Twisted (3 page)

—feeling worse,
Caleb was saying.

The dizziness had never been this bad before. And once the switch-switch-switch had begun, the souls should not have been able to stay put. Why hadn't they left her?

We all have to stay calm,
Elijah said.
Okay? We'll be fine. I know we'll be fine
.

You're lying.
Julian's words were slurred.
Hurts too badly for us to be fine.

Yes, lying.
Panic drenched Caleb's voice.
This is terrible, I'm dying, and you're dying, too. We're all dying. I know we're dying.

Stop saying the word
dying
and calm down,
Elijah com
manded.
Now. Your little anxiety attacks are placing Aden and Victoria in more danger.

At last, concern. But it was too little, too late. They were already in danger.

I just…I need…

Caleb! You're placing all of
us
in danger, too. Please, calm down.

“Thirsty,” Aden said, his gravelly voice drawing her back to the hated present.

The amber was fading in his eyes, the red expanding. He was losing the battle…would soon attack her, his gaze already zeroing in on the still-seeping wound in her neck. He licked his lips, his eyes closing as he savored the lingering flavor of her.

This was the perfect time for her to strike, she thought, reverting to her baser urges. Her opponent was distracted. “Taste,” she said, the word garbled.

Victoria. You love him. You fought to save him. Don't undermine your own efforts by succumbing to a hunger you
can
control.
A voice of reason in the chaos of her mind. But of course, Elijah, the psychic, would know exactly what to say to reach her.
All right? Okay? I can't deal with both you and Caleb right now, on top of the dizziness. One of you has to act like a grown-up. And since you're eighty-something years old, I pick you.

Aden's eyelids popped open. Bright red, no longer any hint of his humanity.

Control herself, yes. She could. She would. “Aden, please.” Save him, yes. She would try that, too. He meant everything to her. “I know you can hear me. I know you don't really want to hurt me.”

A pause, heavy and laden with tension. Then, miraculously, another flicker of amber, deep in those beloved eyes. “Can't hurt…” he said. “Don't want to hurt.”

Tears of relief pooled in her lashes, leaked onto her cheeks. “Let go of my hands, Aden. Please.”

Another pause, this one lasting an eternity. Slowly, so slowly, he uncurled his fingers from her wrists and lifted his arms away from her. He straightened until he was straddling her, his knees pressing into her hips.

“Victoria…sorry, so sorry. Your poor, beautiful neck.” The dual voice, one his, one the beast's, tendrils of sympathy and smoke, blending together, wafting over her.

She offered him a soft smile. “Nothing to apologize for.”
I did this to you.

I…need…you must…
Caleb couldn't quite catch his breath—and suddenly, Victoria couldn't quite catch her breath, either.
Something's happening…I can't…

Listen to me carefully, Caleb,
Elijah lashed out.
We can't go back to Aden yet. We'll be killed.

Killed?
Caleb gasped.
Figures. I knew we were going to die.

What do you mean,
killed? Julian snarled.

I mean, we'll be fine unless you two keep this up! Your panic is going to drive us out of Victoria, and we can't leave Victoria. Not yet. So you have to calm down like I told you. Do you hear me? We can return to Aden later. After the…just after. So, Caleb, Julian, are you listening to—

His speech ended abruptly. Caleb screamed, then Julian screamed, the sounds blending with Elijah's sudden groan of distress. No, they hadn't listened.

Neither had she, apparently. Victoria was the next to scream, and the sound of
that
busted her eardrums. Loud, loud, so loud. Hurt, hurt,
so
hurt. Then, she didn't care. The pain left, and her scream softened into a purr.

Somehow, some way, absolute power was birthed inside her, blasting through her, fusing with her. Now, a part of her. Good, good, so good.

Throughout the decades of her life, she had drained several witches. A bad thing for vampires. Witches were their drug of no-choice, and once sampled, it was difficult to think about anything else. She knew that very well. Though years had passed since her last bender, some days the cravings hit her, and she'd find herself running through the woods, searching, searching, desperate to
find a witch. Any witch. And that was reason number one why witches and vampires usually avoided each other.

But, oh, this sudden burst of power…it was witchlike, intoxicating, warmth and sunlight, yet cold like a snowstorm. Dizzying, overwhelming, everything and nothing. She floated on clouds, swept away from the cave. She dozed on a beach, water lapping at her feet. She danced in the rain, as carefree as the child she'd never been allowed to be.

