Hope and Vengeance (Saa Thalarr, book 1): Saa Thalarr, book 1 (28 page)

"I understand that I might have destroyed myself," I said. "Although it's still sinking in."

"What if Kiarra had attempted to intervene? She could have been destroyed, too. I hear the process is rather cataclysmic," Bearcat mused.

"I'm glad I hadn't heard that before," I growled. "This puts a different light on it."

"I hear you're engaged," Joey clapped me on the back. He was attempting to distract me, now, but I ignored him.

"I think you should go ahead and get married," he added. "In Vegas. Go back a couple of years and get married by your favorite rock star impersonator."

"I don't have a favorite rock star."

"I can suggest one of mine."

"No, thank you. I get to hear your music often enough through your earphones."

"Maybe there's a Mozart impersonator, then."

"I prefer jazz. You know that."

"Just teasing," Joey grinned.

"The marriage idea is a good one," I said, ruffling Joey's hair. "Convincing Kiarra may be a different story."

"Convincing me of what?"

"How do you do that?" Bearcat breathed. "We say your name, you show up, no matter what."

"Nexus echo."

"Right."

"It's an old Larentii mind trick."

"Very funny."

"You're going to Vegas to get married, aren't you?" Joey bounced on his feet.

"What?"

"Vegas. Married. Not rocket science," Joey grinned.

"Says you," Kiarra tweaked his ear.

"Wow. Affection. I love it," he laughed.

"Come here, you." She pulled Joey into her arms for a hug.

"And the universe rights itself," Bearcat sighed with satisfaction.

* * *

That's how the four of us ended up in Las Vegas, two years prior, inside a tiny wedding chapel. Joey had insisted that Kiarra couldn't wear a rented dress, so he and Bearcat disappeared for a few minutes, then reappeared with an ivory gown in a dress bag.

I believe she slapped his hands when he offered to help her dress. The photographs taken by the photographer were lovely, although half of them captured Kiarra frowning.

The awkward moment came when I produced her wedding band from a pocket, and she discovered she didn't have a ring for me. For a moment, she was close to tears before breathing a deep sigh and pulling something from her low-cut wedding dress.

"What's this?" I blinked—the ring was pale in color, but upon closer examination, I discovered it held many colors, including gold and silver.

A piece of my horn
, she responded.
It's the only one of its kind
. She slipped it onto my finger.

"I pronounce you husband and wife," the movie-star look-alike announced. I leaned in to kiss Kiarra; we were married.

* * *

"You own this?" she studied the manor house converted into a hotel in Dublin.

"It has an excellent rating, and the restaurant gets top reviews." We stood near the gate leading to the property, which was surrounded by an expanse of lawn and gardens. Built of white stone, it had three stories, with a wide terrace in the center and a sunroom on one end.

"You really, really own this."

"Yes. I tried to hire the chef to work at one of my restaurants in London. He didn't want to leave, so I purchased the hotel. He gets to work for me anyway."

"Does he mind?"

"Absolutely not. I gave him a raise when I bought the place. He's quite happy."

"Good. I didn't want somebody spitting in my food."

"All the rooms are updated. Let's see if the largest suite is available for the owner."

"Let's just see if the largest suite is available. I have an alias and a credit card," she said. "We don't need a repeat of last night."

"Understandable. Shall we?" I offered her my arm.

"Absolutely."

* * *

"Adam, this is nice." Kiarra studied the lawn behind the hotel from our suite window. "It's so green. I've never been to Ireland before."

"I like Dublin," I shrugged. "I imagine I'll like it better, now that I can taste the food and walk the streets in daylight."

"Can we go to Trinity College? I always wanted to see the Book of Kells," she said.

"I'll take you—tomorrow. Tonight, we'll eat, drink and have sex."

"The traditional honeymoon, then?"

"If that's what you want to call it. I'd say my lust is not so traditional. Marriages were often arranged in my day. Justin was lucky that he liked Catherine so much. My parents found three women they thought I should marry. I refused all of them. Poor Justin was the sacrifice for the Chessman boys."

"You really loved your brother."

"I did. My parents, too. Sweetheart, will you take us somewhere?" The idea had come to me from nowhere.

"Anywhere," she said.

"Good." I gave her the address of my ancestral home. Taking my hand, she folded us there.

"He won't sell it, the bastard," I grumbled as we walked past crumbling walls and antique furniture covered in dust.

"He's a bastard for treating it this way," Kiarra agreed. The house was quite dim inside, as there was no electricity. "It's falling down," she added.

"I know, and there's nothing I can do."

"I didn't get you a wedding present," she said.

"I got a ring." I held up my hand.

"Pffft." She waved it off. "I'll do this, sweetie, just for you."

I never expected the glow as she worked, or that it was even possible. I shouldn't have been surprised. Crumbling walls repaired themselves. Dust disappeared. Threadbare fabrics became whole again. Scratches on wood healed—on furniture and flooring. Wallpaper brightened, the colors seemingly new again. I wanted to weep as my family drawing room from the past reappeared about me.

Just as it had been resurrected, so was the rest of the house. My breath caught at the staircase—it had rotted out. Now it looked new, the carpet running down it just as fresh.

"I think I just jacked up the price," her shoulders drooped. "But at least it won't fall down while you're negotiating the price next time."

"I don't know that he'll sell during his lifetime, but I have an advantage over him, there. He can't outlive me."

"Nobody can guarantee that, Adam. Not even one of my kind. You know why."

"I know." I pulled her against me. "This is the best wedding gift I could ever receive."

"You're welcome."

