The Hunted (70 page)

Greg slid his head down to her bloodied neck and licked up the arterial spray on her skin, lapping at it until all I could see were the seeping puncture marks.

‘Please let me go,’ she moaned against his face, her soft cries barely audible.

Greg placed a finger on her lips and then flashed his set of sharp fangs again to remind her who she was dealing with.

She tried to writhe backwards in his grasp, trying to get her body as far away from his teeth as possible, but his grip was sure and strong. Even I could smell the fear that was clearly evident in her watering eyes as she submitted to his demands.

I looked back to John, swallowing my guilt.

‘What’s it to be?’ he said, touching a finger to my lips again, his alpha scent washing over me completely, a stark mixture of raw earth and sweat.

I shuddered under his touch and closed my eyes to fight back the heated response that was building up inside of me again. ‘You have my answer.’

He dropped his finger from my trembling lips and then leaned forward, grabbing my head in both of his hands and lowering his mouth to mine without hesitation.

I gasped as he captured my lips with his, covering me with the pure heat and taste of male virility. His movements were assured and demanding as he took from me without remorse or doubt. I wanted to scream and shout, and scream some more, but my body was riding another tangent, something that my mind was no longer a part of. My mind rebelled but it was still enjoying his touch, despite how much it sickened me inside.

He pulled away a moment later, releasing my face and staring at me with hungry black eyes. He turned to Greg in the next instant and snapped his fingers, pointing at the girl who was still moaning gently.

Greg smiled menacingly and then tilted the girl’s neck back as far as it would go, then sinking his teeth into her flesh again. He suckled at her greedily, her arms and legs swatting uselessly at him as he held her steady and took his fill. Soon, her struggles became too weak and her legs collapsed underneath her, her eyes rolling back in their sockets. Her body was lifeless within minutes. All I could do was watch helplessly as Greg drank down the last of her essence, the very thing that kept her heart beating and her body warm. After that, he callously dropped her body onto the floor in a heap, like a crushed coke can. He licked the blood off his lips in slow, suggestive motions.

I turned away from him and stared down at the crumpled body lying at my feet, her lifeless eyes looking up at me accusingly.

‘I think we are done here for now,’ John said, touching a hand to my cheek again and motioning for both men to clean up.

Greg and Adam began to untie me, and I watched as John got up from the ottoman and exited the room without a backward glance.

CHAPTER TWENTY:

LIFE

A
dam and Greg escorted me back to my cell, locking me back in the confined space and yelling for Elizabeth to ‘shut up’ for the umpteenth time. They disappeared back up the stairway again and slammed the red door shut behind them, once again shrouding the basement in near darkness.

I pressed my face up against the barred window of my cell door and listened to the now silent passage for signs of Elizabeth. There was nothing. ‘Elizabeth. How are you doing?’ I asked, my voice echoing around the silence.

There was a small, choked reply. ‘I’m alright at the moment. The baby isn’t moving right now.’

‘How big are you?’

‘My belly’s the size of a watermelon, maybe bigger. I can’t see my feet anymore. The skin is all red and stretched.’

‘Have they been feeding you?’

‘Only every other day. I’m starving.’

Yeah, me too.

‘Do you have any of that canned food in your cell?’ I asked, looking back at the cardboard boxes piled high in the corner.

‘Yeah, but I can’t get into the cans. I’ve tried.’

‘Is there anything else in there except for tins?’

‘Not in my cell.’

I left the window and hurried over into the corner to grab one of the long life tins of baked beans. I was starving. I wanted to help Elizabeth by getting her some food, but there was no way I could help from here.

I held the tin in my hands and squeezed hard until the lid popped off under the pressure. Baked beans spilled over the edge, splattering the wall and covering my hand in red sauce, but I didn’t care. I was pretty sure that it was almost Saturday morning and I hadn’t eaten anything since Thursday lunchtime.

I licked the sauce from my fingers and then lifted the can to my lips, where I greedily swallowed down giant mouthfuls of beans. I barely even chewed. When I’d finished the first can, I cracked open a second, indebted to my powers of strength more than ever before.

Hunger could do strange things to a person.

‘Elena?’

I looked reluctantly at the window and then back at the
can in my hands before swallowing the last of it. ‘Yes?’

‘I heard you screaming a few hours ago,’ she said quietly. ‘Did they do it to you too?’ Her voice tinged with sadness.

‘No. They are keeping me here for information and to use as bait.’

