Enslaved in Shadows (8 page)

The fact you were born immortal and never made one didn’t rest well with the government at all. It made a lot of sense t
hat they would try and harness i
mmortal genetics for themselves.
But finding out they couldn’t caused a rife between the
Houses and the Governments, and still i
mmortals were willing to help out anyway they
were able
.

Seeing that Faith was an immortal herself was what gave Bells the reason to come clean in the first place.
It hadn’t been too big of a shock to her. She knew her daughter was different the moment she held her in her arms.
Her beautiful little girl had tiny claws for fingernails and incisors that would put knives to sha
me. It explained more things tha
n she cared to remember. Cyrian and his private parties. Marcus and his gloating on how he knew Immortals were real. He’d told her after three months of dating they existed. She should have seen that as a stop sign then, his family practiced Obeah. Half the
populations in Belize were
f
irm believers in Obeah’s
. The firm practice of their
Caribbean and West Indian
culture
.
It’d migrated
from West Africa. Her mother shunned all those who were into the sorcery and magic’s, but her father had embraced it.
She just hadn’t believed until her best friend of eighteen years
shifted right before her eyes.
Bells was stunning
in her Phoenix form.
She had b
eautiful red and gold feathers with streaks of blue and purple. H
er violet eyes
turned
a fire gold,
almost liquid. Jesminda amazed by her transformation was taken back at how fast it happened. Even to
immortals,
Phoenix’s were rare and considered to be sacred. Making the decision to remain secret from the
world’s government
was unanimous among her kind.
Bells promised Faith would remain out of harm’s way until the Shadow
Unit
was able to take over the duty of guarding them. House Phoenix didn’t want to get any more involved in her situation. Faith was safe and that’s all that mattered.

“That’s good sweet pea. I’m glad you’re having such a good time with Auntie Bells.” There was rustling on the other side of the phone and then loud giggling. Squealing into the phone Faith laughed and soon Bells was on the other end of the line taking deep breaths.

“Girl, this daughter of yours is going to run me ragged. She talks all the time, asks the most absurd questions,” Bells paused before she continued in a little girls squeaking voice.
“Auntie Bells, how old are you, when is it going to be my turn to change? Am I gonna turn into big bird too?”

Jesminda sputtered a laugh and the two of them talked about Faith’s daily ritual of watching the Backyardagins, Yo Ga
b
ba Ga
b
ba and Sponge
B
ob. She would be
re
unit
ed
with her daughter in three days. She quickly disconnected the call after assuring Faith they would see each other soon. She’d never been apart from her for more than hours.
Three more days.

The lady at the fr
ont desk eyed her, like somethin
g was stuck on her face as she approached.

“Yes, can I help you?” The woman said in a nasally voice.

“Yes.
My name is Jesminda Zealand and I’m here to see Captain Dravaggio.”

The woman typed something on her keyboard and looked up beneath her lashes eyeing her with a steady glare.

“He says to come on up. Fifth floor
,
second door on the right is the conferen
ce room. Someone will meet you at the elevator.
”

Jes nodded and clutched her purse tighter as she headed for the elevators. This meeting scared her to death. She’d never met a conscious vampire before. Well a fully conscious one.
Don’t think like that. Nothing is going to happen. They are here to help.

The elevator dinged open and she stepped inside. Soft jazz played through the speakers in a comforting tune of some long ago song.
J
e
s
hit the number five and the doors dinged closed and took her to meet her saviors or her doom. It could go either way as far as she was concerned. These men were her last choice.
No one else could help her, unless she went to another Shadow
Unit
of course.
But they had jurisdictions and hers fell under theirs.
She’d only just found out how to reach them from Oliver’s captive daughter Teresa.
The girl had been semi-conscious and kept saying her father worked for the Shadow
Unit
, to look them up on the internet.

She tried to locate them, but to her
luck,
there was no Shadow
Unit
anywhere on Google or any other search engine.
And then her house phone rang suddenly and she was greeted with the voice of Captain Dravaggio. He’d given her the location where she could meet with them after she explained her situation. She knew from the tone of his voice he wasn’t happy about her dilemma any
more than she was.

The sounds of the door opening shook her out of her trance. As it opened there was a tall man standing in an at ease position. He was extremely tall with dark blond hair cut short and ocher eyes. They looked almost like a warm earth red, with a yellow ring around them. He was built like a linebacker with corded muscle that ran the length of his form. His black fatigues were stretched to their limits. As if there wasn’t enough room to breathe until he relaxed his stance
.
His face was handsome in a savage
way, which
quickly transformed into fallen angel when he cracked a smile. She looked away for a moment and cleared her throat.
He was too beautiful.
He exuded strength and confidence with a hint of calm.

“Miss Reinhold?”

She started at the use of her ex-husband’s last name.

“Please, call me Miss
Zealand. Or Jes is fine to.”

