Rosko, Mandy - Night and Day (Siren Publishing Classic ManLove) (15 page)

Cedric opened the door a crack to peer inside then threw it open at the sight of nothing. No Silus in bed, but Cedric didn’t need to search around, or even call out to know he wasn’t in this room, or even hiding in the joined bathroom. The room was bright, and the curtains were wide. No one had been inside to close them. Silus was not in here.

He left the room and did the same with the three other guest rooms, this time calling out, the spot under his breastbone cracking just a little more when he came up with nothing.

“He’s not here?” Ben asked.

Cedric had to brace his hands on the doorframe of the last empty room in order to steady himself. He shook his head, his voice quiet. “No.”

Whatever had kept Silus away must’ve been important.

“Shit!” Ben punched the wall, putting a fist-sized hole in it.

Cedric jumped. “What the fuck?”

“Ceddy, there’s a big problem happening right now. I just got back from your folks’ house, and there’s going to be a fight.”

“Fight? With who?”

He bit his lower lip, made a helpless half shrug, then sighed. “Vampires and sun sprites. Silus’s father issued the challenge early last night. They’re all going to try and kill each other.”

It felt like the lid on his sanity just cracked. With a roar and a flash of the brightest light he’d ever emitted, Cedric flashed.

* * * *

They nearly bled him dry before his father finally offered his wrist, and by then, Silus was in and out of consciousness.

He did not want the offered vein. He hated his father and didn’t want anything to do with the man’s blood. But when that artery went under his nose, and Silus inhaled the sweet scent of fresh blood, so close, so warm, pulsing with every heartbeat, his mouth watered and his fangs lengthened of their own accord.

He was so thirsty. His body felt cold like ice without any blood inside to keep him warm. He had to have it or he would die.

Silus opened his mouth, but he couldn’t lift his head to take the bite. His father’s other hand clasped the back of Silus’s neck to lift him up, to wrap his lips around that narrow flesh. Then he took the bite, relishing the familiar piercing sound of tight skin giving way under fang, and the immediate flow of that hated life-blood splashing into his mouth.

It tasted sour to his tongue. If it had been Cedric’s blood, it would have been spicy sweet.

Cedric. With his previous blood loss, Silus could no longer feel his sprite, could not call to him. Not that he could to begin with. He’d bled so quickly that first time he couldn’t get his head on straight to send out any messages before it had been too late.

He would not have done so even if he’d been able to, though. Cedric would have heard him and immediately come to his aid, endangering himself in order to protect Silus. It was better this way. This way, he remained safe and hidden. Silus’s father did not know where Cedric was, so when the attack commenced, whenever that would be, with Cedric disowned, he would not be in the middle of the battle that would kill many vampires and sun sprites alike.

“That’s enough. Any more and he could break his chains,” said Crowley.

Wiktor tried to pull his wrist away, but Silus locked his jaw and kept right on pulling and sucking that thick fluid into his mouth. Though he despised the taste, the good doctor was correct. This was just what he needed to escape.

“Silus, release me,” Wiktor said through clenched teeth, his palm pressing down against Silus’s forehead, attempting to push him away. Silus ignored him and continued to drain what he was now stealing.

“I said release me!” This time, with great force, Wiktor used his open palm to punch down on Silus’s face. The shock of the strike had him open his mouth, droplets of blood he hadn’t yet swallowed spattering all over his face and bedsheets.

His father backed away and sucked on his wound, chest heaving.

Silus’s breaths came in rapid succession as well with the new blood inside him. He pulled on his chains, testing them, but what strength he gained from the feeding was not enough to break them. He was still too damn weak.

Crowley was in his face again, this time flashing a low watt light in his eyes. Silus swore he would kill the little shit for this. “Tell me, my lord, how do you feel?”

“Angry,” Silus growled.

The light went away. “That is understandable, however, is it us you are angry with, your father and mother, or are you angry with that sprite?”

Silus shook with the urge to scream at them all. He swallowed that rage instead and replied, “The sprite.”

Crowley, Winchester, and his father leaned in close to examine his face.

Silus could only pray they believed his farce.

“He’s lying,” Winchester said. “Look at how nervously he swallows.”

“Obviously there is still some sun sprite blood in him,” Crowley said.

“I thought you said the bleeding would remove the sprite blood.”

“Father, there’s nothing wrong with me.” Silus struggled as much as he could against his shackles. “I love him.”

“Listen to how he speaks!” Wiktor was gripping his hair in mad rage before turning that anger onto Crowley. “Does that sound like the bleeding worked?”

“Calm yourself, milord,” Crowley said. “Think about it logically. Of course not all the sun sprite blood would have bled out of him on the first try. We’ll wait for his strength to rise and then do it again.”

Silus’s skin ran cold again. Again? He barely survived the first time. “Father, do not let him do this.”

Wiktor sighed. “How many more times will this need to be done?”

“As much as necessary,” Crowley said.

* * * *

Cedric flashed back to what was once his family home. He landed in the middle of the vast green lawn and sprinted toward the doors. He heard the familiar pop that meant Ben had followed behind him. His friend tried calling out, but Cedric ignored him and kept on going.

A human guard with his palm out stopped him before he could make it to the glass doors. “I’m sorry, sir, but I cannot allow you entrance.”

“I need to speak with my father.”

The guard’s face twisted, as though he were uncomfortable. “I’m very sorry, sir. I’d like to let you pass, but we all have our orders. You’re not to enter.”

Ben finally caught up with him. “Stand down, Peter, he’s with me.”

Though Ben was one of the family guards, it was likely because of Cedric’s friendship with him that Peter appeared unconvinced.

“He summoned me about the attack,” Cedric said. He prayed the weak lie would work.

