AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Those going back for the helicopters left. The rest began to strip their clothing for their shifts—except for Kalen, who, as a Sorcerer, didn’t need to remove his clothes to change into his panther. Lucky bastard. But he was good to have around when the rest of them needed to change back to human form and had left their clothes far behind. His magic had also saved their asses in more ways than Nick could count.
Once his group had shifted, they joined him by the rock to imprint her scent on their brains.
There were other scents, too, ones Nick didn
’t recognize. In one spot blood was pooled on the ground, and he investigated. This scent probably belonged to the guard who’d been injured. He and his team filed that information away as well.
From the rock, he followed Calla’s and her captors’ scents across the open area and down the path, away from the stronghold. The trail led to a dirt road, several miles away, where there were tracks from an unknown vehicle that had pulled in, turned around, and drove off again. There, the scents were drastically reduced.
They’d taken her away by car. He could’ve howled his anger, but forced himself to remain focused.
Pushing himself harder than he ever had, Nick ran. On and on, hour by hour, his team flanking him. Though he eventually grew tired, he stopped only to allow his team water from the streams and lakes they came across.
He had to find Calla, refused to think it might already be too late.
And he made a vow—if she was spared, he’d step up and grow a pair of balls. He was going to be a mate she could count on and be proud to call hers.
Or die trying.
Seven
If there was a place on her body that didn’t hurt, she couldn’t locate it.
Calla slumped against the wall in the little box she thought of as her coffin. Weakness weighted down her limbs and her vision was blurry. She couldn’t see very well anymore, but her hearing was still fine. She heard the rain pattering outside the cabin, trickling off the roof and onto the ground. Pat, pat, pat, pat.
It sounded a whole lot like her life ticking away its final hours and minutes.
She could also hear the bastards in the other room laughing about what else their boss had in store for her. More draining of her blood, more cuts to her body. Maybe a beating or two thrown into the mix.
“That stingy vamp better let me have a go at her pussy before he sends her to hell,” Buzz Cut said from somewhere in the cabin.
“Think she’s still nice and tight after a few centuries?” This from Rat.
“She’d better be, or I’ll skin her worthless hide with my Buck Knife.”
Shivering, she huddled and wrapped her arms around herself, trying to make herself smaller. Conserve warmth. That was easier to do since they’d removed the duct tape from her wrists, though it didn’t help much. It was so cold and tomblike in the dank room—or that feeling could be the blood loss.
The vampire would return soon.
There was something slightly familiar about the voice of the sick bastard hiding beneath the black clothing, but she couldn’t be sure. Did it really matter whether she recognized him? Nick and her brother would figure out the vampire’s identity and make him pay for what he’d done. But she might be dead by then.
As sad as she’d been the past few years, she wasn’t ready to give up. And she didn’t deserve to have her life taken by some megalomaniac with a twisted idea of revenge. He seemed to think her brother and his allies should know what his acts were all about. Whatever it was, the vampire was past anger—he was insane with an emotion that went much deeper than rage. She hadn’t been able to pinpoint what it could be, but the cold, methodical way he was capable of doling out his torture was frightening.
In the other room, the vampire’s arrival signaled the end of Buzz Cut and Rat speculating about all the nasty things they’d do to her. Chairs scraped the floor as they apparently scrambled to attention, deferring to him.
“Fetch her to the video room again.”
That was all he said, as though he had no emotion. But she knew better. She’d heard the tension, felt a shift in the air. It was in his voice, a certain kind of excitement or anticipation. Not pleasure, no matter what he claimed. Calla’s torture was a means to an end, she realized.
That made him the most dangerous enemy of all. One with a point to drive home and nothing to lose in doing it.
The vampire’s two main lackeys unlocked the door and Buzz Cut grabbed her arm, dragging her out. She stumbled to keep up with his long, hurried stride.
“Damn shame,” he mumbled. “Waste not, I say. But he’s calling the shots.”
That chilled her to the marrow of her bones. She was about to die, then. Tarron and Nick would be searching, but they weren’t going to find her in time. This was it.
Tears pooled in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She thought of her brothers, whom she loved so much. With Adrian off living his own life, Tarron had been her rock for so long, even before their parents had been killed. He was the best man she knew, until Nick came along.
