Death's Redemption (The Eternal Lovers Series) (23 page)

“You…you can turn.” She whispered after a few minutes.

When he did, his jaw dropped. She’d stripped the shirt off and was now only in a sexy red bra. His nostrils flared, heat pooled thick into his gaze, and he wanted her to see it. Wanted her to know that he didn’t view her as a monster or as something vile.

She wiped the back of her mouth with fingers. Holding up the bloody shirt, she twisted her lips. “It was dirty.”

“It’s okay.” He grabbed it from her and tossed it to the ground. “We’ll get another.”

She merely chuckled, but didn’t respond back. “Can we head to Lise’s now?”

Glancing up at the darkening sky, he nodded. “It’ll be night soon. We’re safe to head into the city. Are you okay, though? Do you need more?”

“No.” She shook her head quickly, tucking a loosened strand of hair behind her ear. “I’m satisfied.”

She was too quick with her words, which made him wonder whether she was lying.

“Really.” She smiled and it was dazzling. Her skin looked flushed and pearly again.

Holding out his hand, he said, “Then are you ready?”

Looking down at her half-nude self, she laughed ruefully. “Since I can’t go back for a shirt, I suppose I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”

She hadn’t wanted to tell him the truth. The animal’s blood, while it’d been warm and delicious going down, was settling wrong in her stomach. It called to mind the deer she’d taken from and what had happened afterward. Was she allergic to animal blood? As much as it’d disgusted her to feed from the animal, she knew Frenzy was right. She had to feed. But her stomach was not adjusting well to her most recent meal.

She didn’t have this reaction when she drank from Frenzy.

He was like a god among men, and his blood had been ambrosia. She had a feeling drinking from him would never be the same as drinking from anything else, even a human. And as much as she’d craved more, yearned for it to the point that she’d nearly attacked during sex last night, she’d refrained.

She hadn’t lied when she’d told him that it’d been too good. The only comparison she had for it was like someone taking a hit of heroin for the first time. Her senses had flooded, her mind had been clearer, sharper; and the taste of him, like champagne.

Gods.

It’d been so overwhelming, made her feel ravenous, and for a split second the thought had crossed her mind that being an immortal, she could drink and drink and drink her fill of him, knowing he’d never die.

But she knew something about vampires, something he didn’t seem to be aware of. The more they took from the same source, the weaker that source would eventually become—
even
if they drank from immortals. She could literally suck all vitality out of him to the point that he would live only to be her food.

Faerie were strong, and there was a lot yet she didn’t know about him. It was entirely possible that she couldn’t trance him that way. But she had no real way of knowing since she’d never heard of a fae offering himself up to the avarice of the vampire. It just wasn’t worth the risk.

His thumb rubbed circles at the base of her back. She shivered, clutching him tight. The trip through space and time wasn’t as scary this time around as it’d been the first, but it was long, only helping to increase her dread of stepping foot back in that city.

“Are you okay?” he asked, his lips close to the shell of her ear, which made her stomach curl with sexual longing so fierce she had to shut her eyes and count to ten before trusting herself to speak.

“I’m fine.”

Silver eyes stared at her, as if knowing she was lying. He knew; he wasn’t a fool. But he also didn’t push it, and for that she was grateful. In fact, there was a lot about Frenzy that she liked.

He wasn’t at all what she’d expected when she’d first met him. It made her ashamed of how she’d treated him in the beginning. Cuddling into his warmth as much as possible, she leaned her head against his shoulder.

The starry tunnel they’d been traveling through suddenly turned opaque and, like a mirage in a dessert, it looked like they were staring through a sheet of shimmering heat. Objects on the other side manifested. A green Dumpster, potholes full of brackish water, brownstone apartments with fire escapes.

Frenzy hissed. “What the hell is this?”

After that, everything happened so quickly. Like an invisible giant grabbed hold of her and snatched her out of his arms, dumping her into the alleyway head over feet. Realizing instantly that they’d likely been ambushed, she swallowed the scream in her throat, landing like a cat on all fours, sniffing and scouting her surroundings.

