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Authors: Kathi S. Barton

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“No, he isn’t. What’s going on, Pete? What’s happened? Are you hurt, in danger?”
Aaron asked.

“No. She’s below on the courtyard. I can’t…my vine didn’t protect me from her. I don’t
understand.”
Pete looked down again. “
She needs a vamp, sire, or she’s dead.”

“You mean the woman from the restaurant? I’m finding someone now, Pete.” P
ete could feel Sara close to Aaron, their combined magic almost palatable even through a mental link.

“Tell me what you know about her, Pete. Is she marked? Do you think that’s why the vine
didn’t harm her?”

Pete didn’t know how to answer Aaron.
“Honestly, I don’t know. God, she’s powerful,
Aaron. She just threw me across the room like I weighed nothing, and she did something to the
two wolves with me. I threw a power ball at her and she ended up on the pavement below my
room. She’s still alive, but I can’t feed her. I…she hurt me. Not badly, but enough that I’m a little
weak but all right. There’s something about her, Aaron. I need someone here to heal her before
she dies.”

She felt Aaron’s comfort and strength as he sent it to her.
“Let me see what I can do. Just
wait for a few minutes, all right?”
Pete could feel when another person of strength and magic entered the conversation, and wondered about it.

Pete didn’t answer about the sigil, hers or the woman’s. Pete didn’t know why hers didn’t hurt the woman, and she had no idea if the girl had one or not. This was a very strange night, she decided.

Pete was a wood nymph and she was marked as such. Her mother, part Fae, had mated with a nymph and Pete had been born of that union. Pete’s mark had protected her and Dominic, her mate, when they had needed it, but it hadn’t with the girl.

The vine, a beautiful work of art of thick ivy, covered most of her body and down her arms and legs. Pete’s face was covered in green leaves and looked like a very well done tattoo to humans and some beings alike. Whenever Pete or Dominic had become threatened, the vines would cover them protectively and hurt, even kill those that caused them harm.

“Tristan can materialize anywhere over long distances. I can only manage short hops and it
will take too long for me to get there,”
Aaron told her. “
He is leaving now.”

“Thank you, master. I will explain when I get back home. Please tell Dominic that I’ll be
there soon and that I’m all right.”

Pete felt him laugh.
“I’ll try, young lady, but you had better be bringing him back something
naughty to appease him with. You know how he can be.”

