Charleston Past Midnight (15 page)

My decision is made. I’m going after him and hope to God that I can rescue her in the process. I can’t trace to the top of the pinnacle because I haven’t been there before, so instead I employ another ability. I focus and fly straight up just like he did moments earlier, hoping that he doesn’t drop her before I get to them.

Inside of four seconds I’m balanced on the sloped metal roof, not three feet away from them.

He sneers, “Don’t be foolish, Severin, I told you that I would have her. You knew your time with the girl was limited. I am, however, quite disappointed that you didn’t heed my advice and turn her. Now you force my hand.”

Somehow, through my terror for her welfare, I manage to find inner calm. My focus is honed to a knife’s edge. Tears stream down her beautiful face. Her eyes are glued to mine, silently pleading for help against the monster that has her in his vice-like hold
.
I’m staring at my worst nightmare sprung to life before me. He knows my Achilles’ heel, knows my depth of feeling for her. He’ll use it against us both if I let him.
Never!

Just hold it together, Calla ….

My eyes reluctantly break from hers as I do my best to gauge his next move.
He can’t stay up here forever.

“Mmm …. Her blood smells simply delicious, and I can scent you on her. Isn’t it divine to find a blood thrall that is submissive to your whims, Severin?”

He’s trying to detonate my temper, make me lose focus.
Remain calm ….

“She’s not now and never will be in servitude to me, Valdon. We are together by choice.”

He grins, his lethal fangs glinting in the quarter slice of moonlight. “Ah, we all convince ourselves of that, Severin, and over time, some even believe it. No, this one will soon come to know me as her new master.”

I nearly lose it as he leans his large frame down to slowly lick up the right side of her cheek. She gives a desperate, strangled cry but is paralyzed with fear at being suspended three stories in the night sky. All he has to do is relax his hands and she will plunge to her death.

Must make my move ….

“I know her well, Valdon. She is far too headstrong to ever bend to your will. She will only hate you for it, and she will turn on you, I guarantee it. Give her to me. Save yourself the hassle.”

“Never. I know how to break beauties like her. I’ve done it countless times. And if she thinks just possessing the gift to catch glimpses of what’s coming will help her thwart me in some way, she will be swiftly and effectively corrected. Now our little discussion has come to an end. I suppose I should thank you for breaking her in for me, Severin. Your blood is not the only substance of yours that I can scent on ….”

My brain explodes at his vulgar insult. I launch myself forward in a blur of power and speed. My right fist connects with the side of his head as I make a desperate grab for her.

The vicious struggle lasts only twenty seconds, but it feels like centuries as she is tugged back and forth. We use anything in our means to attack each other. Finally I have her in an awkward hold, pressed tightly into my side. My only choice is to trace us, which I’m about to do when he roars in fury and launches straight into us, his hands stretched out toward my neck.

“Don’t let go!” I scream to her as his body hits mine with the force of a Mack Truck that’s just barreled down a steep incline. His power is astonishing as he presses me into the steel of the roof. She is clutching at my belt, desperate to hold onto me as the fight turns vicious. His eyes are black as his massive hands attempt to close around my throat. I heave my body up and flip over, knowing that this is it—do or die time. Her hold turns frantic. Her fingers are giving out under the weight of gravity coupled with our violent movements. I reach down but only connect with her hair.
She’s slipping ….

I decide to let him do his worst. I can’t let her hit the pavement, or worse yet, the gravestones. She’d never survive a three story fall.

I reach lower to grab for her when his hold is suddenly loosened. He smiles cruelly at me and in one swift movement he stomps on her shoulder with such force that I hear the bone crack. I grab blindly for any part of her, but she is already falling fast. Her screams of anguish mix with his depraved laughter.

Trace!

I’m back down on the sidewalk in the blink of an eye but I’m still ten feet from where she is about to land. I launch forward, determined to catch her, but I fall short. Only one extended palm is there to slow her descent as she lands with a sickening thud on the hard-packed earth, just inside the gates of the cemetery.

He’s still laughing and I barely comprehend him yelling down at me, “I’ll be seeing you both very soon, you can count on it. Oh, and I can’t wait to see how she turns out, Severin.”