* * *

"I don't want to trouble them with this," Dragon studied the video. "Not until tomorrow, anyway. They knew to send it to Anna Madden's address, didn't they?"

"They knew," Griffin agreed.

"How is Merrill taking this?"

"He's upset. That's his third-youngest.
Was
his third youngest. Brock is angry and extremely distraught."

"Filthy bastard. This is always the lowest of tactics, to draw one of us out. We need a way to evacuate the population of Corpus Christi, before it gets worse."

"We need Kiarra."

"She deserves one night with Adam before we lay this on her."

"I know."

"The kapirus is responsible for the remaining deaths."

"I know that as well. I'll call a meeting of the others tomorrow. We'll figure this out. We have to figure this out."

* * *

"What is it?" Kiarra knew before I did. We walked into her kitchen after leaving Dublin behind, to find Lion, Dragon, Joey, Bearcat and several others waiting for us.

"We have a message from the bastard," Dragon held up a flash drive.

"Not now," Kiarra breathed and rubbed her forehead. I led her toward two empty barstools and settled her on one of them before sitting beside her. Lion produced a laptop, the flash drive was installed and we watched the video in shocked silence.

"Hello, Kiarra," Saxom said. "Did you think to hide from me? I suspected it was you all along. It is both fortunate and unfortunate that Chessman was sent—it had to be either Russell or him, so Xavier could yank their strings. I received every bit of information on you that Chessman supplied, did you know that?" He laughed. The sound scraped raw nerves.

"I hear you've learned of my presence," he went on, his eyes lighting with something close to insane glee. "You know what I want. I'll do whatever it takes to get it. This is just a taste."

My breath caught when Xavier walked into the frame, dragging someone with him—Jeff, one of the Corpus Christi vampires. The one with medical experience; the one who'd helped save my life after I was bitten by rogue werewolves.

Kiarra began to tremble beside me. I pulled her against me as tightly as I could. We watched as Xavier sliced Jeff's head from his shoulders just as easily as I might lift a pen to write. I held the stone-faced expression vampires are known for while Kiarra wept in my embrace.

Other bodies were shown to us. All drained of blood, several of them werewolf. The kapirus had been quite busy. "This will continue to happen if you refuse to come to me willingly," Saxom chuckled. "I care not for them. I have no desire for them. You know what I want. Make it soon, Kiarra, or more deaths will bloody your hands. In the meantime, as a show of good faith, bring Chessman to his sire. He has offended both of us, and we desire his death. That will buy you time for these."

My heart stopped when Rita's two small sons were jerked forward by a rogue vampire, who shoved them in front of Saxom. "We killed the werewolf guards, as you likely realize. Send Chessman along, and I'll let these two go," he said. "Chessman must come alone to the ship channel seven nights from now. His death will ensure that these two live."

The children were crying as my barstool scraped back and I stood, furious. If I could have gotten my hands on both of them then, they'd have died. "We have to evacuate Corpus Christi," Kiarra brushed tears away.

"How do you propose we do that?" Lion asked. "Dragon and I have come to the same conclusion, but aside from telling the population the truth—that a madman, a kapirus, rogue werewolves, vampires, spawn and a Ra'Ak are likely waiting to devour them, I'm not sure how to go about it."

"Let me think about this for an hour," Kiarra wiped more tears away. She sounded determined, however. I couldn't help comparing her to many women I'd known, and most of them would have succumbed to a fit of the vapors.

"Adam, come with us," Lion motioned me toward him.

* * *

"While Griffin is the best when it comes to
Looking
, Kee's the best at finding viable solutions," Lion informed me. We sat on the front deck in the open air on a beautiful day.

Saxom had ruined all that.

"Jeff was Merrill's third youngest child," Dragon sighed before
Pulling
in a bottle of Scotch and three glasses. "He is obviously upset, as is Brock, Merrill's second youngest." He handed a glass of Scotch to me. I accepted gratefully. I knew Joey was Merrill's youngest, but I had no idea how many vampire children Merrill had.

"Three now living," Lion answered my unspoken question. "When this is over, I'll teach you how to shield your thoughts."

"Didn't you hear? I have to go alone and face Xavier and Saxom," I huffed.

"Bullshit," Lion muttered. "Isn't that what they say in your language? Bullshit?"

"It's an acceptable term for idiotic circumstances," I tossed back the Scotch and held out my glass for more.

"Idiotic and deadly," Dragon nodded, tilting the bottle and splashing more Scotch in my glass.

"There's no way you're going alone to meet those bastards," Lion said, emptying his glass and asking Dragon for a refill. "We don't send one of ours into an untenable situation like that. Saxom knows it, too."

"So he's expecting others."

"He'll use it as an excuse to kill those children. We have to find them first."

"We'll have to split up," Dragon corrected. "And do this simultaneously. Yes, we must locate the children, but part of us will perform the rescue, the rest of us will go to the ship channel with Adam. If we coordinate with mindspeech, we ought to be able to pull this off."

"We're back to the problem of locating the children," Lion said. "Griffin says they're in one of those blank pockets we've encountered."

"I know where they were when that video was recorded," I said.

"Where's that?" Dragon was interested immediately.

"In Roy Cheek's old office at the refinery," I said. "Joey and I went there to hack Cheek's computer. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I ever informed Xavier that we went there instead of Cheek's house to do the hacking."

"He'd expect you to go to Cheek's house?"

"Yes. That's the standard protocol. We lay compulsion if necessary, get the information and then tell the victim to forget we were there. Kiarra pointed me toward Hartshorne Oil, so that's where Joey and I ended up. Cheek wasn't on our initial radar, either, but Xavier did know that he was involved somehow after I messaged him several times."