Unleash The Moon (The Preternaturals Book 6) (2 page)

“
You’ll die out there,
Syd.”

She rounded on him. “Then maybe
I
should
die. Maybe it’s not natural for something so weak to live at
all. I wouldn’t be a stress or burden on my parents, anymore.
They’d get over it. They’re immortal! I wouldn’t be a prisoner. I’d
be… free.”

But would she? She’d heard the stories about heaven.
The idea of going there, being in another sterile prison, scared
her almost more than her current situation, but something had to
change. She couldn’t go on this way.

“
Where will you go?” Jacob
asked.

He was only humoring her. She couldn’t even read
minds like a normal vampire, and even she knew that. He was
treating her like a child, just like her father—like some
recalcitrant toddler proclaiming they were running away.

“
I don’t know. I don’t care. Do
you know I’ve never been outside these walls without guards? And
even then I’ve never been more than a few blocks away. I don’t even
know what all of Cary Town looks like! I want to see something
worth seeing.”

“
It’s not like I get to wander
much, either. Come here. You’re just hungry. You need to
feed.”

Jacob pulled her into his arms, and she allowed
herself to melt into his warmth as he pressed her mouth against his
throat. She hesitated, just breathing in his warm, clean, human
scent. Dinner.

Her fangs emerged, and she bit down.

Jacob let out a hiss of pain as
his muscles clenched against her bite. She wasn’t even strong
enough to hypnotize him into not feeling the pain. Not that a
vampire could get into the head of someone else’s claimed mate,
anyway. She was sure when Elise fed, it didn’t hurt him because of
their link.

Sydney closed her eyes and pushed the thoughts away,
pushed everything away but the taste of him. He patiently held her
in arms that felt strong to her because she only had human strength
herself.

“
That’s it. Just drink. It won’t
seem so bad after you’ve fed,” he said as he petted her
hair.

Her hands strayed down his muscled back. She felt
his erection pressing into her leg. She was moments from taking his
pants off and removing her own clothes, but she caught herself in
time and instead ran her tongue over the wound on his throat to get
the last bits of blood. She couldn’t keep using him like this.
Maybe feeding was necessary, but sleeping with him wasn’t, and she
was only leading him on, only hurting him. That wasn’t who she
wanted to be.

He healed, not from any healing power she had—she
had none—but from Elise’s claiming bite.

Outside in the hallway, someone jiggled the
doorknob.

“
Go away, Dad! Do I interrupt you
and mom when you…”

“
It’s Elise.”

Sydney growled and went to the door. She turned the
lock and flung it open. “What?”

Elise looked past her into the
room. “I’m hungry. I need my
mate
, please.” She said it as if
she were jealous, as if she had actual feelings for him. The claim
would make her feel possessive, but Sydney knew the other vampire
wasn’t in love, either.

Poor Jacob. Sydney had no doubt Elise was sleeping
with him, too. He was being used by both of them, and he’d never be
free. Jacob seemed less thrilled to feed Elise, but he followed her
out of the room without comment, his concerned gaze going back to
Sydney.

She mouthed the words, “I’m fine.”

He nodded, but she knew he didn’t believe her. She
was such a bad liar.

When they’d left, she shut the door and locked it
back then turned to the pile of clothes on the bed. She filled a
duffel bag with what she thought she might need, then shoved it
into the back of her closet. Would Jacob tell someone? Had he even
taken her seriously? She’d made empty threats of running away
before. But this time, it was different.

Sydney had reached her breaking point. She felt she
might die in this cage. It was bad enough that she’d never seen
sunlight and would never see it—not outside a movie or photograph,
anyway. She had to get out there into the world. The bag was
abandoned in the closet. She needed to know where everybody was
before she made her escape.

She’d need to find resting spots during the day to
shield her from the sun. If she picked wrong, she might not wake
up. No, that wasn’t true. She’d wake up in heaven. And no matter
what they’d said about the place, it couldn’t be any worse than
here. Almost nothing could be worse than here.

