Wild Hearts (Blood & Judgment #1) (12 page)

She crosses her arms, defiant as ever, and I snap my fingers at her and point to the bed. She growls at me, but grudgingly sits, perched on the very edge, still being rebellious.

“I will start at the beginning,” I say and pace in front of her.

“Please do,” she drawls at me.

I ignore her sarcasm as I am trying to think now. “My mother…”

“Wait, your
mother
?” she scoffs at me. “Is that how you think of your sire? That’s some messed up shit.”

I throw her a death stare and struggle to keep hold of my temper at her insult. “My
mother
is from the same Realm as the Ambassadors. Once every so often, they are able to enter this world and my mother had the unfortunate luck to be kidnapped by my father and raped repeatedly until she conceived me, and then she was murdered. But, I was born, Aria, not turned. Are you aware that your mother is from the same Realm? Don’t you feel the darkness in you that dwells from our heritage? Now, I don’t know the ins and outs of your father’s relationship with her, but suffice it to say, here you are. Bred for power.”

“That is
not
…” she shouts at me, standing up and clenching her fists.

“Like I said, I don’t know and I don’t care. I am special, and so are you. I am one third of an ancient prophecy that shall come to pass. You are also a third of that circle. With the combining of our powers, and one other, we will become more powerful than any other force and, as a result, we will be able to take down, not only the Ambassadors, but the entire Jurisdiction as well.” I give it all to her straight, plain and simple.

Aria stares at me for a moment in silence and then she snorts and rolls her eyes at me.

It irritates the beast within and I grab her face roughly. “If you roll your eyes at me again, wolf, you know I am not shy about removing them.”

I see her gulp, but then it’s gone and the arrogance is back. She pushes me away and stands up. Before I know what she has done, she has a stake pressed against my heart with a triumphant look in her eye. “Tell me why I shouldn’t dust you right now?”

I smirk at her and push the stake away gently. “If you stab me with that through my heart, all it will do is make me bleed. I told you, I was born this way. I am different to regular vampires.”

She takes that in. “But you still need to be inside during sunlight hours. You have a weakness.” She returns the smirk.

I growl at her. “It is not a weakness. It is a
limitation
. One that I have lived with for two hundred years without issue.”

“Keep growling at me and I will chain you up outside to await the rising sun.”

“You could fucking try,” I respond, confident in my abilities to protect myself. “You think you are the first one to threaten me with that?”

“Doubtful,” she sneers. “You have a tendency to piss people off.”

“Back at you,” I say, crossing my arms.

We glower at each other for several moments, but we are wasting time. The dull ache on the back of my head is picking up its tempo and I need to focus.

“You are fucking insane,” she says dismissively, breaking the silence.

“Am I? What other reason would I have to save you? Because I fucking like you? Need you as my new BFF? I
need
you to help me stop the Jurisdiction, you stupid bitch,” I say to her, trying to hold onto my temper. I was expecting this sort of reaction; I mean, I know how crazy it sounds. I am not completely unreasonable.

“Who the fuck knows, but you are…” She twirls her hand at the side of her head, “…fucking delusional. Stalker-bitch.”

“You know deep down that you were put here for a higher purpose, Aria. Don’t tell me that you don’t feel it. I know, because I feel it too.” I try the gentle approach with her as the aggression is just getting us nowhere. We are both too damn stubborn to stand down, but now I have to take the high road, because it is clear she wouldn’t know the high road if it hit her in the face.

“How do you know all of this anyway?” she asks me, huffing out a breath.

“I am a Seer. I have visions. I have had them since I was a little girl, barely old enough to understand what was happening to me. They have all led me to you. Eventually. A couple of centuries has been a long wait.” I smile at her, a close-lipped one as my fangs are aching to drop, so hungry am I.

“Visions?” she scoffs. “This is getting even more far-fetched.”

“You need to believe me, Aria. War is coming and we are the only ones that can stop it. And speaking of stopping things, whatever the hell you were doing in here with
one of them
, I suggest you put an end to it before you get us all killed.” I am firm with my suggestion, so that she knows it is, in fact, an order.

“Say I believe you,” she says, her gray eyes flashing as she struggles to ignore my order. “What then? Who is this ‘other’ that is supposed to complete the circle?”

I frown and turn away from her. “That I don’t know yet. All of my visions thus far have been about the coming war and leading me to
you
. You are…” I really don’t want to have to say it out loud to this arrogant bitch, but needs must. With a noise of exasperation, I continue, “…you are important. To me. I am hoping that now I have you, my ability will enlighten me to the third.”

“Have me?” she spits out. “Okay, yeah, great. Get on that.” She pushes past me.

“Where are you going?” I ask her.

“I have business to take care of, and by the sounds of it, so do you,” she calls back over her shoulder.

“Humph,” I say crossing my arms. Although, I am glad to be alone. This whole set-up creeps me out, all these wolves so close to me. And I can tell how unwelcome I am here. I don’t know yet if Aria fully believes me, but she believes enough, and that will have to be good enough for now.

I turn and head back to my own bedroom down the corridor. As soon as I enter the room, the dull ache turns into a white-hot stabbing pain and I gasp. I quickly close the door. I cannot have any of these creatures seeing me have a vision. It will put me at great risk if they know how vulnerable I am when one of them hits. No one can ever know what a drooling mess I turn into.

I stumble forward as my eyesight goes blurry and I make it to the small double bed just in time for my knees to give way.