Peter’s eyes rose above his sunglasses as he dipped his head. “You mean the challenge the suckers issued?”

The spot under Cedric’s eye twitched at the name. He used to call vampires things like that without thinking, but now it just pissed him off.

Ben stuck his hand on Cedric’s shoulder, snapping him from his murdering thoughts. “Yeah, it only just happened, so every team obviously didn’t hear yet, but because of the challenge, I was charged with retrieving Cedric. Seeing as it concerns him and all.”

Peter looked between them both then quietly stepped aside.

Cedric got the feeling the man knew he was being lied to but was doing him a favor anyway. “Thank you,” he said.

Peter nodded. “I’ll call the others to let them know you’re here.”

Cedric ran up the deck stairs, into the sunroom, and then he headed for his father’s study since that’s where that old bastard always was.

“Are you insane? What are you doing here?” Ben nagged. He grabbed for Cedric’s arms to try and stop him, but Cedric kept shrugging him off. “We all have orders to shoot you on sight. You’re so lucky I was with you.”

Cedric snorted. Shoot him on sight. Lucky. Yeah right. Ben wasn’t the only member of the guards Cedric had made friends with, and while none was as close to him as Ben, he knew for a fact none of them would dare point a gun at him, orders or no. His father knew it too, he was certain. The man always had a flair for the dramatic. “I need to know where and when,” Cedric said, finally bursting through his father’s study door. Without knocking.

The man sat behind his desk like some kind of king, his mother standing beside him. Both jumped at the sudden and unexpected intrusion.

“What’s going on?” Cedric demanded, walking right up to the desk where his father liked to pretend he ruled the world. “I know the vampires challenged you. Where is it going to be?”

Cyricus’s lips thinned, and his mother put a delicate hand on his shoulder to calm him. That small action seemed to bring him down from whatever high his anger had taken him to. “You are no longer part of this family. It does not concern you.” Then his eyes narrowed on Ben. “Thick as thieves, you both are. I should have known you would bring him here when the challenge was announced.”

Ben shifted his feet around, and that really pissed Cedric off. When he told his parents that he was choosing a vampire over his cousin, his father had practically torn at his turtleneck to get a look at the bite marks it hid. Cyricus had squeezed that spot so hard he was honestly surprised his fingers hadn’t pierced the skin.

He’d let the old man do that because, well, he was his father, and he didn’t want to fight back when the guy was throwing his little tantrum. Now, after everything he’d been put through, Cedric was ready to throw the son of a bitch out the window.

“He didn’t bring me here. I came on my own and lied to the guards so they’d let me pass.”

Cyricus snorted and muttered something about finding good help.

“Father,” Cedric said, struggling for patience, “this wouldn’t be happening if it weren’t for me, so it does concern me. I don’t want you or anyone in this family getting hurt over this.” Not the vampires or even his father, but he decided to keep that bit to himself. “Please, don’t accept the challenge.”

Cyricus’s face actually turned red. “You—you would have me dishonor myself? Again? For your—” Whatever he was about to say, he didn’t say it. “It matters not anyway. I have already accepted.”

Cedric felt his insides drop. As head of the house, Cyricus would be leading the attack, whenever it happened.

Great.

“Where and when?” Cedric asked. If he couldn’t persuade his father, then maybe he could find out what happened to Silus.

“Go to that vampire you’re fucking and ask him.”

His mother squeaked and actually jumped a little. Cedric couldn’t blame her. He’d never heard his father say
fuck
before. The poor woman just kept on getting shocked lately.

He looked to Ben, who just shrugged.

Wait a minute. “You mean he’s still at the Veturious manse?” If that vampire was not in trouble, he was so going to be.

Cyricus snorted. Another thing Cedric had never heard before. “I don’t make such assumptions. After issuing me the challenge via telephone, that leech head of household went into an unprecedented rant about how my child dared to spoil that disgusting spawn of his.”

Cedric rubbed his face. “Dad, please talk in smaller sentences, and not like we’re in the Victorian era.”

“He accused you of using trickery and whoring yourself to Silus, when I know for a fact it was the other way around.”

“Dearest, perhaps you should—”

Cyricus threw Cecelia’s arms off him and stood. He paced a little then faced out the window, gripping the pane and watching the sunshine glide across the lawn.

The only sound was the ticking of the mantel clock. Cyricus’s behavior was as twisted as it was endearing. Even though he’d disowned his only son for lying with a vampire, refusing to marry for a vast dowry, and just downright never doing as he was told, Cyricus still loved him. As much as the man was capable of love, that is.

But he would never, ever accept that Cedric was in love with a vampire, and neither would Silus’s father, it seemed.

Cedric wanted to be with Silus, but he didn’t want his father to kill himself for that to happen. He didn’t even want Silus’s father to kill himself. Cedric doubted Silus could ever be truly happy knowing his relationship had caused deaths in his family. And if this challenge came to pass, there would be a whole lot of bloodshed.

He couldn’t let that happen.

“Dad, I’ll ask you again. Please, when and where is the challenge going to be held?”

Cyricus didn’t answer.

“Mother?” Cedric tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice.

She bit her lip and folded her hands in front of her, still facing her husband. She hadn’t looked directly at Cedric the whole time he’d been in the study, and she wasn’t about to do it now either.

Cedric pounded on the desk, and they both jumped at the unexpected act. “This is such bullshit! If it’s an agreed upon place and time, why don’t you just tell me?”

His mother actually looked like she was going to faint from all the foul language. His father was looking at him like he was really seeing him for the first time.

Then Cedric started paying attention to the blue papers on his father’s desk. Blueprints. Of a really big house that was not this one.

Then it clicked, and he laughed. “All that talk about honor. You’re so full of shit.”