A KNOCK AT the door summoned me from my deathlike slumber. Really, it was more of a pounding that caused my door to shimmy and quake. I lifted my head without opening my eyes and then let it drop. It was too much effort to get up. Whoever it was would go away eventually.
The knocking paused. Moments later it resumed, louder than before. I pried my eyes open and blinked at the purple and blue wings filling my vision. Lowen leaned forward. "You have company."
I turned on my side and buried my head in the couch I'd ended up on last night. "I can hear that. Tell them to go away."
Between one breath and the next, I drifted off. A sharp pain on the rim of my ear brought me back to the land of the living.
"Take care of it before they break the door," Inara ordered. She released the abused appendage and flitted out of range before I could swat her.
"I'll be fast enough one day, pixie," I said, giving her a dead stare even as I lumbered to an upright position. When had sitting gotten so hard?
"Not even in your prolonged life," she returned in a scathing voice.
"Yeah, yeah." I yawned, my eyes falling shut. Couldn't this wait? I thought it could. I started to lean back against the couch. I was just so frickin’ tired.
One of the pixies dive bombed my face. "Get up and answer the door, you worthless blood sucker."
With a long groan, I made it to standing and with the help of the pixies swooping at me whenever I veered off course, I made it to the front door. I leaned against the wall for stability and unlocked the first lock, then the second. I'd barely finished with the last lock when the door thrust itself open and a very angry pair of werewolves stalked inside.
"Please. Come right in," I said in a dry voice as I squinted against the bright light. Well, that answered the question of why I was so exhausted when I normally woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed. As a new vampire, I still struggled to stay awake when the sun was in the sky. Most of the time I could only manage a few minutes at sunrise and sunset. At the moment, the sun was shining bright and cheerily in the sky. This had to be a new record for me.
"Where is she?" Brax rounded on me as Sondra moved through my small apartment, her head up and face alert. A pair of ice blue eyes glared at me with a fierceness that would have taken my breath away if I’d been able to summon enough energy to feel fear. His power, that thing that only he as alpha had, filled the room with heat. It felt like standing next to a raging wildfire. You just knew if the wind shifted in the wrong direction, your ticket was up, and it would be an unpleasant way to go.
I shut the door and shuffled back to my couch. I collapsed onto it. "Who are you talking about?"
"Don't try to lie to me. I smelled her on your landing. I know she came here."
I made a whimpering sound. Why couldn't the big, bad werewolf just shut up and leave me in peace? Couldn't he see that I was in no shape to deal with his shenanigans?
"She's not here," Sondra said, appearing from the hall that led to my bedroom. She moved with an almost feline grace through my apartment, which was funny since she was a wolf. Her hair was a curly mess around the feral beauty of her face.
Brax leaned down, trying to use his standing position and general badassery to intimidate me. Most days that would work. Today, I was just too tired to feel anything beyond the smallest spurt of concern. Then that too was gone. Even now, I could feel the allure of sleep sucking me back down.
"Where's Caroline?" he growled.
"You're her alpha. You tell me." I gave him a sleepy smile. "Guess you wish you'd been a little more forthcoming when I needed you to. Tit for tat."
He stared at me for a long moment. He wasn't handsome, not in the traditional way. He'd never be on a billboard or featured in a magazine. He was rough around the edges, like a really sexy mountain man—one capable of changing into a wolf and ripping your throat out at a moment's notice. He had a presence to him, a way of demanding attention anytime he was in a room. Right now, he was trying to use that same sense of charisma to get answers from me.
The pixies landed on either side of my shoulders, Inara haughty and amused, while Lowen had an implacable expression on his face. Brax eyed the two of them with a look of distaste before whirling and sending my coffee table sliding across the room with a well-placed kick.
"Rude animal," Inara said with a moue of disgust.
I patted next to her, mainly because she managed to evade the pat. "Shh, don't upset the alpha. You wouldn't like him when he's upset."
I realized what I just said and snickered.
"What's wrong with her?" Sondra asked, watching me with fascination.
"Nothing’s wrong with her," Inara snapped. "She's just tired."
"This isn't a game, Aileen. You need to tell me where she is right now before someone gets hurt." Brax paced the small space, running a hand through his hair and making it stand upright for a moment.
