rene winced as Bex hoisted him from the floor. “Sounds good to me.”
“No, not agreed,” Walker looked around at the vampires like they were insane. “We need a plan now, not tomorrow.”
“
We
need a plan?” Bex growled. “You are not a part of this coven. Is he your night blood, Lysander?”
Dominic glanced at Walker and laughed. “Certainly not.”
Bex locked eyes with Walker. “You’ve found your way in and out of this coven on multiple occasions, with and without my consent. I have no doubt that you can see yourself out. If you’re still here at sunset tomorrow, assuming you survive the day in my coven without my protection, I’ll assume you mean me and mine harm, and I’ll kill you myself.”
Walker stared at her, the muscle ticking in his jaw.
Rene looked back and forth between them, and a wide, beautiful smile blossomed across his face. “Finally.”
“How like you, unable to put aside petty problems for the greater good. We need to contain that creature!” Walker shouted.
“We need to
kill
that creature, but we don’t need your help to do it. You’re just a liability.” Bex looked pointedly at the door and then back at Walker, her intentions like crystal.
Walker made a rude noise in the back of this throat. “I hope he eats your heart and you rot.” He jerked his head toward the door. “Let’s go, DiRocco.”
I tensed to stand, but Dominic placed his hand on my shoulder.
“Cassidy isn’t going anywhere,” Dominic said, his voice amused.
I blinked. “I’m not?”
“No, you’re staying the day with me. You’re my night blood and as such, you’re staying where you belong, by my side,” Dominic said distinctly, obviously goading Walker, but also subtly reminding me of my role. Bex believed I was truly Dominic’s night blood, so more than pretending at dinner, now that he was here, I needed to play the part.
Walker locked eyes with me. His hand adjusted its grip on his gun. “DiRocco?”
I swallowed. Even if I wasn’t playing my part in this game, which I was, I wouldn’t say otherwise. Walker with his gun against Dominic, Bex, and Rene with their preternatural abilities didn’t stand a chance.
“I’m staying,” I said softly.
Walker’s hand loosened on his gun. He shook his head. “I was wrong about you.”
“Walker, I—”
He lifted his hand. “I hope you figure things out with your brother. I hope you find a way to bring him back, and if you don’t, I hope you can kill him quick and easy. I wish you the best, DiRocco, but between you and me, I was wrong.” He turned to Bex. “I’ll leave at sunrise.”
Bex nodded. “Done.”
Walker turned his back on us, walked out of the room, and slammed the door behind him without another word.
Dominic squeezed my shoulder gently, and I realized that I was trembling.
“I’m assuming that you have accommodations in which Cassidy and I may take our day rest safety?” Dominic asked.
I stared dumbly at the dining room door where Walker had just left, realizing with a type of slow-dawning horror that I would be staying the day with Dominic in Bex’s coven.
Dominic squeezed my shoulder more forcefully.
“My vampires would never dare harm you. They know the punishment for such crimes,” Bex replied, but she didn’t sound offended. She sounded weary.
“I understand, but I do not take Cassidy’s safety lightly. There may be one or two in your coven who haven’t received word of our renewed alliance.”
Bex nodded. “Of course. I’ll show y’all to your rooms. I have an entire wing dedicated to guests. You’ll be safe.”
Dominic raised an eyebrow. “An entire wing? Do you host guests often? I can’t imagine a rarer situation than the one we find ourselves in tonight.”
“As you so acutely stated, I don’t take the safety of
those in my coven
lightly. My vampires know the consequences of crossing me, but that doesn’t mean I intend to provoke their disobedience.”
“Tests have their uses but are better used when the coven itself is not being tested.”
Bex nodded. “Precisely. One can only hope that prior tests have served their purpose, and with such preparedness, that we have a fighting chance.”
I sighed, thinking of Nathan’s sweet face compared to the impenetrable scales and lethal fangs of the creature. “Assuming we haven’t already failed.”
Bex’s guest bedchamber was very similar to Dominic’s rooms in his own coven. The chamber was composed of several rooms—a bedroom, bathroom, and sitting room—complete with two sofas, a recliner, a coffee table, two lit scented candles, and a vase of Gerbera daisies. Fluffy area rugs spread over each room, softening the unyielding chill of the stone floors. The rooms were mostly gray and brown from the natural elements of stone and wood, but splashes of pink from the daisies, candles, and bedspread brightened the decor.
Dominic kept his coven relatively clean and inhabitable, and in some rooms, even personal, but a lingering dampness permeated his coven. Bex, on the other hand, had gone through some lengths to rid her coven of the dank, moldy humidity of the cave; the room smelled pleasant and fresh.
