Blue Moon: Blood Moon Trilogy #3 (32 page)

S
ilence surrounded me as they all tried to put the pieces together. He did it. He’d successfully turned himself into a hybrid.

“How?” The question registered before the voice. Slowly, my eyes lifted to Corbin, who stood near the front door.

I stroked the pink scars on my arms, remembering the sound as Bobby’s nails tore through my skin. I traced them up to the spot on my elbow, recalling with crystal clarity the way the needle felt as it pierced my skin and how each beat of my heart filled the vial more and more.

“He took my blood,” I explained. One quick glance at my parents told me they were confused, so I decided to start from the beginning. “When he held me captive, in the compound, he’d ordered my blood taken. When he wasn’t forcing me into a room to watch me change into the wolf, he was either torturing me, drugging me, or sticking needles in my arms.”

A gasp escaped my mother as she clapped a hand over her mouth. I hated that I was tarnishing the image of her son, even if he was no longer the man she’d raised.

“His sire—the one who’d made him what he is—Gianna, had this theory that she could merge the two species. She’d been trying for years to mix our DNA with theirs multiple different ways, but always failed. Every test subject they’d acquired died an excruciating death.” Forcing myself to relive that awful time forced my heart to race and my unease to heighten. “Recently, she and Bobby had wondered if there was something they were missing, something that might help link the two bloodlines seamlessly.”

My mom and dad regarded me, expressions both curious and shocked.

“That string of murders in Scottsdale wasn’t just about Gianna building her army,” I told my dad. “They were to draw me out. They knew I would see the similarities to Bobby’s death. They wanted me involved because I was that link. The key to their success. They thought that since my DNA and Bobby’s came from the same bloodline that maybe they could get the werewolf and vampire blood to merge without the risk of rejection. He was all amped up to use me as his guinea pig, but he decided to wait. He hadn’t anticipated my escape.”

“Why would he wait?” Dad continued to prod like a good little detective. “If he had you, wouldn’t it have made more sense to just do what he’d intended?”

Nervous, I shifted my glance around the room before finding Nick. He gave me no indication as to whether I should tell them about the pregnancy or not; I would have to make that decision all on my own.

“At first, I had no idea,” I replied honestly, twisting my hands together anxiously. “He seemed ready to go forward with his plan, and then he just stopped. He told me he was going to wait a few months.” I bit my lip hard, dropping my eyes to the floor. “I didn’t know it at the time—until very recently, actually—but I’m pregnant.”

Any and all noise was snuffed out in an instant like all the oxygen had been sucked from the room. Nick came up beside me and took my hand in a show of support as my parents’ eyes widened in surprise. I looked from one pack member to the next, slowly gauging their reactions, and aside from Nick, Layla was the only one who didn’t look shocked by this news.

“Pregnant?” my mom finally said, stepping toward me, her eyes flitting between mine and my stomach. “At Christmas, you said—”

I cut her off before she could think I had lied to her. “I either wasn’t…or I simply wasn’t aware.”

A laugh slipped past her lips; it was a nervous sound. “It’s only been a couple of weeks. There’s no way you could possibly know already if—”

“Everything progresses faster with our pregnancies,” Layla spoke up, rubbing her own distended stomach. “I’ve only been pregnant just shy of four months. I’ll be considered full term by six.”

My parents seemed to be struggling with this news, so I decided to try and segue back to Bobby’s plans. “Bobby kept saying how he wanted to reunite our family. Chances are, if he’d succeeded with me, your fate would have been sealed in with ours. When I heard from O’Malley and Keaton that you’d both gone missing, I panicked. I flew to Scottsdale and found the clue Bobby left for me before rushing back here. At first, I hadn’t realized it was he who had taken you. The surveillance video from the airport didn’t show anything suspicious in that regard.”

“This is all so confusing,” Mom said, voice shaking.

“I know, Mom. I know.” I turned to the Pack. “Knowing what we know about Bobby now, we’re not safe during the day. He could attack at random. I don’t know if he’s able to create more hybrids or if he needs a pure bloodline for that, but we need to be on guard.”

Vince nodded. “The Shaman is coming over today to cast the barrier spell. I tried to get them here sooner, but I struggled to get a hold of them. They were reluctant to talk to anyone other than Marcus, and I figured you weren’t ready to take that on,” he told me, apologizing with his eyes.

“Magic?” Dad said, his skepticism audible. I admit, I felt the same thing originally, but then I remembered what I was now and all I was being forced to deal with because of it. Magic was absolutely a possibility.