Such a beautiful eternity awaited her here. She never wanted to leave.

She thought she heard the souls crying, soft, almost childlike. Where they not experiencing this, too?

A roar cut through her euphoria. That roar stretched out wispy tentacles, and those tentacles wrapped around her, surprisingly strong, tugging her away. Frowning, she dug her heels into the ground.
I'm staying!

A second roar inside her head, louder now, threatening, causing a chilled, clammy sheen of perspiration to coat her….

In a snap, she was jerked back to the present. And just like that, her sense of tranquility vanished. No. No, no,
no.

Oh, yes. The souls were no longer chattering, screaming, crying,
anything,
and the sense of power had
evaporated with the tranquility. More than that, Chompers had returned, and he didn't want her to hurt Aden.

Before, each time her beast had returned to her, she had experienced a sharp lance of acknowledgment. Nothing more. Then he'd left her again. Then returned. An endless cycle as she and Aden endlessly drank. But this…this was something different. Something stronger. A passing of energy, perhaps. Or had that been a final break of the ever-changing cycle of possession?

Chompers' hunger blended with her own, familiar, yet utterly unwelcome because he would not allow her to do anything about it. He never did, not with Aden.

Victoria blinked open her eyes, gasped. She had never left the cave, but she'd been
busy.
She was on her feet, her arms outstretched. A golden glow radiated from between her fingers, dimming…gone. Aden lay in a crumpled heap against the far wall. He was unconscious, unmoving, maybe even—no. No!

Her bare feet dug into the rocks as she raced to him. The moment she reached him, she was crouching and feeling for a pulse.
No, no, no. Please, please.
There! Fast, too fast and too weak, but there. He was alive.

Relief flooded her, followed quickly by remorse. What had she done to him? Beaten him? Drained him?
No, she couldn't have. Chompers wouldn't have allowed that, either. Right?

“Oh, Aden.” She smoothed the hair from his brow. There were no bruises on his face, no punctures in his neck. “What's wrong with you?”

A sound wafted to her ears. Frowning, she leaned down. Was he…humming? She blinked, listened more intently. Yes, yes, he was. And if he was humming, he wasn't hurting. Right? He must be experiencing some sort of euphoria. Perhaps even the same euphoria she'd basked in.
Right?

Please, be right.

She studied him more intently. His expression was serene, his lips edged upward. He looked boyish, innocent, almost angelic. He
was
experiencing the euphoria, then.

Relaxing, she traced her fingertip along his hairline. He was so striking, with his hair dyed black and those two-inch blond roots. Perfectly arched eyebrows rose above perfectly uptilted eyes. His nose was perfectly sloped. His lips were soft, his chin stubborn. Again, perfectly. His was a face a girl would never tire of looking at. Maybe because every new glance revealed a previously undiscovered nuance. This time, she saw the thick, feathering fan of his lashes, a golden chocolate in the haze of the cave.

“Wake up for me, Aden. Please.”

Nothing, no response.

Perhaps, like her, he didn't want to leave. Well, too bad. They had some chatting to do.

“Aden. Aden, wake up.”

Again nothing. No, not nothing. He scowled, and the scowl soon became a grimace.

Her heart galloped against her ribs. All right. What if he wasn't floating and carefree? What if he was stuck? Or worse, agonized? That grimace…

He panted out a breath once, twice, shallow and rasping. Crackling. She'd heard that crackle before—each time she'd taken too much blood from a human.

He won't die. He can't.
They'd been here a week. Seven days, three hours and eighteen minutes. They'd fought and kissed and drank from each other the entire time. Aden had survived all of that; surely he would survive this. Whatever
this
was.

Shame suddenly outweighed her ever-present guilt. And maybe that shame was what corralled her beast, stopping him from screaming for release the way he had every time before.

Wait. Chompers wasn't screaming. The realization caused her to blink with confusion. A quick glance at her chest, and she saw that
all
of her wards had faded.
Even still, the beast was silent. That had never happened before.

What else was different? Her gaze fell to Aden's neck, where his pulse drummed sporadically. Her mouth watered, but the urge, the electrifying
need
to bite him, wasn't there.