"Did I hear you right? Were you just threatening one of my vampires?" a silky voice asked from my open door.
I cracked one eye open from where it had drifted shut and glared at the newcomer. "Does nobody respect a person's private space anymore?"
Both men ignored me. Liam stepped into the room, his enforcers at his back. A vampire several centuries my senior, Liam was a dragon given human form. He moved with the grace and confidence of a predator at the top of the food chain. Every movement he made held the potential for violence even as it looked like it belonged in a dance.
He had a maturity about him that said he'd been turned somewhere in his early thirties—something I envied him for. Who wanted to be stuck in their mid-twenties forever? He had dark hair and electric blue eyes that had a habit of seeing right down to the very core of a person, stripping away their paltry defenses. His cheekbones were sharp and his jaw stubborn, but his lips were utterly soft and kissable as I'd discovered during the one and only time I'd ended up kissing him. I claimed the distraction of my first blooding as the reason. He was the thorn in my side that just kept digging deeper.
"Hey there, baby ass-kicker, you're looking kind of rough," Nathan, his enforcer, said with a playful smile on his face. He was light where Liam was dark and acted like a flirtatious frat boy. I'd seen him kill, though, and knew he was every bit as deadly as everyone else in this room.
"I'm gonna kick all your asses as soon as I have my energy back." I gave up and let myself collapse on the couch, falling sideways.
"Aw, it's cute that you think that."
I made a grunt of argument. It was all I could manage with my current level of exhaustion.
"What are you doing here, Brax?" Liam asked. He moved with the grace of a tiger, beautiful and deadly, and oh so distracting.
"Your vampire is hiding one of our pups," Brax said.
Liam flicked a quelling glance my way. That would have normally made my night—I lived for pissing him off—but right now the effort was too much. I really just wanted him to go away and take all these other trespassers with him. He jerked his head and Eric, his other enforcer, strode for the hallway leading to the rest of the apartment.
"You won't find her," Sondra called after him, posting herself at the mouth of the hallway. "She's long gone."
Eric returned in moments and shook his head, confirming Sondra was right. She folded her arms and leaned back. All eyes turned to me.
"You're sure she was here?" Liam asked, fixing me with a stare.
"Her scent stops right outside the door," Brax responded.
I met their stares with as much energy as I could muster.
"I don't think you understand the severity of what is happening here," Brax began.
My eyes drifted closed as the conversation continued around me. I woke with a start, the taste of life and decadence on my lips. A weight pressed hard on my chest—Liam holding me down. One of my legs had curled around his. His eyes flared briefly as he finished licking the wound on his wrist.
"What the fuck?" I scrambled to seated as he stood and stepped away. "Did you just give me your blood again?"
He lifted one eyebrow, the superior expression on his face letting me know how stupid he thought that question.
I would have kicked the coffee table if Brax hadn't already knocked it out of the way earlier. Damn it. I just got used to bagged blood again. It had taken me weeks to be able to keep the stuff down after the last time I'd had a taste of Liam's blood.
"Don't do that again," I ordered.
"I will do what I must since you have already shown you can't take care of yourself. We needed you awake and alert for this conversation." He gave me a smirk. He knew exactly how difficult his blood would make my coming weeks. Yeah, I'd be supercharged for a few days. Stronger, faster, able to leap tall buildings with a single bound, but it came with a cost. That cost being the difficulty of keeping the bagged stuff down.
"When you two are done flirting, can we get back to business?" Brax asked. He'd taken a seat on the coffee table he'd knocked across the room and was leaning forward, his eerie blue eyes focused intently on me.
I glared at him, properly outraged at his presence in my territory now that I had the energy to stay awake and alert.
"From what I understand, Caroline needed a little away time from the farm you secluded her on. I understand the feeling." My smile was humorless. "All of this can be a little hard to take at times."
"No, you don't." Sondra stepped forward. "You can't. You're not a wolf. She's dangerous right now, both to herself and others. If we can't find her and she hurts someone, she could be put down."
I scoffed. "Like you were?"
Shame crossed Sondra's face before her expression firmed.
"Those were mitigating circumstances," Brax said, his voice a rumble in the quiet.
"It doesn't matter. Caroline won't let herself hurt anyone." Not physically at least.