Blood gurgles up from between her parted lips.
Internal bleeding, she’s shutting down fast ….

As gently as possible, I slide my arms beneath her still warm body and bring her up to a slight incline. Her glazed eyes are in and out of focus, and it’s destroying me to see her in this much physical pain. I know that there is little time. Once her heart stops … that’s it. I’ve never turned another, believing it unjust to bestow our dark gift without an exceptional reason.
Could I, rather than lose her forever?

She sputters out a blood-filled cough. I try to soothe her by holding her close, running my hand gently down her cheek.
Her heart is faltering … not much time.

She makes a wet, strained sound. I lean down close to her lips. I must comprehend what she is trying to tell me.

Barely audible, her voice is unrecognizable as she struggles to choke out, “T-turn ….”

That’s all she can manage before the blood filling her mouth makes it impossible for her to continue. That was enough incentive for me. Not wanting any passerby to see us, I quickly drag her back into the heavy shadows in the corner of the cemetery. With my back propped against the white stucco wall of the church and her body reclined in my lap, I use my fangs to tear into my left wrist. Confident that the flow is steady, I do what was done to me so very long ago: I use my fingers to work her lips open and swiftly seal them with my wrist.

For the longest moment, nothing happens. Confusion roils through me. I wonder if I did something incorrectly, or if I was simply too late.

I hear Ambrose and Case calling out from a distance, “Where the fuck are you?”

Knowing that I need their help, I turn in the direction of the sound. “Over here!”

Within seconds, they’re crouched low. Ambrose is used to wreckage on a massive level. He’s always outwardly calm. Only the flare in his light eyes gives any indication that he’s worried.

Case starts to prowl the graveyard before us, eyes narrowed, ready to attack anyone or anything that comes near us.

Ambrose grits out, “How long have you given your blood to her?”

My voice is shaking as I tell him, “Maybe a minute. Her mouth was full of blood when I covered her lips.”

“Here, pull away, let’s tip her to the side to clear her mouth. It’s faint as fuck but I can still hear her heart. Your girl’s a fighter.”

She is.

As quickly and gently as possible, we roll her over. Ambrose rips the sleeve off his shirt, and as I hold her up in my arms, he cups her jaw with his wide palm and uses his thumb to press down on her lower teeth, effectively pushing her jaw open as wide as it will go. Scarlet blood streams out of both corners and he wastes no time inserting the wadded up white material to swiftly and efficiently clean out her mouth.

“Okay, gotta be quick to get some down her. Ready?”

I nod. He pulls the saturated cloth away and grinds out, “Now!”

I lock my bleeding wrist down against her face and hope that she can manage just one swallow. A human can only turn when they are at the precipice of death and can only be given the dark gift directly from a vampire, at his or her discretion. She needs to get at least a mouthful of my essence inside her to counteract the colossal internal damage that is taking her life with the swiftness of water down a drain. I’m becoming desperate, uncertain if I can save her.

He straddles her legs to assist. “Let’s tip her head back a bit.”

My head is pounding with pressure.
Can’t lose her 
….
Fuck!

Suddenly her body jolts hard against us as if she was just shocked hard with a defibrillator. Ambrose lets out a sigh of relief. My eyes fly to his in question. He nods once. “She’s good.”

I bang my head back against the hard stucco, amazed that we weren’t too late.

“Ambrose, the keys are in my pocket. The SUV is just around the corner on Market Street.”

“On it, back within five minutes. Case, keep things tight.”

The gigantic male continues scanning the shadows, keeping a lookout as he grunts his response to Ambrose. Standing above us, Ambrose looks down. “Forgive us, Severin. We had a run-in with Valdon’s thugs out at Wild Dunes. Things almost got messy in front of a bunch of humans. Obviously that was part of the nasty fucker’s grand plan. Never again. We’ve got his number. Alina traced back to the house. She has a broken wrist; nothing that won’t heal overnight. Back in a minute, keep it streaming down her, she’ll latch on soon.”