What would she do about food? Did it even matter?
Couldn’t she eat wildlife? How would it be possible for her to be
any more weak and useless than she already was? What difference did
it make if she dined on Jacob or Bambi?

She closed the door carefully and snuck down the
hall. Blue LED lights on the walls came on via motion detector as
she moved past the other vampire resting chambers. Most were
unoccupied these days. This level was also where they’d kept
prisoners, back when there had been executions.

Sydney eased past Elise’s room. Hopefully the
vampire was too busy with her human to notice. From the sounds
behind the door, she was distracted enough.

At the end of the lighted path was a steep set of
stairs that led to the main levels. Her parents were in the living
area cuddled on the couch like a couple of college sweethearts. She
envied that her mother once had the option of college. Sydney had
only read about it in books.

“
Are you over your snit, Syd?”
Anthony asked from the couch, pausing the movie they’d been
watching. How could they watch the same things over and over? How
could they live this way? In hiding, like so many rats. She
wondered if they’d have to hide and stay in this one place if not
for her. Probably not. They acted like old married people. Maybe in
a way they were, but this seemed far removed from her dad’s glory
days.

“
Hey baby,” her mother said. “Do
you feel better now that you’ve fed?”

“
I don’t want to talk about that
with you, mom.” Inappropriate.

“
Sorry,” Charlee said,
blushing.

And now Sydney felt bad for making her mom feel bad.
But she was about to make both of them feel bad if she managed the
nerve to leave. She wanted to scream at the unfairness of it. Why
had they let her live? Why hadn’t they killed her at birth? This
was no way for any of them to live. In the long run, they’d thank
her for giving them their lives back.

Anthony had that look again. “He hasn’t hurt you has
he? I will end him if he tries.” This had been his favorite
conversation for the past decade.

Sydney rolled her eyes. Surely her father didn’t
think she was some unspoiled virgin. How old was he again? Nearly
five hundred. Too old for such goofy logic.

“
No, dad. He hasn’t hurt
me.”

“
Oh stop it, Anthony. Jacob is a
nice man. He cares about her.”

Anthony snorted. “He better watch how much he cares
if he doesn’t want his head removed from his body.”

“
Nice visual,” Charlee said,
smacking him in the arm then snuggling into him.

Her parents were so sickeningly sweet together.

“
I’m going up to the
roof.”

Anthony sat straighter, alert. “Do you need me to
send someone up there with you?”

“
No, Dad! The whole building is
warded, even the roof. I’ll be fine up there.” It was the only
fresh air she ever got. The very idea that he was so protective
that he didn’t even like her on the roof alone had become too
much.

“
Sometimes you behave like such a
child,” he said.

“
Oh, gee, I wonder why? Could it
be that I’ve never been able to develop any autonomy because God
forbid I get into any danger. You’re such a helicopter
parent.”

Anthony’s eyes narrowed. “Where did you learn that
phrase?”

“
Old sites on the Internet.” Cole,
The werewolf pack alpha had wired them up for Internet and
electricity using the existing infrastructure and bypassing the
need to pay many years ago when he and the king had been on
tentative speaking terms still. Most of the hub cities used a more
advanced but similar technology, but the net as it had been had
become a digital wasteland to match the abandoned physical
landscape.

Cole still popped by and checked things out and made
sure her connection was working when her father was away.

“
You don’t talk about yourself to
anyone on there… what you are? Who you are?”

“
Of course not. Don’t be
ridiculous.”

Her father was too paranoid.

Sydney disengaged from her parents and went to the
roof. The stars were bright overhead. Not a cloud in the sky. It
was breezy out, spring just starting to turn into the earliest sigh
of summer.

The roof had lots of tables and an
outdoor kitchen. Sometimes when it was nice they ate out there—when
her father wasn’t in super paranoid mode. On one end of the large
roof was an Olympic-sized swimming pool. She’d had to look
up
Olympic
online. The games no longer took place among the
humans.

