Inception (The Marked Book 1) (33 page)

Trace raised his hands to him, palms out and pleading. “Alright. Okay. Let’s talk about this for a second.”

Dominic pounced on Trace, clawing at his face as he took him down in a mess of blood and fur. Trace swung out at him wildly, but it was no use. They were the desperate hits of an overpowered man. Dominic was faster in this form. Stronger.
Deadlier
.

Jagged teeth and feral claws ripped at Trace’s body and chest, tearing away at him as though he were made of sand. Blood poured from his wounds like water, pooling on the ground around him as his body snapped back and forth in unnatural ways.

“Stop it! You’re killing him!” My deafening screams were futile. Morgan’s vision was coming alive right before my eyes and I hated her even more for it.

“Run, Jemma!” Trace’s voice came out choked and hoarse. “Get out of here!”

“I won’t leave you here,” I shouted back, tears spilling over my cheeks.

“Go…NOW!”

I had to do something. I couldn’t let this happen. But what? What could
I
do? All I had was my partial training and some Protective necklace that was supposed to keep me—

That’s it!
The Amulet
.

Without a second thought, I yanked the necklace from around my neck and closed my trembling hand around it. This was it. My one shot. I screamed out his name like a lovesick prayer, “Trace! Look up!”

As soon as our eyes connected, I drew my arm back and threw the necklace across the room at him. His hand punched up through the air and caught it.

Dominic, who had been crouched over him in his wolf-form, yelped out in pain and then shot backwards through the air; almost as though he’d been shocked by an electrical fence.

Or touched a magical barrier.

Dominic retreated into the corner, away from Trace and the Amulet, and then shifted back to his human self.

Yes! It worked!

Trace jumped to his feet, the necklace fitted securely in the palm of his hand. He was smiling to himself. A beautiful, victorious smile that ignited a fire inside my heart.

“Alright, Romeo, good job. Now hand it over to me,” said Dominic, wiping the dust off his shirt.

Good job
? I shook my head, certain I heard that wrong.

“Actually,” said Trace, dimples blazing. “I think I’m going to hang on to it for a while.”

Dominic quickly stepped to him but Trace moved back, seemingly one step ahead of him, in more ways than one.

“We had a deal,” roared Dominic.

Trace laughed in response.

A
deal
? “What the hell is going on?” I shouted, even though it was painfully obvious. Trace was in on it.

“You don’t want to play this game with me, boy,” said Dominic as he pulled Taylor over to him like a human shield. “I’ll rip both their heads off before you make it to the door.” Flames of fury raged in Dominic’s eyes as he watched Trace dangle the Amulet, taunting him with his victory.

“Knock yourself out,” said Trace, backing away. “I got what I came here for and there’s nothing you can do to stop me. I’m protected and we both know it.” He turned his back on him—on
me
—and barreled off towards the exit.

What the hell was he doing? How could he do this to me? How could he just leave me here?

“Trace!” I heard myself cry out his name, a desperate last ditch effort to wake him up—to make him come to his senses and turn around. But it was all in vain.

He didn’t even so much as offer a glance in my direction as he tossed my heart to the meat grinder and left the church with my Amulet in hand.

43. UNNATURAL BORN KILLER

Bitter tears of betrayal stung my eyes as the ugly truth nestled itself inside my soul. Trace had set me up. Everything we’d been through, everything he said to me…it was all a lie. It meant nothing to him.
I
meant nothing to him. He used me to get what he wanted and when he got it, he threw me to the wolf.

Through blurred vision, I looked up at Dominic. He was still holding Taylor by her neck, seemingly shocked by the sudden turn of events. God only knew what he would do to Taylor and me once the shock wore off. He would blame us for this, for all of it. Heck, we were the only ones around
to
blame.

Dominic’s head twisted at the sound of my choked sob.

I shook my head at him as though attesting to my innocence—to the fact that I had nothing to do with this. As though silently begging him to have mercy on me.

His expression changed suddenly; faltered. For the faintest of seconds I thought I saw something
human
in his eyes. Something sympathetic. Maybe he wasn’t all monster after all. Maybe there was still some feeling—some humanity—buried somewhere deep inside of him and he would let us go.

“How very pitiful of you.”

“This isn’t my fault,” I quickly defended.

“I was referring to your choice in men. You certainly know how to pick them.”

I felt the sting on my palm even before I registered what I’d done. I
hit
him. I hit Dominic Huntington right in the face.

I held my breath for what felt like an eternity as I waited for him to delve out the consequences for my massive misstep. But none came. He barely flinched nor did he say anything. My eyes moved to his hand still wrapped around Taylor’s porcelain neck. I wondered if he was pressing down. If he was slowly strangling her to death. And then suddenly, as if responding to my thoughts, he released her from his grip.