No, not true. It was there, it simply wasn't as strong. It was controllable. Even still, she was thirsty, desperate to drink from
someone.
And if
she
could now take from someone else, perhaps Aden could, as well. If so…

He could be saved. Completely. She hoped. There was only one way to find out. Though she was still weak, she twined her fingers with Aden's and closed her eyes, imagining her bedroom at the vampire stronghold near Crossroads, Oklahoma. White carpet, white walls, white bed covers.

Please work,
she thought.
Please.

A cold breeze kicked up, blowing her hair up and down, the strands winding together and knotting. It was working! Her grip tightened on Aden, and her lips curved into a grin. The floor fell away, leaving them suspended in the air. Any moment now and they would be—

Her feet settled on a soft, plush foundation. Carpet.

Home. They were home.

Three days later

T
HE BEDROOM DOOR CRASHED
against the wall as a harsh male voice snarled, “I hear you've threatened to disembowel anyone who steps foot in your room. Well, here I am. But before you disembowel me, you better tell me what the
hell
is going on.”

Victoria stopped pacing and whipped around to face the intruder. Riley. Her bodyguard. Her best friend. Tall, as muscled as Aden now was, with a face roughened by life and fist fights.

Her chest constricted. He wasn't handsome in a Prince of Your Dreams way like Aden, but in a sexy I'll Kick Your Ass No Matter What It Takes and Laugh way, and that was exactly what she needed at the moment. A willingness to do whatever was necessary.

He might be the one person able to help her.

And though he was obviously fuming, his eyes glittering with angry heat, he was the best thing she'd seen in days. He had dark, shaggy hair, bright green eyes fringed by long lashes of the darkest jet, and a nose broken too many times to count, with a slight bump in the center. Certain injuries, when received repeatedly, simply couldn't heal properly.

He wore a green Lucky Charms T-shirt and jeans—or what looked to be jeans, since she knew they weren't really denim. He was the only slash of color in her white-as-the-clouds bedroom.

“Nice shirt,” she said. One, to distract him from his anger before she spilled her secrets, and two, to showcase the sense of humor she was desperately trying to develop. Once, his human girlfriend, Mary Ann Gray, had accused Victoria of being too somber.

“Only thing I could find. Victoria. Talk. Now. Before I assume the worst and just start offing everyone in the house.”

The pretend sense of humor vanished, and tears filled her eyes, those stupid human tears she'd never shed before coming to the States. She raced to Riley, throwing herself into his strong, capable arms.

“I'm so glad you're here.”

“You might not be so glad if I have to force you to start talking.” Despite the threat, he hugged her tight, exactly as he'd done when they were younger and other vampires refused to play with her.

Because she was a daughter of Vlad the Impaler, every one had feared punishment if she were hurt—or worse—on their watch. But not Riley. Never Riley. He was like the brother she had always wanted, her comforter and her shield.

Oh, she had a blood brother. Sorin. Except, Vlad had forbidden her from looking at, talking to or even acknowledging him. Father Dearest hadn't wanted his only son tainted by his “too soft” daughters. In fact, when Aden had asked Victoria about her siblings back when they'd first met, she'd named only her sisters. Last she'd inadvertently heard, Sorin was leading half of the vampire army through Europe, keeping Bloody Mary, the leader of the Scottish faction, in line. Combine all of that, and Sorin didn't count.

Besides, Vlad had long ago given Riley charge of Victoria's care, and the wolf shifter had taken the job seriously. Not just out of a sense of duty, or fear of torture and death if he failed, but also because he liked her. They were friends first and everything else second.

“
Why
are you here, though?” she asked, ignoring his demand. Again.

“My brothers hunted me down and scared two centuries off my life when they told me you'd ventured into Crazy Town. Now, enough about me.” Riley pulled back and cupped her cheeks, forcing her to peer up at him. “Have you fed properly? You look like crap.”

His concern—and insult—offered more comfort than anything else could have and was so wonderfully Riley she responded in a way she knew he would approve. “Yes, Daddy. I've fed properly.” Truth. Five minutes after arriving home and settling Aden in her bed, she'd had her fangs buried deep inside one of the blood-slaves who lived here at the stronghold.