“I know it sounds unbelievable, Mr. Leighton,” Vince told him, “but Marcus had a few connections. He had made contact with them before his death, but no plans were confirmed. I’ve been trying to make contact for days in order to get the barrier up and running. It won’t stop Bobby from getting through, but it will slow him down and give us enough of a warning to brace ourselves for his attack.”

“Why isn’t this something that’s in effect now?” Dad asked.

Vince answered as best he could, sounding a little hesitant. “We’ve used these barriers from time to time when the threat level is high, but they come at a price that Marcus isn’t always willing to barter.”

“And that price?” I asked, having never heard this before.

Reluctant to give me the details, Vince paused, taking a deep breath. “Shaman’s practice defensive magicks—barriers, shields, binding spells. They don’t cast anything that could knowingly harm another living thing. That’s not to say they
can’t
, but it goes against their moral compass.”

“Okay…”

“Like us, they have enemies as well as others like them who don’t follow their rules. In exchange for their barrier spells, we’ve often been used as their executioners.”

Hearing this shocked me. While I now accepted what we had to do for our own survival, it was jarring to hear that we might be asked to take the life of another just to pay back a debt. I looked around the room at my Pack, remembering the look of fear on both Marcus and Miranda’s cold, pale faces, and I came to a decision. Even if it sacrificed my comfort and morals.

“Do what you have to do,” I ordered before turning to Nick. “I want to head back to the manor and look around the library some more. I don’t know what I expect to find now that the cops have trampled through there, but I have to try and see if I can find anything that might tell us where Cordelia is.”

“I want to help.” My father surprised me by volunteering his services. I hadn’t expected him to jump into this investigation. “I just think that two detectives might be better than one.”

Smiling, I reached out and gripped his hand. “Thank you,” I told him. “I’d really appreciate that.”

While Vince and Layla stayed behind to contact the Shaman, Nick and I, along with my father, headed for the Manor. My mom wasn’t feeling well, so she found a quiet place to lie down. It didn’t surprise me that she wasn’t feeling well; she had to be overwhelmed by everything she had found out. Jackson assured me he’d keep a close eye on her, which made me feel better about leaving. I escorted her up to Layla’s room upon Vince’s insistence, and then we left for the manor.

The door creaked as we pushed it open, something I’d never noticed before now. The manor was usually so busy and full of noise and life that little sounds like that never really registered. I led the way to the library, still picking up traces of blood.

When I pulled the yellow crime scene tape from the doorway and crossed the threshold, I was surprised to find the scent almost as strong. Most of the blood had been cleaned, save for the massive stain on the carpet that Marcus had been found on. The white walls were still stained with streaks of blood from when Cordelia had likely tried to fight being taken.

While I surveyed the room from the center, absorbing everything I possibly could before taking a closer look at the finer details, my dad headed straight for the walls.

“Small finger trails.”

“Marcus and Miranda’s teenage daughter was here with them when the attack happened,” I explained almost robotically as I scanned the library, comparing it with my memory of that day. “There was a disturbance in the blood pool, indicating she’d likely happened upon her father after he’d died and kneeled next to him.”

“There are scratches in the blood trails,” Dad continued, leaning forward and inspecting them further.

I hummed my agreement. “She probably tried to use her claws to stop them from taking her.” Dad made a sound that said he wasn’t so sure, and that got my undivided attention. “What is it?”

He was silent for a minute, probably going over his theory once more to be sure he was right. “I’m not sure…” I watched as he lifted his hand and ran his finger over the slight tear in the drywall. “Hypothetically, if you were…what you are—”

“A werewolf,” I interjected, reminding me of one of the first conversations I had with Nick months ago.

“Right. Well, if you were taken and were trying to stop that from happening, wouldn’t the gouges in the wall be a little more…I don’t know…desperate?”

Stunned into momentary silence, I rushed to his side and looked at the claw marks. Not only were they shallow and thin, they were one long trail. I tried to put myself in her shoes, because my dad was right: something just didn’t add up.

“
M
aybe they’re not hers,” my dad offered, but I shook my head.

“It’s her. I can smell traces of her in the drywall left behind from her fingers and claws.” I continued to rearrange the puzzle I thought I’d almost solved, biting my lower lip as I concentrated. “And there’s virtually no trace of the coven anywhere here. Their scent was faint that day, and it’s almost non-existent now.”

Nick stood beside me, his hand brushing the small of my back. “What are you thinking?”

“I don’t know. None of it makes sense. Whoever was here took them all by surprise and took Cordelia again.”

“Perhaps watching her parents get murdered made her give up,” Nick suggested carefully, looking pained. “I seem to recall you didn’t put up much of a fight when I had to drag you away from Bobby after the cops arrived that night.”