"She's not the same person you knew," Sondra said.
"I was turned, and I managed not to hurt anyone," I said as a defense.
"You're not normal," Liam spoke.
"That's for sure," Nathan agreed.
Eric didn't give his opinion, just lurked in the background as he usually did, keeping an eye on things as he observed the situation around him.
Liam ignored the comment. "Most yearlings have to be heavily monitored for their first few decades. Before we had such strict laws governing their creation and rearing, they would rise and kill those closest to them when they tried to resume their normal lives. Their instincts often consume them, making it hard to establish control for a long time after their turning."
I shifted. This wasn't the first time I'd heard something similar. Evidently, I should have killed a whole army of people in my first year. The fact that I hadn't was a puzzle my sire and Liam were still trying to figure out.
"It's more than just her wolf she has to contend with. The demon taint has made her unstable," Brax said, sounding grim. "It's why I had to move her to the farm and extend her time there."
"What do you mean?" I asked. "I thought the demon taint was taken care of when Sondra bit her."
The look Brax leveled on me was both pitying and censorious. "Demon taint is not so easily remedied. She will have to deal with its effects for the rest of her life. The bite saved her life and preserved her sanity, but it still has a hold on her. She is stronger than other newborn pups. Her temper is shorter, which means it will be that much easier to snap and go feral."
"Feral? Like a wild dog?"
"Similar," Sondra said from my countertop, where she sat cross-legged. Glad to see she was making herself at home. "For us, it means a loss of self. The wolf takes over and becomes rabid. Its thirst for blood unquenchable. A feral wolf can never recover the person they were. They have to be put down one hundred percent of the time."
Some of my exhaustion faded away, and I looked from Brax to Sondra in worry. "Caroline's not feral."
"For now." Sondra's agreement didn't put my mind at ease.
"There are those in my pack who think I should have put her down as soon as we discovered the taint." Brax met my eyes with determination in his gaze. His mouth was pulled tight, and his eyebrows lowered in a frown.
My chest tightened, and a chill crept into my soul at his words. Why hadn't they told me any of this before? They could have revealed this information during any of the dozen phone calls I'd placed asking for news on her condition.
Liam appeared at my side and sat down, stretching his arms across the couch behind my back—his body coiled and poised for action. It was only then that I realized that I was making a growling, hissing sound, similar to the deep throated warning a cat gives when it’s preparing to claw the face off its enemy. My fangs were down, and my hands were tensed and flexed as if they had claws on the ends of them.
Sondra leaned forward, one leg dropping down as she focused on me like a hunting dog sighting its prey. Nathan and Eric took a step closer, both watching me with caution. The room was poised for battle, the tension making it almost hard to breathe.
I took a deep breath, my shoulders lifting and dropping. My hands relaxed and my fangs returned to their hiding places in my gums. I'd discovered early on that vampires don't walk around with their fangs out all the time. Most of the time they were kept hidden. Strong emotions such as anger, fear, and lust could bring them out. Guess which one I was feeling at the moment?
"Why wasn't I told any of this?"
"You're not pack. Furthermore, Caroline made it clear she didn't want to see you."
Not pack. It always came down to an “us vs. them” mentality with these guys.
"I'll ask again. Where is she?" Brax's face was set and serious.
I kept my silence, meeting his gaze for a long moment. "She showed up last night and asked for a place to stay."
"And you didn't think to call us?" There was an edge to Brax's voice, and his frown grew more pronounced.
I lifted one shoulder. "It crossed my mind." I left out the part about how Caroline flipped out when I tried.
"Because you delayed, you've put her life needlessly in danger." Brax's tone was cold as his gaze shifted to Liam next to me. "This is what comes when you're too lenient with them."
My snort held all of the exhaustion and fear I felt. "This is what comes when you withhold important information just because someone isn't the same species as you. I begged you to let me know what was going on. I even threatened to blow-up your properties."
"And would knowing have made you act any different? You, the yearling who refuses to join a clan? Who hasn't even made the smallest effort to gain control of your instincts?"
Liam's hand landed on my shoulder, restraining me when I would have leapt for Brax.
"See what I mean?" Brax asked Liam. "She doesn't even know when she's fighting out of her weight class."