“Go.” His dark eyes bore into hers. “Forget everything that happened here tonight and go home.”

Taylor turned on her heels and started off towards the door. I immediately tried to follow suit but Dominic snagged my wrist and pulled me back.

“Let me go, Dominic. Please, I’m begging you.”

“Oh, I intend to,” he said, his tone harsher now. “I have no desire to walk in the wake of the death and misfortune you leave behind.” He stared down at me, watching me with his dark eyes as though trying to read me. “Utterly infuriating.”

I shifted under his unrelenting stare, uncomfortable by our proximity. By his words. By the fact that I was alone with a soulless vampire who had no empathy or self-restraint.

He took a step towards me, surprising me. His hold on my arm tightened as he inched closer to me, moving as though he were going to kiss me. As though he were invited. The very thought of it sickened me, enraged me.

I shoved him back with both hands, freeing myself from his grip. He let out a sharp mocking laugh, showing me once again that this was all a game to him.
I
was a game.

But I would not be played any longer. Not by him. Not by Trace. Not by anyone.

I reached around and grabbed the chair from behind me and smashed it to the ground in a fit of rage. My strength surprised both of us. I looked down at the scrambled pieces and without even making the decision, I reached down and snagged a piece of jagged wood from the wreckage. Long and pointed, just the way I needed it to be.

I looked up at him, makeshift wooden stake in my hand and lifted it into position.

“You won't do it,” he said, so sure of himself and of me. “You don't have it in you, angel.”

“Yes I do.”

“You would have already done it.” He took a step towards me, and then another, putting himself right in my line of fire.

A moment of deadened silence passed between us as we stared each other down in remnants of the old church. Me with the wooden stake in hand and him with that lopsided smirk that made my blood boil. I hated that smirk. I hated him. The world would be better off without Dominic Huntington existing in it.

So then why wasn't my arm moving? Why wasn't I doing the one thing I swore I’d do if I ever had the chance?

A bustle of men burst into the room, jolting me upright. Dominic snatched my elbow and pulled me to him, stepping in front of me as if to hide me, to protect me. I looked up at him baffled; one minute he's trying to kill me and the next minute he's protecting me? This man, this godforsaken thing, was not only depraved, he was obviously insane, too.

Let me handle this
, said a balmy voice inside my mind. It wasn’t my voice. It was a man’s voice. Dominic’s voice—familiar and sultry. Either he just spoke to me through my mind or I was going crazy…again.  

“Dominic, my friend,” said the leader of the pact. He was much smaller than the men that followed but there was something alarmingly unsettling about him. His long dark hair was slicked all the way back, accentuating his disproportionally large forehead. “I trust you have what we're looking for.”

“There's been a slight problem, Engel.”

Engel
?
The
Engel? My eyes zeroed in on him.

This was the man that has been tormenting my sister for months, haunting her like a nightmare, and yet there didn't seem to be very much to him. In fact, he looked rather sickly—thin framed, pale skin—especially in comparison to the other men around him.

I took each of them in, assessing their strengths and weapons, and noticed the long blond locks amidst the group.

Taylor.

The tall, burly man standing behind Engel had her by her arm, holding her against her will. They must have grabbed her on their way in.

“A problem you say?” Engel’s pale eyes glowered with supremacy.

“The Reaper has the Amulet,” explained Dominic. There was a definite nervous pitch to his voice.

“Tsk, tsk.” Engel shook his head in a scolding manner. “I'm disappointed in you, Dominic. You had
one
job.”

“He had his own agenda. I didn’t know—”

“And this one?” interrupted Engel, ticking his head at me (or what he could see of me as I cowered behind Dominic). “Why is she still alive?”

“We need her.”

“She no longer holds the Amulet therefore no longer serves a purpose. You were told to dispose of her.”

The massive knot in my stomach tightened as Engel moved in closer to me, his long fangs visible from behind his grimace.

“Don’t come near me...” I meant for it to come off as a threat, a warning, but it came out like a pathetic plea.

He reached over and yanked me away from Dominic as though I were nothing more than an insignificant commodity.

“Ah, the blood of a Slayer,” he said, sniffing the air around me like a rabid hound. “Truly an exhilarating aroma, though sadly, yours is quite faint.”

I tried to pull away from him, writhing as best as I could, but it was no use. The frail looking little hobbit was shockingly strong. “Let me go you sick—”

His sharp teeth pierced through my neck before I could finish the words. I let out a faint scream though it quickly died in the back of my throat.

In an instant, his otherworldly venom was coursing through my veins, working hard to subdue me, to turn me into a useless bag of bones. Even in my mounting haze, I knew he wouldn’t let me survive this. I knew I was on my own again, and I’d have to save myself. I just didn’t know how I was going to do that.