As I became more entrenched in Dominic’s world, it became increasing difficult to accept the juxtaposition between the vampires’ savage, instinctive, animal-like nature and their intellect, emotions, and personalities. I couldn’t scrape the image of Bex gathering Rene in her embrace from my mind. She had worried over his well-being, and her joy at his return had been undeniable. It was unfathomable to me that beings who could rip each other’s throats out, hunt indiscriminately, and kill without remorse could embrace a friend for returning safely, decorate a room with a pink bedspread, and light scented candles to counter the clammy air of the underground.
Seeing Bex’s interaction with Rene and witnessing the care in which she kept her coven made me wonder if I’d been wrong about Bex and Dominic and vampires in general. They were lethal—there was no denying their strength and dietary preferences—but maybe there were more hues to their personalities than I’d ever considered. Maybe they were like humans in that the whole of their species couldn’t be judged by the actions of individuals. Maybe some were monsters, like Kaden, some had conflicting agendas, like Jillian, and others, like Dominic and Bex, were leaders, forced to make swift, difficult decisions for the safety and security of their covens.
I could and often did deny Dominic’s feelings toward me and my well-being, justifying them as shallow and selfish. I believed he only cared for me and not about me, like an owner cares for its guard dog. A guard dog isn’t a loved member of the family. It might be fed and bathed and cared for physically, but when its purpose ends, whether from injury or age, the dog is replaced by a new guard dog that can better serve its purpose.
I was Dominic’s daylight guard dog, his right arm in the sun, as he was recently fond of saying, but I worried that despite Dominic’s intelligence and vast experience, the more animal, instinctive side of him was also utilitarian. Once my position as his night blood was no longer useful—after the Leveling—he would see me as more liability than asset, and I would be put down. Or turned into a vampire against my will.
I stood in the middle of the bedroom and stared at the single bed in front of me, the bed I would be sharing with Dominic unless one of us took the couch, and I couldn’t decide what to believe. Was Dominic a leader, making difficult decisions to protect his coven, or a monster, using me and discarding me at will? Who could I trust? How would I survive? And if I aligned myself with the monsters to survive and hopefully save my brother, did that make me a monster, too?
I covered my face with my hands. The image of that creature, my brother, with its hand puncturing Bex’s chest and tearing out her heart still haunted me, and I suspected would continue haunting me for the rest of my life. I shuddered.
“You are disturbed by the recent turn of events,” Dominic said softly. “I knew that finding your brother, no matter the condition we found him in, would be difficult.”
He had been standing near the bed to my left when we entered the room, but now his voice was directly behind me. I could feel his presence bearing over me.
I rubbed my eyes with the heel of my hands. “It’s still out there, my own brother, killing something else because it couldn’t kill us.”
Dominic reached out from behind, wrapped his hands around my wrists, and pulled my hands down, away from my face. “That is very likely true, but there’s nothing else to be done about it tonight.”
I felt his presence, like a live wire, scorching my back. His thumbs massaged lazy circles on my inner wrists as he held me captive, and I felt suddenly trapped. He was my only protection here in Bex’s coven, but who would protect me against him?
Dominic leaned into me. I felt his breath, hot and chilling, against my neck. Goose bumps puckered down my spine like a bolt of electricity. I froze.
“Dominic, let go of my arms and step back. Please,” I added, trying to soften the request, “I need some space.”
He nuzzled closer. His cheek was pressed to the back of my neck and his hands, so strong and unyielding, slid up my arms. “Your mouth says no, but I can smell you and the wet, heady scent of your desire. I can feel the vibration of your body, like a tuning fork, singing for me to touch you. I could taste the sweetness of your trust when we fell into the cavern. You were terrified, but you clung to me, trusting me to save us and protect you. Trust me now.”
“One has nothing to do with the other. Let go.” I turned my head, trying to face him and dislodge his grip, and my silver earring brushed his face as he nuzzled into my neck. I smelled the sizzling stink of burning skin before I realized what I’d done, but once I realized, I angled my head to press my earring flat against his face.
Dominic jerked back sharply, his expression fierce.
I froze at the sudden transition. “What?”
“Your earring burned my cheek.”
I leaned in to inspect his injury, but his features were smooth and unblemished from my earring. He’d already healed. “Your cheek looks fine to me.”
Dominic gave me a level look.
I sighed. “I asked you to let me go, and you didn’t. What did you expect? For me to just take it?”
“After everything we’ve survived together, I expect your trust.”
Most of what I survived, I considered having done so against him, not with him, but when my life was literally in his hands, he’d saved me without turning me into a vampire. He allowed me to keep my humanity, and for that, he’d earned a sliver of my trust.
“I trust you.”
Dominic raised his eyebrows.
“I don’t particularly trust your motives, but I trust you to protect me,” I clarified.