"Way I remember it, the reason you aren't some demon's plaything is because I saved you. Me, the baby vampire who doesn't know her weight class."
"She does have a point there," Nathan said with a grin.
Brax ignored his statement.
"Enough of this," Liam said. "The girl is gone. Aileen, do you know where?"
I hesitated. It galled to have to share any information with the jerk across from me, but if he was right, he held Caroline's life in the balance. At least for now, it would be smart to humor him.
"No, I gave her my bed last night and then went to sleep."
"You didn't see her leaving? Ask where she was going?" Sondra asked, a thread of judgment in her tone.
I shot her a derisive look. "You've seen me since arriving. I'm barely functional during the day. A herd of unicorns could have pranced through here, and I wouldn't have known the difference."
Brax didn't move and his expression didn't change, but I got the sense that my answer frustrated and disappointed him. He looked at Liam. "We'll need to take custody of Aileen in case Caroline tries to contact her again."
I stiffened and glared at him in outrage. No way was that happening. He wasn't the police. There'd be no taking custody of anyone.
"That won't be necessary," Liam said.
Brax's attention shifted to the vampire at my side. The wolf moved behind his gaze. To my new other sight, the shadow of a wolf cloaked him even as his power emanated in waves off him. It was like staring into the sun during a flare.
A cooler power, like that of the cold bite of an arctic night, flared as Liam tensed to meet him. You would think the absolute chill of his power would be uncomfortable. It wasn't. It called to some deep part of me that shifted in answer as if hearing the voice of a loved one after a long absence.
"It's my wolf and by her own admission she's been in contact with her. Your vampire has interfered with one of the most sacred aspects of our existence. If it was the other way around, your kind would have attacked en mass," Brax snarled.
"I don't disagree with the importance of locating your wayward wolf, and I'm well aware Aileen has trespassed on things she does not understand."
I shot him a glare at that last part. He ignored me, focusing on the wolf in front of him.
Brax watched Liam with a careful gaze. He seemed to be considering, weighing each of Liam's statements.
"Your vampire has already proven her inability to keep her nose out of things that don't involve her," Brax stated. Much of the antagonism had dropped from his voice, and the hint of a growl that had been there since he'd barged in had disappeared.
"This does involve me. She's my friend. She came to me for help." If he thought I was going to wash my hands of this, especially after what he'd just revealed about how close she was to a death order, he had another thing coming.
He shot Liam a glance as if to say 'see'.
Liam sighed and muttered, "You're not helping matters."
I folded my arms and sat back. By all means if he wanted to handle things, whatever they decided, I'd find a way to work around if necessary.
"Until your pup can be found, we’ll take responsibility for Aileen," Liam said.
My head twisted so fast that I almost got whiplash. One of his hands dropped from the back of the couch to brush against my neck. I held my tongue, not because I trusted him or because that touch asked me to. I did it because I had no intention of letting him or his men keep me on a short leash. I figured it'd be easier giving them the slip than it would be Brax and his people. Not to mention I had a feeling my stay with Brax would be a lot less cordial this time, given the degree of hostility currently being aimed my way.
"She’ll stay with us, and I, or one of my enforcers will be with her at all times. You have my word on it." Liam sounded firm, and I wasn't sure if that first part was directed at me or Brax.
"That doesn't fix the problem she's already created," Brax said, his gaze canny. "I wonder how the newly selected master of the Midwest would take it if he found out one of his own had misstepped so horribly. How would he handle it if the rest of our city knew the vampires have taken it upon themselves to interfere with our young? It might feed into some of the hard feelings that have been brewing over the last few months."
Liam was a frozen statue at my side, none of his feelings leaking through as he regarded the wolf with a lazy gaze. "You've made your point. To help smooth over this matter, I will attempt to locate the pup and bring her back to her pack."
Brax drummed his fingers on his thigh, studying me and the vampire at my side. He looked like he didn't like the proposal, but he couldn't find a reason to say no. Sondra, at his back, shook her head in disgust and hopped off my counter.
"Fine." Brax's acceptance was grudging. "You keep her close, and if by chance you find Caroline, you notify me immediately."
Liam gave him a sharp nod.
Brax's gaze swung to me. "And you?"