So thirsty had she been, she'd nearly drained the human dry. Her sister Lauren had managed to jerk her away just in time. Her other sister, Stephanie, had found her a second human, and a third and a fourth, and she'd drunk until her stomach could hold no more.

“Smart-ass.” Riley's lips twitched with his amusement. “When did you learn to wield sarcasm?”

“I can't remember exactly.” All she knew was that she'd had a choice. Find the humor in what happened to her or drown in her misery. “Two weeks ago, maybe.”

The mention of time wiped away his delighted expression, leaving him with a cold frown.

Only one person affected him that way. Mary Ann Gray. The girl had struck out on her own the same night Aden had been stabbed, and Riley the Besotted Wolf had charged after her, determined to protect her despite the hazard to himself.

“Where's your human?” Wait. Mary Ann wasn't quite human anymore. The girl had become a drainer—something Victoria had not seen coming—able to suck the magic from witches, the beasts from vampires, the power from fairies and the ability to shift forms from the wolves.

Victoria had begun to wonder if Mary Ann had
ever
been human. After all, fairies were drainers. The difference was, the fairies could control their hunger and feedings. Mary Ann could not. Still. That raised a startling question. Could Mary Ann be a human/fairy hybrid?

Victoria had never heard of such a pairing, but as she was learning, anything was possible. If Mary Ann
was
somehow a hybrid, every vampire and shifter in this stronghold—besides Riley, of course—would want the girl dead. More than they already did. Fae were Enemy One. Dangerous in the extreme. A threat to otherworld existence.

“Well?” Victoria insisted when Riley offered no reply.

“I lost her.” A muscle underneath his eye jerked, a sure sign of his upset.

“Wait. You, an expert tracker, lost a teenager who wouldn't know how to hide if she were invisible?” Another sign that Mary Ann was more than she seemed.

The ticking migrated to Riley's jaw. “Yes.”

“You should be ashamed.”

“I don't want to talk about it,” he said. “I'm here to talk about you. How are you? Seriously?”

“I'm fine.”

“All right. I'll pretend I believe that. Any word from your father?”

“No.” Vlad had ordered Aden's execution while remaining in the shadows. Shadows he had yet to vacate.

She'd never been so grateful for her father's vanity. He wanted to be seen as invincible, always. So, no one here knew Vlad was still alive, and if she had her way, they never would. The vampires might rebel against Aden before he was officially crowned king, and if they rebelled while he was in this condition, he would lose. Everything he'd already endured would have been for nothing.

Even healthy and whole, he needed every edge he
could get. Not just to remain in charge, but to stay alive.

Right now, he had time. Victoria knew her father. Vlad would not return until he was at top strength. Then…well, then there would be a war. Vlad would punish those who'd submitted to Aden's rule. Herself and Riley included. He would make an example of Aden. And his preferred method of “exampling,” as she'd come to call it, was placing a severed head on a pike and displaying that pike at his front door.

Would Aden fight him? If so, could Aden hope to win?

“How's Aden?” Riley asked. The wolf could read auras and had probably sensed the direction of her thoughts. “Did he…survive?”

Yes and no.
Her stomach twisted into thousands of little knots. She tugged from Riley's hold, turned and motioned to the bed with a wave of her hand. “Behold. Our king.”

Green eyes narrowed as they lanced to the lump atop the mattress. Five sure steps, and the shifter was at the side of the bed, peering down. Victoria joined him, trying to see Aden as Riley must.

He lay on his back, as motionless as a corpse. His normally bronzed skin was pallid, the blue tracery of his
veins evident. His cheeks were hollowed out, his lips chapped and cracked. His hair was soaked with sweat and plastered to his scalp.

“What's wrong with him?” Riley demanded in a quiet, yet all the harsher for it, tone.

“I don't know.”

“You know something.”

She gulped. “Well, I think I told you that Tucker stabbed him.”

“Yes, and Tucker will die for that.” A flat, cold statement of fact. “Soon.”

The homicidal confession didn't surprise her. Retaliation was Riley's way. Tit for tat, and never anything in between. That way, an enemy never tried to harm you twice. “I wanted to save him—save Aden I mean—so I…I tried to…”
Just say it.
“Tried to turn him. I told you that, too.”

“And I thought you'd change your mind, see reason.”