When they’d left the woods dusk had just been starting. But the way the streetlamps hit the paved sidewalks and the absolute stillness and quiet of the usually teeming streets meant it was well past midnight.

Licking her lips, she scuttled behind the Dumpster and scented the air. There was nothing, literally no one. Where was she? This was San Francisco, but something felt very wrong, off.

“Frenzy?” she squeaked. So quiet it was more of a whisper, every flight or fight instinct inside of her was going off like the sound of a raging klaxon horn.

After five minutes, some of the panic began to wear off, helping her to think more clearly. When it did, it dawned on her that the ache in her stomach as they’d been traveling through the tunnel was definitely more intense, squeezing her intestines in a tight fist. Swallowing the bile trying to work its way back up her throat, she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to breathe through the churning nausea.

Grabbing on to her stomach, she inhaled and told herself that now was not the time to be sick. But as much as she damned herself to hell and back, her brain refused to believe that what she was feeling was all in her head. Her body suddenly broke out in a wash of sweat. Her limbs shook, a malaise unlike any she’d ever known took hold of her, and, dropping her to her knees, she threw up everything she’d just drunk.

When it was over, all she wanted to do was sleep. For an eternity. Close her eyes and never open them again. Her head was full of fuzz, her mouth tasted terrible, and her ears were ringing.

She rolled onto her side, and her breathing slowed to a crawl. It was so hard to think about anything other than the exhaustion lancing through her bones, piercing her skull. Closing her eyes, ready to give in to the sleep that beckoned, she finally heard something.

A heated whisper of conversation. “Are you sure this is where she was going to be dropped?” a deep voice rumbled.

Frowning, she tried to focus.

“Aye,” an obviously female voice snapped, “the reaper’s route was redirected. She’ll be here.”

“Nailia, you know what Frenzy will do. You’ve seen his—” The male sounded anxious.

“If you’re going to act like a whiny little bitch about this, Tronos,” Nailia hissed, “then you can return to the queen and tell her why you failed.” Her words dripped venom and spite.

Bloody hell, the queen had done this?

Mila blinked, trying to force her body into action. Slowly, inch by painful inch, she crawled backward on her hands until she was kneeling, panting heavily from the exertion used.

Somehow they hadn’t sensed her, but neither could she sense them. If she hadn’t heard them speaking she would never have known they waited just beyond the alley for her. As she took the wind into her lungs, the only things she smelled were rotten garbage and a hint of roses…

Then she frowned. Realizing what an idiot she’d been. Frenzy smelled of summer, of trees and flowers in bloom. Here in the middle of this dump she smelled roses.

The fae, they smelled of nature.

Looking up the walls of the apartments blocking her in on three sides, she knew she could jump to the rooftop. But what if there were more up there?

Why had the queen done this? She worried her bottom lip. How had she known that Frenzy and Mila would come back here?

Had everything the queen said been a lie? What was the box? Was it even anything? When they’d spoken this morning the queen had made her believe that she’d regretted the creation of the shadow almost as much as Mila did. But what if that wasn’t true? What if the queen actually did control that beast and was even now letting it stalk closer and closer to her?

Squeezing her eyes shut, wishing like hell Frenzy was close—she realized just how much she actually did need him. She’d always prided herself on being able to handle anything.

“We can’t just hang around here all night; the queen expects results,” Tronos whined.

“Gods, brother,” Nailia scoffed, “you are such a disappointment. The chit is going to be weak from no food.”

Mila could literally hear the vicious smile curl through her words. It made an icy shiver rush down her spine.

How did they know she hadn’t eaten?

“We bring her bait?” Tronos said in an “aha” tone.

“Exactly. Bring her bait,” Nailia crooned.

The way she said it, with that lilt in her tone, it made Mila’s skin crawl. She needed to find some way of escape; this couldn’t be it. She wouldn’t let it. Making her way painfully slowly to her feet, she gripped onto the edge of the green Dumpster, curling her fingers in so hard the metal began to dent. She wasn’t nearly as strong as she’d been, but she still had some strength. Not much, but maybe there was enough to get out of this mess.