I am assaulted with flashes of images, all things that I have seen before, but with one change. Now in the circle, I see myself holding hands with Aria and a man. The final piece to the puzzle of the circle has been revealed to me and I know what, if not who, he is and where to find him. Too bad I am twitching and slobbering like a pooch and cannot move anywhere right now. I just close my eyes tighter and wait for it to pass.

***

After too many minutes have passed, the worst of my vision hangover has faded and I sit up. I clutch at my head and growl, “A warlock!”

I have been dying to get that out since I saw him in my vision. And not just any warlock, but one so powerful, from the oldest of the Coven’s, that it is clear to me that he is the one to bring forth the power that will take out the Ambassadors. And I have to say, Jesus, he’s good-looking to boot. Long, dark, silky hair to his shoulders, piercing blue eyes, a body that has to be sculpted by the gods themselves and tall, so tall. I heave a sigh. I cannot let that distract me.

Aria and I now have a clear mission objective: find this warlock.

I grimace as I really don’t want to work with them, but in a way I guess it makes sense. One of each of the ‘Tainted’, as they call us. I am also relieved, as I stand up and brush my already impeccable jeans off, that the warlock I have seen
isn’t
the warlock that I screwed at Simon’s. God, that would have been awkward!

After finishing off two blood bags from the cooler that Simon left for me, I splash cold water on my face, rearrange my hair into a neat bun, and reapply my make-up. I pucker up in the mirror and then swear at myself. “Christ, woman. This is business, not pleasure.”

But, I smile at myself anyway and then I turn away from my reflection to go and find Aria and tell her of my latest vision quest.

Chapter 12

~Ember~

I find Aria, talking in hushed tones with the man who led me to my bedroom. Carver, I think she said his name was. Things are getting quite animated, but as soon as they both sense me they shut their mouths and give me tight smiles, which I return.

Carver gives me a wary look which increases when I flash him my teeth and say brightly with a sultry look, “Hi, Carver!”

He blushes furiously and stammers, “It’s—it’s Carter,” before Aria dismisses him with a look of scorn.

“Don’t play with my pack,” she warns me.

“Where’s the fun in that?” I ask.

“Touch them and you die. Got it?”

“What if they want to be touched?” I ask with an arched eyebrow.

“They would never fuck a vamp,” she says in disgust.

“So rude,” I reprimand her.

She gives me a curious look. “How come your mood has changed? You seem, I dunno,
happy
or something.”

“I have found our missing third,” I say and snap my fingers at her. “Come.” I walk away expecting her to follow me, but she stands her ground with her arms crossed.

“Snap your fingers at me one more time and I will remove them,” she threatens me in much the same way I did to her about her eye rolling. It makes me laugh inside. I am older, wiser and more experienced. She is so young and it shows in her attitude.

“How else am I expected to get you to heel?” I ask her, thoroughly amused by her outraged expression.

Whatever she was about to blast at me is interrupted as several males in her pack walk past and I can’t help but breathe in deeply. Their scent is so masculine and feral. I bet they taste….

“Don’t even think about it,” she growls at me, grabbing my arm in her powerful grip.

“Relax,” I say shaking her off. “I would
never
kill one of your pack.”

The flash of shock in her eyes startles me. “Kill?” she asks. “You bite to kill? Every time?”

“Of course,” I scoff at her. “Vampire, remember?”

“But…”

“Oh, you think I am somehow reformed and only take sips from murderers or something?” I ask with a smile.

“The blood bags,” she says, pointing back to the rooms. “I just assumed…”

“Ugh, they are a temporary fix,” I say with disdain. “I need more than they can give me,” I add evasively. No way am I telling her that my abilities cause me to drink more in one day than the average vampire needs in a week.

Usually.

This whole situation since I nearly got caught has thrown me out of my routine and it’s making me even edgier than normal.

“So you’re telling me I brought a fucking cold-blooded killer into my home?” she says, the edge in her tone making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up at her aggression.

“All killers are cold-blooded, Aria,” I say with a slight shake of my head at her naiveté.

“No!” she says loudly. “Not always.”

“How do you figure?” I ask, intrigued by her adamancy.

“If you kill to protect or to fight for what is yours,” she says.

“You think that makes it admirable?” I ask. “Interesting.” I ponder that, searching her eyes, but she has closed herself off even more than usual. She either fights the darkness in her or just assumes it is her wolf doing all of the violence. Sooner rather than later, she needs to learn that her mother’s side is what makes her so strong.

“Time is wasting,” I say spinning around, done with this pathetic conversation. “We need to move.”

She reluctantly follows me out to the
Lambo
and slides into the passenger seat in silence.

***

As I struggle to maneuver this low slung, rear wheel drive, hyper-car down the mountain track, I let out a huff of frustration. “If I had known you were bringing us into the middle of the sticks, I would have swapped it before we left,” I say, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

Nothing.

“I’ll have to change it before we come back up here,” I add.

Still nothing.

“I’ve had it too long anyway; I guess I should find something a little less conspicuous.”

“Yeah,” she snorts suddenly, “cuz nothing screams ‘look at me’ quite like the bright orange cock extension we are in right now.”

I look over at her and then I let out a howl of laughter. A genuine laugh that has my sides shaking and makes me pull off to the side of the track so that I don’t crash and send us tumbling down the mountainside.

I slap my thigh as I scream with amusement. Aria looks over at me, a smile tugging at her lips and eventually she just can’t contain herself any longer. She bursts out laughing with me and for several moments the tension dissipates as we share the joke.

Gasping for breath, I try to get myself under control. “Girl, you are a riot,” I say to her as I restart the stalled engine and take off again under lighter circumstances.