Engel’s men murmured in the background, their voices scrambled and distant. I tried to focus on what they were saying, tried to hear if they were planning on contributing to the dissolution of my existence, and then everything went quiet. Nothing but the deafening silence of a grave.

Is this it? Am I dead?

My pulse responded, pounding loud in my ears as my heart stopped and started in my chest. My eyes circled the room and found stillness. They were all standing motionless like wax figures; frozen in time—exactly like my first night at All Saints. Whatever had happened that night was happening again. Only this time, I didn’t stop to question it.

In a fog of thinly veiled awareness, I twisted my body into Engel’s, bringing myself as close to his paralyzed body as I could get. I tightened my grip on the stake and brought it to my side just as the room surged back to life. It took every drop of strength I had to trudge forward, to fight the mounting urge to succumb to the sweet poison and surrender all hope. He growled loud and ravenous as though I had offered myself up, and I responded by lifting the stake from my side and plunging it into the center of his cold undead heart.

Engel stammered back several steps, clutching at the stake in his chest as everyone in the room gasped in disbelief.

I waited for him to immobilize, to drop to the ground and cease to exist. But it never happened.

The seconds ticked by like molasses and with each one that passed, he remained very much moving and very much alive. All of which were not supposed to happen. It was painfully clear that something had gone horribly wrong.

“Boss?” asked a slender man from behind him.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Engel, eyes wide with amazement. “How peculiar.”

Dammit, angel
. “Only you would stake an ancient Rev and miss his heart,” muttered Dominic as he stealthily pulled me back a step. 

“Ah, but it appears she did not miss,” replied Engel, looking down at his chest, stunned. “I can feel the wood burrowed in my heart, fiery and aching, yet here I stand.”

“That isn’t possible,” scoffed Dominic.

“Indeed,” agreed Engel as he wrapped both hands around the stake and pulled it out of his heart. “Yet here we are.”

Audible gasps broke out behind him.

“Get her!” yelled one of his men.

Engel held his hand up, halting his herd of undead. A morbid curiosity filled his expression as he took me in. “Veni foras, genus.”

“Huh?”

“What exactly are you, child?”

“I'm a g-girl…a Slayer,” I stuttered.

“On the surface it appears that you are, yes, but your blood...” he trailed off, wiping the corner of his mouth as he searched his mind. “It speaks of different origins. An Ancient I have not encountered for many centuries.”

“An Ancient?” I flinched at the word. “I’m seventeen years old. There’s nothing ancient about me.”

His eyes thinned as he took that in. “Interesting.”

“Why is that
interesting
?”

A cunning smile formed on his mouth, tugging at the corners like a dirty secret. He knew something—something about
me
—and by the looks of it, it was something big.

I stepped in closer. “Tell me what you know. Right now.”

His expression darkened. “You stake me so callously yet you dare stand in my presence and make demands?”

“It was an accident—a knee jerk reaction,” I lied.

“One that you will pay for with your life!” shouted the man holding Taylor hostage. Cheers broke out around him. They were out for blood.
My blood
.

Engel held up his hand once again to silence them. “It appears the crowd desires restitution.”

I swallowed hard.

“Surely you didn’t expect to leave here with your
life
?” he said, kneading his palm over his puncture wound.

“Well I didn’t exactly think it through.”

“Clearly,” huffed Dominic.

I shot him a surly look. It was obvious he had no intention of helping me get out of this mess. Heck, he was probably enjoying every minute of my impending demise. I was in this alone and I had to think fast.

There was only one thing to do. I needed to make myself useful to him again. If he thought I was dispensable, he would dispose of me without question and I couldn’t let that happen.

I turned back to Engel, my eyes forged in remorse. “I’m no good to you dead,” I pointed out self-servingly. “I can make it up to you. I can make it worth your while.”

“I’m listening.”

“You came here for the Amulet, right? Well I know where it is. I can get it back for you.” I knew I was making a deal with the devil but I was desperate. “That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“It is,” he nodded. “And to acquaint myself with you, of course.”

“Why?” I flinched back, disturbed by this unfortunate turn of events. “I’m nothing. I’m just a girl.”

“That is as far from the truth as one could get. A rare magical being is amongst us,” he crowed, turning to the men behind him now. “One whose blood can cease death.”

His men cheered in excitement. 

“What makes you so certain it was because of her?” argued Dominic. “I’ve tasted her blood before. There was hardly anything exceptional about it.”

Liar, I thought. I clearly remembered him blissfully staggering around like a complete drunk.

“I’ve dethroned more than my share of Slayers,” said Engel, proud of his past conquests. “I know a Slayer’s blood, and that, old friend, is not one.”