Scanning the buildings one more time, she noted the nearest fire escape was at least twenty feet up. All her life her gran and mum had taught her that the way to winning was to holding on to the one thing she didn’t want to live without. To fight for something.

When she’d been alive, she’d fought for pride. Fought to prove that her gran’s and mum’s deaths hadn’t been in vain.

Then she’d met Frenzy, seen his fire and passion, the way he touched her, looked at her. How he’d tell her over and over that she wasn’t alone…He’d given her something she hadn’t had ever.

Hope.

Crouching low, she clung to that like a lifeline and willed her exhausted limbs to work one last time. Even if there were other fae waiting for her atop the roofs, at least she’d fought, at least she hadn’t stood here and waited to die.

But just as she was set to make that leap, she smelled something that sent shards of ice through her soul. Fresh, sweet, and tangy. The smell of blood. And, gods, it was heavenly. The scent of it crawled up her nose, infiltrated every thought or reason, made her unable to think about the fact that even now the fae were closing in.

That the thudding, beating heartbeat exciting her nerves to a fever pitch was most definitely the bait set out for her. That not only could she smell the blood, she could smell the fear of the human. The panting and sweating musk sliding out of his pores. It was primal, elemental. This was what she’d been created for.

What she was destined to be. A monster. The hunger grew and stretched malignant fingers deep inside her emaciated gut, whispering over and over that this was right, good, that she could not deny her nature any longer.

Eyes rolling in her skull, she took a tentative step out from behind the Dumpster. The fluttering beat of that heart was like a siren’s call, and where she’d been weak just seconds ago, a new surge of power filled her limbs.

The last dregs of her energy she’d saved to jump to freedom were now being used for one thing. Finding food.

A hunter’s instinct took over. Jumping against the wall, she dug her fingers into the brick, ripping into it like a hot knife sliding through butter. She was suddenly strong, sure. She was power; the mortal would die.

“Die,” she hissed, surveying the empty alley, stealthily moving, making sure to keep to the shadows so as not to alert her prey.

Mouth watering, she walked to the very edge of the alley and peeked her head around the building.

The two fae were standing upon a stoop. She recognized them immediately by the blast of roses in her nostrils. The man had long hair, falling down to his ankles. It was a blond that looked spun from moonlight. The female also had the same kind of hair. He was dressed in long black trench coat; she was in black leather and boots. Their faces were the same haughty, gorgeous ones she’d come to associate with the fae. Long, patrician noses, perfectly sculpted lips, and both with glowing blue eyes. The same kind of eyes she’d seen on the vampire who’d turned her.

Obviously they were twins, and it quickly crossed her mind that here was the proof the queen had indeed been in on it from the very beginning. When she’d first seen the vampire she’d had a fleeting memory of something odd about his eyes, but had quickly dismissed it since she was fighting for her life. Now she remembered mum had shown her a book once. A very old book that spoke of pledging one’s soul and honor to the queen of fae and how that pledge was sealed within the eyes, turning them an electric, shocking blue.

The queen had confessed to that this morning, but in hindsight Mila felt stupid that she hadn’t recognized it immediately.

The fae struggled with the woman in his arms.

A terrified human woman. Her brunette hair was caught up in a stylish chignon. She wore a polished plum business skirt suit with nude pumps. She obviously worked out. Her body was trim, lithe, and sleek.

Mila licked her lips, already tasting the salty sweetness, already feeling the glorious thickness of that crimson tide rush down her throat. She licked aching gums as her stomach groaned painfully, making her dizzy and breathless with hunger.

Studying the layout, she realized quickly that there were only the two fae. There were none on the rooftops, but it no longer mattered, because running away was not her priority. Getting to her food first was now the obsession.

However there was no way to snatch the woman and run. She’d be caught, likely taken by the queen’s bitches.

She snarled.

Famished as she was, going down that way pissed her off. The queen had set her up. But the hunger was making it hard to care.

Just then an image of gran’s face popped into her head. Her big, beautiful brown eyes pleading with Mila to make their sacrifice worth it. She’d be so ashamed of her now.