Pete snorted. All the vamps she knew, and some wolves, were very worrisome. She wouldn’t be surprised if they all met her at the airport.

~~~

To say Pete was surprised would have been an understatement, if the look on her face was any indication, Tristan thought. One minute she was begging Aaron for help, the next there stood a strange vampire in her room. Tristan was slightly surprised to find the woman looking so pale.

“Oh thank goodness, she’s down here,” Pete said in way of greeting. “I hit her with a power ball and knocked her out the door. The ball goes to what I want it to, and will track. And since she didn’t have the good sense to just cooperate with me in the first place, when she ran in front of the door, bang! The sucker got her.”

Pete was moving at vampire speed down the stairs toward the back of the hotel. Tristan was close behind. Pete was babbling, but it was a nervous babble, one that said she was scared that he might not be able to save her. Tristan didn’t know why this injured woman was so important to them, but he would do what he could.

Tristan stopped ten feet from the girl who lay broken on the grass. He could smell her blood and feel her immense pain. She was breathing, but just barely. Her pulse had slowed and she was losing blood much too fast. He could also smell another scent, one that was unique to him, daisies and sunshine. And it was everything Tristan could do not to turn around and go back to the States and forget he’d ever decided to help Aaron.

What were the chances of finding his mate while helping out someone, a master someone at that? He lived in France most of the time, having been born there, so finding his mate there while visiting the States was too much to bear. He didn’t want to settle down, not now, maybe not even ever. But he had given his word he’d help out. Aaron MacManus was a good man and good men were few and far between. Especially vampires.

Tristan slowly walked to her and knelt down. He searched her body mentally and found that if Pete hadn’t have acted when she had, the woman would indeed be dead. Her back was broken, as were both her legs. She had eight ribs broken and one had punctured her lung. Her left hip was also broken in two places. Her jaw was cracked and she had a deep concussion. Plus, there were a multitude of cuts and abrasions, glass still imbedded into several of them. Tristan opened the vein at his wrist and forced her mouth open with his other hand. He squeezed her nose closed so she would either have to swallow or choke. He knew what he was doing, and the consequences of his actions. As soon as she swallowed the first mouthful, it was sealed. He was halfway to fully bonding with her, and he wasn’t happy about it.

When a pureblood bonded with a mate, it was slightly different than a turned mating. There had to be a blood exchange, a give and take at the same time. There also needed to be a sexual completion for them both, preferable with another blood exchange to ensure the bond. Once that was complete, they would be truly bonded and mated. But Tristan was of royal blood too. With this, there was a ceremony where they used a family heirloom, a jeweled dagger, and cut a vein over their hearts and drank from there. This exchange was more of a ritual than a need, but it was still practiced today. But he didn’t want to think about that right now. Besides, maybe, just maybe, he was wrong about the girl. And she was just a woman who smelled good
. Yeah,
he thought,
and I’ll go do a jig in the sunny streets tomorrow afternoon.

He felt Pete standing over him moments later. He didn’t take his eyes from the woman on the ground who was still sipping from his wrist. He didn’t have to hold her nose any longer, as she was now drinking greedily from him. The taste of him to her was just as addictive as her scent was to him.

“Who is…do you know her name?” he asked Pete, who stood just behind him. He could feel that she had just fed. His own hunger leapt in response to her fresh smell.

“She didn’t have any ID on her that we could use, but we managed to track down seven lockers at different points across the city. Each one had a different passport and identification to go with it. There were several variations on the same names, but nothing solid. She…she saved my life tonight. It’s my fault she’s in the condition she’s in. I…her power base is incredible.”

Tristan didn’t say anything for a long time. He pulled away from her mouth and licked the wound to seal it. She was badly hurt still. His blood, being pure, would heal her, but it would take a while because of the extensive damage that had been done to her. But she wouldn’t die, not now at any rate.

“She can’t be moved yet, at least not by conventional means. I have a place here in the city we can all go to. I’ll take her with me and you and your men can meet us there. I’m Tristan St.

James, by the way, and you are…”

“Sorry, I’m Piccadilly Marshall, everyone calls me Pete. I’m mated to Dominic, Aaron and Colin’s bodyguard. I have to get back to the States soon. My mate is nearly bonkers without me, and he knows, you see, about tonight. He wants me home.”

“Understandable. I will take the young woman with me then and will contact Aaron when she is able to move on her own. I will send someone for her things, if that is acceptable to you. Is there anything you can tell me about her? What she was doing in Paris?”

Not that it mattered, really. Aaron had sent him to Paris to save the young girl, and that he’d done. Whatever else happened was going to be all on Tristan.

“Yes, of course, I’ll have everything ready when they come. She is armed, or was. I’ve never seen so many weapons on one person in my life. She had two, no, three guns, a couple of lethal-looking blades, switchblades I guess, a tazer, and a few cans of really strong pepper spray on her. Inside of the lockers were more guns and ammo, even a few sticks of dynamite in one of them. Each one of the identifications we found has a permit to carry a weapon with it. She’s powerful, as I’ve said, but I don’t know what she is.”

Pete hesitated and Tristan was almost afraid for her to continue. “How did you meet her? I mean, if you fought, I can only assume you didn’t know her from before.”

Tristan felt one of the guests from the hotel start to come out onto the patio just in front of them. He sent him away with the thought to make love to his wife instead. Humans needed the comfort of touch and Tristan was merely giving it to him. Besides, they didn’t need any more witnesses to this.

“She warned me that I was in trouble and that the man I was using as a translator had been lying to me. She was able to hold an entire restaurant in thrall while she shot, killed, and beheaded a man without being noticed. I have since found out that there was a warrant out for his arrest. He was considered armed and dangerous. And according to my source, police were to shoot on site. I don’t know how she managed to get the jump on him, as she had made sure I was safely out before she did it. Oh, and she speaks Italian. Very well, as a matter of fact. As for being in Paris, I don’t know for sure. I’m sure it had something to do with the man from tonight.”

Tristan merely nodded. He was still trying to figure out what to do about her and had only heard about half of what Pete had told him. He was still trying to come to grips with what the woman was to him. And also what he was going to do about it.

“Tristan, I’d be very careful when she wakes up. She is a mite demanding. And she can be rude when the mood suits her, which seemed a great deal of the time.” He heard the laughter and the seriousness in her voice and wondered about it.

“Yes, I will, but she won’t be able to hurt me. Thank you, Pete. I’ll be taking her now.” He reached down and picked Bailey up, cradling her in his arms tightly. He dematerialized both of them away seconds later.