“Well, I didn't. I know I shouldn't have done it, but I couldn't… I didn't want… I did what I had to do to keep him alive!”

“Aden told you the consequences of messing with one of Elijah's predictions, Vic. The few times he did it, peo
ple suffered more than they would have if he'd left them alone.”

Her back went ramrod straight, her nose lifting in the air. “Yes, he did, and no, that didn't stop me or change my mind. I fed him my blood, every drop I could, drank from him, and then he drank from me. We repeated the process, over and over again.”

“And?”

Of course he knew there was more to the story. Her shoulders sagged. “And…somehow I absorbed his souls inside my head, and he absorbed my beast.”

Riley's mouth dropped open. “
You
have the souls?”

“Not anymore. We kept switching back and forth, and we kept drinking from each other, even though we barely had anything left. I thought we would kill each other. We…almost…did.” Her chin trembled, breaking the words apart.

“There's more. Tell me.” Riley was merciless when he wanted something, and right now he wanted information. He'd warned her she wouldn't like him if he had to force her to talk, and she took the threat seriously.

“Our last day in the cave, I did something to him. I don't know what, and it's killing me! I blacked out, and when I came to, he was like this.”

“You just blacked out? For how long?”

“Yes, and I don't know.”

“Was he bleeding?”

“No.” Truth. But that didn't mean she hadn't injured him internally.

Why couldn't she remember what happened?

“Why did you bring him here? In this condition, he's weak and vulnerable. There's no better time to strike at him. Your people could rise up and finally rid themselves of the human king they never wanted.”

Her nose went back into the air. “I've been guarding him, and no one has even tried to enter my room. I think they remember how much their beasts love him.” Every vampire possessed one, and without the wards they etched into their skin, those beasts could emerge, take solid form and attack. And when they attacked, no one, especially not their vampire “master,” was safe.

And yet, those same beasts acted like trained, slobbery house dogs in Aden's presence, doing everything he commanded, protecting him against any and all threats.

“Or maybe the people haven't yet realized Aden's here,” she finished.

“Oh, they realize. Everyone I ran into was on edge. Their beasts want out of them and in here with Aden.”

That she could believe. The precious silence she'd experienced those last minutes in the cave had ended the
moment she arrived home. Chompers wanted to move inside Aden's mind permanently and wasn't afraid to roar his displeasure about being stuck with Victoria.

After feeding him, she'd had to double up on her wards to quiet him.

“Is Aden now a vampire?” Riley asked.

“No. Yes. I don't know. Before passing out, he craved blood. My blood.”
All of my blood.
She kept that little gem to herself. No telling how Riley would react.

He reached out and lifted Aden's lips from his teeth. “No fangs.”

“No, but his skin…”

“Is like yours?” Frown deepening, Riley unleashed his claws, his nails lengthening and sharpening. Before Victoria could protest, he raked those claws over Aden's cheek.

“Don't—”

Not a single wound formed.

“Interesting.” A clear liquid—
je la nune
—beaded on the end of those claws, and Riley once more sliced at Aden's cheek. This time, the skin sizzled as it split apart.

“Stop it!” With a screech, Victoria threw herself over Aden's body, preventing Riley from making another pass at him. Not that he tried.

“You're right. He has a vampire's skin,” Riley said.

“Which is what I was trying to tell you!” What she wouldn't admit, not yet, because she still couldn't believe it herself, was that she now had
human
skin. Vulnerable, so easily harmed. Feeding hadn't reversed the damage, either. She wasn't sure anything would. “You didn't need to hurt him like that. The
je la nune
would burn through a human, too.”

Riley ignored her. “How long has he been like this?”

“Three days.” She sat up, remaining beside Aden, and glared at her bodyguard, daring him to blame her.

“Give me a minute to mentally calculate.” With barely a pause, he added, “Yep, that's three days too long. Has he fed recently?”

“Yes.” She'd tested every blood-slave she'd allowed him to drink from, then, when she knew they were safe, she'd given him a little at a time to gauge how he would respond. There'd been no reaction, good or bad, so she'd given him more and more, until the blood had practically seeped from his pores. Still there'd been no reaction.

For hours she had debated the wisdom of giving him more of
her
blood. What if he became addicted again? Then she'd thought, what if he was
still
addicted, and only her blood could help him?