Sydney barely recalled the penthouse in the main
part of town. It also had a pool on the roof. The pool here had
been drained. It was too much upkeep in a world where resources
were spotty at best. There were lounging chairs and beach towels
where her mother and a few of the other humans at the compound
liked to lie out in the sun during the day. Her mom got up a few
hours before her dad so she could get some sunshine. Sydney envied
her the warmth of the sun on her skin and how great that must feel
to a human.

On the other end of the roof was a
greenhouse hydroponic rooftop garden filled with vegetables. In
Cary Town there were many months of cold weather. The greenhouse
extended the growing season.

Sydney stood at the edge of the roof, wondering if
she could navigate the jump. She’d never jumped that far, but it
would be the easiest way out of here.

“
Hey Syd!” Reynard called out from
the ground. He was one of Anthony’s loyal vampires. He’d been with
them since before she was born. He had dark hair and thick
eyebrows. With the deer carcass that was draped over his shoulders,
he looked even more like a caveman than he normally did.

The vampires hunted and grew vegetables to feed
their humans. Once things turned bad and the humans were herded
into the cities, the vampires had kidnapped human mates when they
could find one that had been banished to fend for themselves. It
was how the magic users punished the common humans for crimes. They
didn’t bother with prisons. They simply tossed those who wouldn’t
play by their rules out to the monsters. No trial. No appeal.

Jacob was the only human boy she’d
grown up with who she hadn’t accidentally killed over the years, or
who hadn’t escaped and run away. If those boys could run away, so
could she. Though she imagined they hadn’t fared any better in the
wild than she would.

Sydney went back to her room to grab her bag, the
guilt of abandoning her parents clawing at her with each step. She
waited until she heard everyone upstairs—except Elise and Jacob. As
she passed Elise’s room, the door opened.

“
Where are you going?” Jacob
asked.

Dammit.

“
Nowhere,” she said.

“
Nowhere requires luggage?” He
stepped out into the hallway, closing the door behind him. Elise
was still in there, wrapped in a post-coital feeding
glow.

“
I’m leaving. I told you I was
leaving. I can’t stay here anymore. Just give me a head start, a
few hours before you
discover
it and tell my father.
I know you’ll tell him.”

Jacob stopped her. “I’ll come with you. You need
someone to look out for you. It’s not safe out there.”

“
And what could you do to protect
me? Besides, the claim Elise has on you would lead her and my
father right to me. This isn’t the act of a rebellious teenager.
It’s the act of a desperate woman. I have to be free. I don’t care
if I die out there. I can’t stand another minute here. Please
understand.”

“
I understand I’m coming with
you,” Jacob persisted.

“
Didn’t you just hear me about
Elise? You can’t…”

“
What about Elise?” The vampiress
opened the door, still nude, like there had been any question of
what she’d been doing while feeding. Her face held smugness as if
Sydney would be jealous. What did she have to be jealous of? All
she felt with regards to Jacob was guilt that she was using him to
scratch the itches there was no one else around to scratch and
feeding off him like he was some blood slave.

Faster than any human should be able to move, Jacob
bent, removed a wooden stake from his boot, and plunged it into
Elise’s heart. His hand moved swiftly to his mate’s mouth to cover
the sound of her scream, and then she began to melt away.

Sydney’s shock was quickly followed by a dark
satisfaction that the bitch was gone, followed by a pang of guilt
at the previous unsolicited feeling.

Jacob collapsed with the melting vampire, and for a
moment, Sydney thought that the link between them, rather than
freeing him and making him mortal again, had killed him as well.
But he wasn’t dead. Instead, he sobbed, clutching at the quickly
decomposing vampire.

“
Jacob, be quiet! They’re going to
hear and come down here!” While the walls were reinforced steel and
the rooms and hallway were said to be soundproof, Jacob was having
a fit over Elise, and vampire hearing was impressively good.
Soundproof by human standards might not be exactly the same as
soundproof by vampire standards.