~~~

It wasn’t until a man who identified himself as Anthony, second butler to the St. James household, had gathered the girl’s four bags and drove away that Pete finally understood what Tristan meant. The woman he had just saved, the woman who she had almost killed, was his mate. Pete nearly laughed herself into a stupor all the way home and wondered often what she smelled like to him.

~CHAPTER FOUR~

Bailey woke up in a dark room. She started to move to get up when a searing pain rushed through her body, a moan escaping before she could stop it. She reached out and found that she wasn’t alone in the room. There was a vamp in the room with her. A male.

“The pain will lessen in a few hours. Then it will be gone altogether very soon, I would guess. Would you like some help getting up?” The voice was across the room, which was too dark for her to make out just where or who the voice was.

“Where am I?” She moved again, slower this time, and finally got her legs off the side of the big bed. She sat still, fighting against the overwhelming pain so that she wouldn’t pass out, but she really had to work at it.

“Impressive, young lady. You must hurt very badly right now. I wouldn’t have thought that there was any way for you to move much less sit up for several more days. My son brought you here yesterday. You were damaged very badly. Cover your eyes and I’ll turn on a few lights.”

The voice had a hint of humor, and class.

Bailey couldn’t have lifted her hands to cover her eyes if her very life depended on it, so she just closed them tightly against the sudden glare, and even that hurt some. After a few moments, she opened them a little at a time until she could see again. She gently turned her head to where she thought the man had been sitting and sucked in her breath. There sat the most handsome man she’d ever seen. She looked away. Men like him made her nervous. Actually, all men did.

“Damaged? You said I was damaged, what does that mean? And how did I get here? The last thing I remember was fighting some she bitch in a hotel in Paris.”

“Yes, I’m sorry, I meant to say injured. Humans are injured, my kind is damaged. The bitch, ah, that would be Pete Marshall, I assume. She called her master and he sent my son as he is able to move through space very quickly and was there visiting. He healed you and brought you here to mend, err heal. You are still in Paris, in our home. It’s Tristan’s home actually.”

“I don’t know…Tristan? I don’t know him, unless he’s one of the people hanging out with this Marshall chick.”

“No, no, Tristan is a vampire, a pure blooded one at that, and as I said, my son. He should be returning soon. He needed to make a quick…he was thirsty, you see.”
Thirsty, good thing to call
sucking the life out of someone,
she thought.

She finally stood up, swayed slightly, and would have fallen if he hadn’t flashed to her side to catch her. Before she could think, she jerked from him and cried out as the pain again tore through her. As she was falling into a black void to escape the pain, she heard someone yell out.

She didn’t think it was her, nor the man she’d been talking to, though it was definitely the voice of a male.

This time, when she woke up, Bailey took a survey of herself and the room before she moved. The pain was manageable, barely. Bailey reached out into the room and found a female sitting in the chair this time. She didn’t bother with conversation. She could feel the woman’s gentle probe into her mind. Bailey knew she wouldn’t get much, just what she wanted her to have. Bailey managed to turn over and sit up before the woman spoke.

“My name is Abby St. James, and you are?” The room brightened with candlelight in gentle increments, instead of the flare of overhead lights. Bailey knew immediately this room was different than the one before. It was darker and there were no windows.

BOOK: Enduring Retribution e-book
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