“Damn, you smell so good.” He took my arm and brought it to his lips, before sliding his cool tongue over my wound. “You taste so good.”
I felt a mix of disgust, regret, and victory. They didn’t blend well together. “I’ve been told that before.”
He began to suck on the wound, drawing more blood into his mouth. I didn’t try to stop him.
“I see why Matthias claimed you. Your blood is—” He gasped and looked at me with wide eyes.
“Very bad for vampires with no self-control.” I nodded. “Bye now.”
He opened his mouth to scream, but the flames took him over before he had a chance. I stepped away so I wouldn’t be burned and batted at the bits of ash that fell down and caught in my hair.
Without waiting a moment longer, I grabbed the door handle and swung it open.
Declan stood there blocking my way. I felt surprise and painful defeat. I’d been so close. He wore a shirt now, a long-sleeved black one stretched tight across his muscular chest. It looked borrowed from someone smaller than him.
His gaze moved to my bleeding wrist and he hissed. “Cover that.”
“Or what?” I snapped. “You’ll be tempted to have a taste?” I held my arm up toward him and he flinched away from me. I didn’t think I’d ever seen Declan flinch before. He’d been affected by my blood as a dhampyr enough to be drawn to it; to me. I could only imagine how much harder it was for him now. “Why are you here? To kill me? To drag me in front of daddy dearest? How could you do this?”
His jaw tightened, the tattoolike spiderweb appearing on his face only making him look scarier. “Maybe you should have let me die when you had the chance.”
Frustration spilled over inside of me. “Why, Declan? Do you hate me so much that you’d string me along like a fool? Just to try to get some answers about Alex and Matthias?”
He glared at me. “In case you haven’t realized it, my real father is also my sire. Do you know how powerful that combination is? He does. He controls me now.”
“So what does that mean? You need to do what he says?”
“Yes. I’m compelled to follow his orders, no matter what they are.”
I faltered. “So he ordered you to sleep with me?”
“It was a test on whether or not I could resist your blood. I agreed to it. In fact, I requested it.”
“You resisted.”
“Yeah, I did.”
My eyes narrowed. “Just like Matthias’s test. He resisted me, too, when he had me naked and vulnerable. Only he didn’t follow through and fuck me when his heart wasn’t really in it. Even though—just an FYI—I would have let him.”
His lips curled back from his fangs and his expression darkened. “I guess he’s way more of a saint than I am, isn’t he?”
“Get the fuck out of my way, Declan.” I sounded so much stronger than I felt. In reality I was ready to give up. But I couldn’t.
“Or what? You’ll bleed in my general direction?”
“The guard couldn’t resist me.”
“I’m not some stupid fucking guard. My whole life I was taught self-denial. This is no different.”
“What did Kristoff send you here for right now? Let’s just say I’m not feeling very friendly at the moment if you were looking for another quick lay.”
He glared at me. “You’re not going to beg me to help you? Rely on my fondness for you to help you escape?”
“Fondness? I wouldn’t know if you felt anything at all for me. You’re not exactly the expressive type. Not much with the flowers and chocolate.”
He was silent for a moment. “You’re wrong. I’ve brought you a gift. It’s the reason I came here. No one knows where I am right now.”
“Keep it. I don’t want anything from you.”
“I think you’ll want this.” He held out a glass jar to me. “Take it.”
My mouth dropped open. Inside it looked like something from a medical lab—a bloody, fleshy organ the size of a fist. I knew exactly what it was. Mine had been broken only a few hours ago down in the basement. “That’s—”
“Matthias’s heart. I stole it from Kristoff’s room. It won’t be long before he realizes it’s gone.”
I looked at him with so much shock that it made it difficult to speak. “Why are you doing this?”
“Why do you think?”
“Before, you—and Kristoff—when we came up from downstairs—”
He grabbed my hand and placed the cool jar containing the bloody organ in it. “As my sire and father, I can’t disobey him. But it doesn’t mean I agree with what he’s making me do.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Are you trying to tell me that you’re not . . .” I didn’t know how to say it.
“Not evil?” His lips twitched.
“That’s what I—I don’t know what’s going on, Declan. I don’t understand any of this.”
“Kristoff expects me to be one way with him now. That’s what I showed him downstairs. He thinks I’ve changed.” His expression was tight. “I have changed. But not the way he thinks. This is the one chance I’ve got to get to you, to give you this so you can get Matthias and get the hell out of here. He’ll protect you now.”
I grabbed on to his arm. “You’re coming with me.”
He shook his head. “I can’t leave. Kristoff will find me—our bond isn’t the same as yours and Matthias’s, but there are some similarities. If he can find me, he’ll find you.” He watched my confusion for a moment as everything pieced together in my head, his brow creasing. “You really thought I’d betray you like that? You didn’t even give me the benefit of a doubt after everything we’ve been through together?”
I was overwhelmed by all of this. “I didn’t know for sure. You’re—you’re a vampire now.”
“Yeah, thanks for the reminder. But other than an unnatural thirst for blood”—his teeth clenched—“
your
blood in particular—I don’t feel much different than before. Maybe that’ll come over time, but not yet.”
I
had
thought the worst of him. I’d been too afraid to even hope for anything other than total betrayal. That was messed up and I was ashamed of it, but it protected me from any paralyzing disappointment that would have made me curl up in a ball somewhere, unable to help my nieces get out of here.
“You have to come with me,” I said. “We’ll deal with Kristoff later.”
“I can’t.”
“Please, I don’t think I can do this by myself.”
“That’s not true. You can do it. You’re stronger than you think you are. Just go, get Matthias, help him—and he’ll help you.” He looked over his shoulder. “I can’t stay. Go now while there’s time and leave here as fast as you can.”