I watch him jog out of the enclosed graveyard before I focus my attention once again on Calla. Her body begins to writhe slowly. My far more powerful blood has begun to heal her injuries as she turns. I’ve no time to focus on whether what I did was wrong or not. If I had to relive it a thousand times over, the outcome would be the exact same. I suppose I knew that she would eventually be turned the moment I rescued her at Mixture.

I nearly groan in relief as her slim fingers latch around my forearm, desperate to gain deeper access to the healing substance.

I stroke her hair, mostly wet with her own blood, and whisper encouragement to her. “Good, Calla, drink from me. Everything is going to be all right now. I’m going to get us to back to safety.”

Case’s deep voice calls out, “Humans coming, on foot. Keep quiet.”

I watch him back deeper into the black shadows. The last thing we need are humans calling the cops for fucking around in an off-limits historic graveyard. I’m surprised that after the throw-down that occurred with Valdon nobody came to check it out; then again it’s the weekend and the drunks are out. Shouting and fighting is commonplace downtown. There’s a bar on just about every corner and that’s not by accident. So no, somebody pretty much has to be standing in the street screaming out “Fire!” for anyone to take notice, at least at night.

She moans softly, but it’s too faint for anyone to hear.

“He just rolled up. I’ll help you get her in back.”

I don’t have to tell him to be gentle. Despite his size, Case is overly cautious with females, most likely aware of the damage he could cause with his brute strength. Keeping my wrist in place I cradle my other arm around the back of her head and let Case carry her sideways the twenty feet to the idling SUV. We slide into the back and he takes the passenger seat. Ambrose takes off into the night.

“Calla, Calla … can you hear me?”

She groans but is most likely still too out of it for my words to register.

Not until we’re on the bridge does Ambrose ask, “She hanging in there?”

“Thankfully. Your timing was impeccable. Thank you.”

“None needed. That’s what families do.”

“Right.” Even with that single choked word the level of gratitude and emotion is unmistakable.

His eyes stare into the rearview mirror, watching mine closely. No words are needed. They never have been between us.

She’s going to make it. Dear God, don’t let her hate me for it.

Chapter Seventeen

Present Day, The French Huguenot Graveyard

Everything You Thought You Knew

T
he searing pain is unimaginable. My body is in such agony that all I can do is hope that my brain will shut down so I won’t have to deal with it much longer.
I’m drowning in my own blood. I know it.
Every time I struggle to drag in a breath, I gag and choke from the mounting fluid that is blocking my airway. I tried to tell him to turn me but I doubt he understood my desperate plea.
Oh God, I don’t want to die like this, battered and broken in an old cemetery, only a few feet from the dirt I’ll surely be under before long!
I’m not a doctor yet but I’m certain that the organs inside me are torn up. I can feel internal spasming down my right side, the one that took the hardest hit in the fall. The clenching is coming harder with every urgent attempt to get air into my lungs. I doubt I’d even make it to the ER.

The vicious pain explodes as I’m tilted onto my side. If my mouth wasn’t filled with my own hot blood I would be screaming out in agony. Some sort of material is shoved into my mouth. Confusion grips my hazy thoughts and I feel strange, like I’m being pulled down into a strong undertow. Darkness begins to envelop me and I desperately try to stay lucid. The fear is all-consuming, the only thing keeping me from succumbing to the lure of death.
Must fight!

As if through a fog, I hear a different male voice shout, “Now!”

Once again, familiar skin presses down against my open lips. I want to sob because whatever he did before didn’t work. Undoubtedly I’m too far gone to be turned.

Just then 
… I feel a sliver of something that is like liquid sunshine gliding down my throat. The flawlessness of the substance is astounding.

Again the male voice, “Let’s tip her head back a bit.”
Ambrose?

More of the warm, addictive fluid slides down my throat. I can’t recall anything that tastes so complex and delicious. Finer than the most fabulous champagne and the richest of chocolate combined. No, whatever this is has the power to soothe as well as to cover the torturous pain that’s holding me hostage. Suddenly, of its own accord, my body jolts hard, as if I’m prodded with a lightning bolt. There is little pain now, only the warming bliss that is masking all the prior damage.