“Sorry ma’am,” he held out his hand in greeting. “My name is Gabe, if you will follow me the captain and the rest of the men are waiting in the conference room.” The halls were decorated in dark reds and light browns. It wasn’t sterile as she originally expected, it was warm and comforting. The double doors to the conference room swung open and she was faced with seven men all sitting in variou
s positions at a long
table. Some looked relaxed and others looked tense. She immediately picked Oliver out of the group. His daughter Teresa looked just like him.

“Oliver?” She asked with a hesitant voice. He sat up straighter and crossed his hands on the table.

“Do I know you?” He asked.

She shook her head and felt stupid for blurting out his name like that. He was handsome, but all vampires were, especially i
f they were from the Royal Houses
. They all had a diamond like quality that was hard to miss. Sharp and flawless.

“No,” She answered looking him straight in the eyes. She owed him that. “Your daughter Teresa was the one
.
”

He was in front of her before she even blinked.
He grabbed her forcefully by the arms and shook her.

“You know where she is!” Oliver shouted.

He’d shaken her so bad her teeth felt misplaced. Her arms were on fire from the pain he was inflicting from the freezing touch of his fingers. Panic was setting in, threatening to take her back to horrible memories.
Think of something else.
Anything
. H
e
wouldn’t hurt her
he’s concerned about his daughter. Jes took a deep breath. What had Bells said? Vampires weren’t dead but living. Only
Reg
s as she called them went cold from not enough blood. Regulars were vampires not part of the Royal Houses. Oliver was either a
Reg
or newly joined to the Royal family.
His skin was cold and clammy.
Before she could answer
,
Gabe began prying her as gently as possible from Oliver’s bruising grip. She took a steady step back and tr
ied not to wince from the pain.

* * * *

“Olly, man ease up she’s mortal man, damn.” Gabe growled.

He gently rubbed her arm where Olly had taken hold of her.
She was nervous enough meeting him and knowing she was the one that would have to tell him she didn’t know where his daughter had been taken. It would be another reason for him to go on the attack. Marcus moved his locations every other month and the only reason she’d stumbled onto where he was keeping the vampires was due to a mix up with one of his goons. She was suppose to meet Marcus for a lunch date and instead of Vince giving her the directions to the restaurant he’d sent her the GPS coordinates of one of the apartments Marcus owned. She mentally cursed her own stupidity.
She’d been so excited he’d allo
wed her to come and meet him
in public that she’d jumped at the chance to make things right.
Save your marriage.
That’s exactly w
hat her mother would have said.

When she’d first met Marcus he was charming, had a great sense of humor.
It had been right after the entire debacle of her summer vacation with her best friend Bells.
They’d sat next to each other on the plane back to the states. She’d known it was too fast to jump into anything, but he hadn’t tried to fuck her, and then leave her.
One night stand and you consented.
She reminded herself for the millionth time. No, Marcus took her out to the theater, they ate at regular places. Mr. No Names didn’t even get to that stage in the game. Marcus made it a point to see to her happiness.
He’d even been there for her when she found out she was pregnant.

She’d been just as shocked as he was since they weren’t having any sorts of between the sheet time.
I’m sterile.
You’re clean.
Sterile my ass! She was furious with herself and at the bastard who left her that way. Instead of Marcus being pissed,
he had
been understanding. Saying everyone had a past, but the future is what they would look forward to. She’d married him shortly after. If she’d only looked deeper into that entire comment about everyone having a past, it would have made perfect sense.

Once Faith had been born, his true colors came to the surface. He’d known the minute her daughter had been plucked from her womb, that Faith was
,
in fact
,
different. After her
birth,
he’d been abusive and cold hearted. Every time he would beat her he’d say in a soothing tone how much he loved her. That it was her fault this was happening to her. All while beating her senseless. To this very
day,
she’d cringe at those words. Even her daughter knew the pain those three words caused her.
She’d tried to go to her parent’s estate back in Belize, but her mother had quickly stopped all communication.
Told her if she couldn’t control her husband there was no reason for them to visit until she did.
Uncaring.
Her mother never showed emotion.

Marcus had become paranoid and controlling as
the
months passed.
He t
old
Jes that
she and her daughter were no longer to go outside of their home. He’d turned their estate into what she now knew was a compound. Her personal jail cell. She’d been taken from her friends and family. Not even her father had been able to get an audience with her. Soon after, she realized it was because he was selling VAB to humans and other immortals. She thought he’d done it for their safety, and if she were
agreeable,
the beatings would stop. She’d even convinced herself she could reason with him, have him go to the authorities and work it out. He dealt in so
much other illegal activities, i
ncluding selling flesh to humans who wanted to ingest not only a vampire’s blood but their skin in order to become like them, immortal.
A falsity he sold them daily. Promising they would soon turn once they’d ingested enough of a vampire’s flesh. She shuddered inwardly
.

She used to be so strong and independent.
He’d taken that from her, swallowed her identity and more.
It took less than two years to make her weak and
self-conscious
.
Her
self-esteem
was darker tha
n it had ever been before. She didn’t know if she was coming or going half of the time.
If she hadn’t left for herself, she definitely had to man up and do it for her daughter.