I let out a breath. "Whatever you say."
Liam turned his head, meeting my eyes with a catlike smile, as if he'd gotten everything he'd ever wanted. His hand behind me reached up to twirl a piece of hair around his finger. I narrowed my eyes at him and sat forward.
"Checkmate," he rumbled in a low voice, one intended only for my ears.
We remained seated as Brax and Sondra showed themselves out. The stairway rattled as they made their way down, even supernatural beings unable to navigate its length silently.
Nathan said, "That went well."
Eric, his hands clasped behind his back, made a small noise of disagreement. Liam pulled his arm from the couch behind me and leaned forward.
"What are you guys doing here anyways?" I asked. Not that I was complaining, for once. Without them, I got the sense things might have gone very differently for me with the werewolf alpha. I had a feeling I might have been kidnapped before the day was over, had Liam and company not shown up.
It was just strange, that was all, given the sun's height. It was just now beginning to set, and I could feel it as it began its descent. Twilight wouldn't be far away. While the myth that vampires couldn't go out in the sun was largely just that—myth—it was still true that it wasn't our natural element. I'm told that older vampires, ones that have matured enough to stay awake through the day, could go out in it without burning themselves to a crisp. They could enjoy the beach on a summer day, catch a wave and sun themselves. All the things I haven't been able to do for two years. The drawback being, they were significantly weaker and long-term exposure became uncomfortable. Or so I'm told.
Nathan and Eric looked at Liam. After a beat, Nathan said, "We heard the wolves were in the area and thought we'd stop by to see if you needed help."
I frowned at Nathan. Something about that story didn't add up. "You drove all the way from your headquarters downtown to my little abode on a rumor? During rush hour?"
Nathan once again looked at Liam before nodding. "Yup, that's what we did."
I turned to glance at Liam. He stared back at me, his gaze enigmatic. He looked relaxed and at ease as he rested against the couch, as if he'd just stopped by for pizza and a beer. If I didn't know better, I'd say he was pretty pleased about this turn of events.
"Did you have someone watching my apartment?"
His gaze sharpened, and the slightest bit of tension entered his muscles. That was a yes.
"I thought we had an agreement," I said, my eyes flashing with anger. "You leave me alone if I found one of Thomas’s progeny, and I go my merry way."
Thomas was the vampire who had become the master of the city and the ruler for all the surrounding territory earlier this spring. He also happened to be my sire. I'd negotiated for my freedom before revealing that last bit. It should have been enough to buy me out of vampire interference, but as usual, things were stickier and more complicated than I'd anticipated.
"That agreement was with Thomas and Thomas alone." Liam relaxed back into the couch.
"He's your leader. How can you say that?" I said.
"As I recall, he only agreed to not force you into a clan or compel you to serve him; nothing in there about keeping an eye on you," he said with a lazy smile that exposed the points of his fangs.
Vampires. Always looking for a loophole.
"That also doesn't cover my own interest in you," he continued. He brushed one finger against the arm that displayed his and the sorcerer's mark.
I turned it slightly, looking at the mark emblazoned on my forearm. A normal—aka human—would assume it was a tattoo. In reality, it was an intricate piece of artwork that would never fade and told the world of my debts. When the sorcerer had first marked me, it had been a stylized lion wrapped in a vine with thorns. At first glance it appeared silver, but on closer inspection you'd see flecks of purple that looked almost metallic, as if someone had poured colored metal into the dye and then embedded it into my skin.
Since Liam had placed an unsolicited mark on me, it had changed. Now an oak tree grew behind the lion. At first, its branches had been bare of all but a few leaves, but now they were full, a green and earthy bronze joining the silver and purple. I had no idea what the addition of the leaves meant and doubted I would like the answer when I figured it out.
Liam gave the mark a pleased look. "It's taking root quite nicely."
I pulled my arm out of his grip, shooting him a displeased look of my own. "So, it would seem."
"That mark makes you my business. Whatever your agreement with your sire, it doesn’t affect our relationship."
"We don't have a relationship," I said through gritted teeth.
"That mark says otherwise."
"Because you forced it on me."
He lifted one eyebrow. "We can spend the rest of your time here arguing semantics or you can pack. Your choice. You have ten minutes and then we're leaving."