‘Bait?’

‘Yeah, they want a friend of mine.’

‘I’m sorry, Elena.’

‘Don’t be. When he finds me he’s going to be pretty pissed. He’ll be the one person who can get us both out of here.’

‘Is he a cop or something?’

‘Yeah,’ I said, smiling to myself for the first time in days. ‘Something like that.’

‘I hope so. I don’t know how much longer I can take the pain. My skin feels like it’s going to split open any moment
and this thing inside of me keeps hammering at my organs with its feet.’ Just as she finished her sentence, she let out a roaring scream of pain.

‘What happened?’ I yelled, but she continued to scream, unable to answer.

It’s happening.

I started to slam my body against the door, trying to break it down so that I could get to her.

I ran from one end of the cell to the other, repeatedly ramming my body against the door, trying to make it budge. I put a few massive dents in it, but didn’t have an effect on its hinges. It was not going to open for me anytime soon.

I heard the red door open and someone run down the stairs, into the muddy basement. ‘It’s happening,’ I heard Adam yell out. ‘She’s having the pup!’ A few seconds later, another set of footsteps came running down the old rickety staircase and into the basement. I pressed my face up against the little window of the door, trying to hear what was going on.

‘It’s working. It’s actually working,’ I heard Adam shout gleefully.

‘Have patience, Adam. We don’t know for sure yet,’ Greg answered. Elizabeth screamed again, long and hard, and it rang in my ears like a siren.

‘Should we get John?’ Adam asked, sounding alarmed.

‘No, he’s busy on the telephone with one of the other pack alphas. He doesn’t think this is going to work either.’

He’s talking to the other alphas?

It must be about me.

Well, shit.

‘Yeah, but look at her. She’s about to burst. It has to work this time.’

‘That doesn’t mean anything. Do you think you’re the first one to try? John and the others are the only ones capable—you know that.’

I couldn’t drag my ears away from the door. If this pregnancy was not going according to plan, that gave me a little bit of hope for her yet.

Elizabeth screamed out again and again. My eyes teared up in sympathy for her.

‘It’s coming,’ I could hear Greg say now, sounding a little more excited. ‘Look, it’s coming through her stomach.’

I couldn’t see what was going on, but Elizabeth screamed one final time. All I could hear afterwards was a tormented, lacklustre moaning. She sounded like she barely had the energy to breathe.

Then everything from the other cell went quiet. I did too, listening for anything that would tell me if Elizabeth was still alive. The one thing that I did instantly become aware of was blood—thick, red, warm and intensely satisfying blood. The sweet, salty undertones drifted down the passageway, filling me with uncertainty. If I could smell blood then Elizabeth was not in good shape.

‘It didn’t work,’ I could hear Adam say dully.

‘I told you it wouldn’t,’ Greg answered.

‘I had to try.’

‘You shouldn’t have, anyway. Now we have to get rid of another body.’

‘She’s not dead yet.’

‘She will be soon.’

My heart convulsed in my chest. I had known that it would end this way, but my own words of encouragement had instilled a new sense of hope in me that William would come in time, that everything would be alright. It was silly to have hoped I could save Elizabeth. I had known death to be her eventual companion. Perhaps I had wanted to believe that if she could be saved, then I could too.

I still wasn’t sure what was in store for me, although I doubted it was amnesty. John wanted me not only for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but as a bed companion as well. When he tired of that, I was sure to be as disposable as poor Elizabeth.

Well, he could stick that idea where the sun don’t shine.

Hang on a second. Let’s be cold and clinical here, Elena. Why didn’t the birthing work? There has to be a reason.

It was common knowledge that a vânâtor mating with a human produced more vânâtor offspring, so why hadn’t the union between Elizabeth and Adam had the same result? Adam was a pup and as far as I could tell, first generation offspring, directly from John himself. Now if Adam, a first generation wolf, couldn’t successfully reproduce with humans could I safely assume that only alphas have the capability to extend the packs? Could this be their main purpose?

Bloody hell. Could it be that simple
—
Kill the alphas, kill them all?

‘Don’t do this again. You have to learn to control yourself, Adam,’ Greg’s voice said, cutting into my thoughts.

‘I will, I know better now. I just thought that maybe things might have changed and being born of an alpha that I might have been able to—’

‘Adam, shut your mouth! We are all born of alphas. Do you not think before you speak? You know who is listening.’

Bingo. These two drongos are complete idiots.

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think.’