What he said made a little bit of sense, but there were still behavioral inconsistencies to what happened here, and there was only one person who could fill in the blanks. There had to be an explanation to it all, but we wouldn’t get any concrete answers until we found Cordelia.

With even more questions and no answers, the three of us headed back to Vince and Layla’s place where we gathered the Pack in the living room and discussed our options. After talking it through, we all decided that the best course of action would be to head back to the compound for answers, and hope to God we found some information that would lead us to Cordelia.

“How can we be sure it’s safe?” Colby asked nervously.

“They won’t be there now that we know where it is. As far as we know, Bobby plans to build an army. I’m not sure how they intend to do this, but we won’t ever know unless I can get my hands on their research.”

“That’s assuming it’s still there,” Corbin spoke up, skepticism thick in his tone.

“Well, we need to at least try. We can’t just sit around here, waiting for one of them to strike. I doubt they’ll strike during the day while outnumbered, so this might be our only chance. Bobby has to know we’ve started to piece it all together by now.”

In a show of support, Nick moved to my side, like any Alpha’s mate would. “She’s right.” He turned to Layla and Vince. “Where are we at with that Shaman about the barrier spell? I want one around this place and the manor before we go anywhere.”

“He’s on his way,” Layla announced. “He should be here in a little under an hour.”

“Good,” I announced. “We’ll leave after that.”

Layla tried to convince me that we could all leave and that she would stay behind and wait for the Shaman to arrive, but I ordered against it. “It’s too dangerous. With Bobby able to walk in the day, he could be out there, just waiting for us to separate again. I won’t jeopardize another member of this pack.” That was the last I’d heard of it.

Just as promised, the Shaman showed within the hour. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t for him to look like a regular guy.

I’d seen so many movies and television shows that portrayed Sorcerers and Shamans as otherworldly, eyes glowing, skin of an unnatural shade of grey, and sometimes they moved as if levitating above ground after materializing out of nowhere.

This guy, though? He showed up, knocked on the door like a gentleman, and when I answered, I took note of his professional appearance. He wore a pair of jeans, a dress shirt, and a brown blazer, carried a briefcase, and his dark brown hair was combed neatly to the side. There was a scar running down the left side of his face, and his grey eyes practically shimmered behind a stylish pair of glasses as he stared down at me from a height of around five-ten. I shook his hand, introducing myself as the one in charge.

When he saw the rest of the Pack, he offered his condolences for our loss. “The news travelled fast amongst us all,” he informed the room before turning to Colby and Corbin. “Your parents were great leaders, and highly revered. They will be missed, and we will do whatever we can to help—over and above this barrier spell.”

Vince stepped forward and shook his hand. “Thank you, Alistair. You have no idea what it means to us.”

“It’s our pleasure, old friend. After all, Marcus has been very good to us.”

Curiosity prodded me to ask for the specifics, but I figured now was not the time, and I let Vince show Alistair around so he could get started on the barrier. As he moved around the house, chanting some kind of spell at every possible entry point, I watched, wondering how we would know if someone breached our fortress.

When the house was done, Alistair went outside, offering to cast a perimeter spell as well. My eyes remained on him as he stood in the backyard, his back to the house, and I gasped when I saw a strange wave of blue energy expand away from his body like a blast.

A blast of warmth moved through me, making my skin hum and my body tingle. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that his spell had been a success, and as I looked around the room, I noticed that the rest of the Pack had experienced the same thing.

Alistair ascended the stairs of the back deck and let himself back inside. “Everything is in place,” he announced.

“How will we know it works?” I finally inquired.

“Should a vampire try to cross the barrier beyond the house, it will stop them momentarily. Eventually, they will be able to pass, but not without struggling and sounding an alarm that only you will hear. It will be a high-pitched frequency that only canine hearing will pick up. They won’t be alerted, but it will give you enough time to prepare yourselves. I wish it could do more.”

Regardless, I was impressed so far. “And the windows and doors?”

“Should they make it through any one of the entrances, their lack of body temperature will activate a UV simulation, burning them and slowing them down.”

“It won’t kill them?”

Alistair shook his head. “Even burning them goes against our beliefs. Killing them would have me tried and executed amongst my people.”

While this sounded perfect, there was one that could make it past this particular spell. “And if a vampire had somehow managed to splice its genes with a werewolf, making it able to walk in the day?”

Alistair’s eyes widened in shock. “No such creature exists,” he proclaimed, sounding absolutely certain. “Such a monster would be an abomination.”

“Exactly,” I agreed. “Which is why we need to find a way to stop it.”