I reached for him, but he was already gone.
21
MY GRIP TIGHTENED ON THE JAR CONTAINING MATTHIAS’S heart and I felt frozen in place, afraid of failing and afraid of dying.
Nothing new there.
I left the room and retraced my steps, keeping close to the wall and freezing whenever I heard a sound. I figured even the vampires had to be headed for bed by now. Sunrise couldn’t be that far off.
I quickly crept down the stairs to the basement, then pulled up the trapdoor.
“Hey, where are you going?” a familiar voice said.
I nearly dropped the jar when I jumped. I whipped around to see Noah looking at me sheepishly. “Sorry, did I scare you?”
I tensed. “Why are you following me?”
“Caught a whiff in the hallway, figured it was you.” He grimaced and crossed his arms tightly over his T-shirt. “You know, the more I expose myself to it, the easier it is to resist. And by easier I mean fractionally not as difficult. Still, the scent of the Nightshade seems to trigger my saliva glands like nothing else I’ve ever experienced. It’s very interesting, actually.” His gaze moved to the jar. “Is that a human heart you’ve got there?”
Being near Noah didn’t set my mind at ease. It got my back up now that I wasn’t sure about vampires again. I wouldn’t recover from Declan’s act in front of his father for a while. But it was an act just to fool him, to keep Kristoff from realizing Declan was still helping me. He’d been trying to avoid a direct order that he wouldn’t have been able to ignore.
Maybe the stronger the vampire that made you, the more control you had. Weaker vampires sired weaker fledglings that had the most problems with control—the ones who couldn’t help themselves when they were near me, like the guard. Like several others I’d come across since meeting the syringe full of Nightshade.
It was a theory. And according to this theory, Noah should be one of the stronger ones, like Declan was. Only Declan had a better head start being a dhampyr to begin with. He’d already been halfway there.
“Uh, the heart?” Noah said. “Is there an answer or are you just wandering around looking for Frankenstein’s lab?”
I looked at the organ. It was hard to believe it was over four hundred years old, but I was no expert. “It’s Matthias’s.”
Noah blinked. “Never seen a vampire’s heart. Shouldn’t it be ash by now?” His face whitened. “Matthias is immortal. Holy shit, he’s still alive without that in his chest. He must be in agony right now.”
“And that brings you up to speed on the exciting night I’ve had.”
Noah whistled. “Damn. Remind me not to drink any baby’s blood in any secret-society rituals.”
I eyed him. “If I need to remind you about something like that I think we have a serious problem.”
“Good point. So, need some help?”
I glanced behind us at the empty basement, not nearly ready to let my guard down yet. “So they just let you wander around freely?”
“Are you kidding? I slipped out of the room they’d locked me in and I was about to take off, but I felt all guilty about leaving everyone behind. And there you were, lurking around in the basement.” He glanced at the rope ladder. “So what are we waiting for? Let’s go shove that bloody thing back in his chest.”
Sounded about right to me.
If I thought climbing the rope ladder was difficult before, I hadn’t tried it while carrying something breakable. I ended up shoving the jar down the front of my dress and praying that it wouldn’t fall out. I went down the ladder so quickly that I burned my hands on the rope, but I touched down to solid ground with everything intact. Noah made it down easily as if he’d climbed rope ladders all of his life.
“This way.” I started heading left along the humid, musty underground tunnels until I finally came to the green metal door that was slightly ajar after Declan had broken it off its hinges. “Here it is.”
I half expected someone to stop us. After all, Kristoff and some of his men knew where we’d been before, knew that we’d seen Matthias in his makeshift coffin. But after Declan’s “betrayal,” and my being thrown into a locked room, it was likely that Kristoff thought I was safely and soundly tucked away for the rest of the night.
While Noah seemed able to be around me without digging his fangs into my skin, he didn’t try to get too close, keeping several feet of air between us at all times.
“Open it up,” I told him, and he pushed up the lid of the coffin after undoing the broken padlock. Even in the near darkness of the room that was lit by only one bare lightbulb, Matthias looked so pale he nearly glowed in the dark.
I felt immediately relieved that he was still alive. Despite the promise of immortality, I wasn’t sure. “See? I told you I’d be back.”
He just stared up at me. I felt wearier than I had before, which told me he was pulling energy from me to stay conscious. If he passed out, I figured there would have to be a full awakening like what had been done with Kristoff. Matthias said it had involved the blood of a dozen human sacrifices. I’d really like to avoid that at all costs for too many reasons to list.
“Are you trained in first aid?” Noah asked nervously, looking around the empty room and ending at Matthias’s pale and sickly form.
I shook my head. “Afraid not. You?”
“A little. But this is your show, Jill. I’m not going near that heart. It disturbs me how delicious it looks.”
I cringed. “That is disturbing.”
“Should you wash your hands first?”
“With what?”
“Right. That’s another excellent point. This place isn’t decked out with a full commode, is it?”
I didn’t exactly have a game plan here. Matthias must have seen the trepidation in my gaze.
“It’s . . . okay . . .” His voice was so quiet I barely heard it.
I felt weak suddenly with the prospect of what I had to do. “There’s nothing okay about this. This is going to hurt you, and I don’t even know if it’ll work. Plus, I think I might throw up.”
His forehead was creased and he let out a small sound that may have been a laugh.
I glared at him. “This isn’t even remotely funny.”
“You’ll . . . be fine. Just . . .” He paused and swallowed thickly. “Take it . . . shove it into my chest . . .”
Shove the vampire’s severed heart into his bloody chest. This wasn’t happening. This was a horror movie I’d fallen into and couldn’t get out of.