“Mateo is coming.” Asher’s eyebrows knit together over the bridge of his nose. The flecks of gold in his troubled brown eyes stood out sharply in the lamplight filling the room. His eyes flew to Logan as his forehead cleared. “We should get out of here.”
Logan didn’t get a chance to reply before the hunters closest to them turned to look at them. The hair on his nape rose, and he almost took an involuntary step back from the sudden wrath clouding their faces. He couldn’t understand them, but he now heard the ire in their words.
They had decided who the killers were, and they werewrong. However, that wouldn’t save their asses from an entire compound of pissed-off hunters who believed them to be murderers. Their bodies would already be in pieces before theymayberealized they’d killed the wrong people, and they might never realize that.
With no son to take over control of the hunters now that Alejandro was gone, his second-in-command, Mateo, had assumed leadership. And that leadership wanted them dead or imprisoned, or whatever came first.
Most likely death.
When one of the hunters lunged at him, Logan darted to the side to avoid the smaller man. He’d prefer not to harm anyone, but he didn’t think they were going to give him a choice. He searched for a way out of the office. There was only one doorway, and dozens of hunters were blocking it.
The drapes concealed the windows in the wall to his left. He didn’t know what lay beyond them. Every time he’d entered this room, those drapes were always closed, but when he looked to Asher again, he could tell his friend was thinking the same thing.
Those windows were their only option.
“Easy,” Asher said as he danced back from the enclosing hunters. He held up his hands in a pacifying gesture. It did nothing to calm the crowd. “We didn’t do this. We’re not your enemy.”
“Lies!” Elena spat. “Vampires havealwaysbeen our enemies.”
“I’m not a vampire. And he”—Asher pointed a finger at Logan— “is a hunter too.”
Elena’s eyes widened at this revelation, and her gaze shot back to the vampire. It unnerved her to discover his attention on her.
“I’m as much a hunter as I am a vampire,” he told her.
Mateo may be the new leader of the compound, but this was Alejandro’s daughter. If they could sway her to their side, they might have a chance of escaping with their heads still attached to their bodies.
He hadn’t known Alejandro had a daughter, but he wasn’t surprised by that. Most of the women were kept away from them when they came to the compound. However, Alejandro talked of his wife often, and they’d met Rosa a few times. He found it odd Alejandro hadn’t spoken of his daughter.
“They’re traitors,” someone hissed from the hallway. “They killed Alejandro.”
When Elena’s chin went up, Logan knew he’d lost any chance he might have had to convince her they weren’t the bad guys.
“Shit,” Logan said. “Asher…”
He didn’t have to finish what he’d been about to say. The two of them had trained together since they could walk. Asher was his best friend; they knew each other well and often anticipated each other’s moves. Right now, that anticipation had to get them out of this.
Closest to the door, Asher was the first to move as someone shouted something from the hallway. Logan wasn’t expecting it when a scuffle broke out in the hall. He was annoyed with himself for not paying better attention in Spanish class and while here.
Instead of waiting to find out what was happening and if it would benefit them, Logan moved with Asher. The two of them sprinted across the floor but didn’t get far before gunshots rang out.
Chapter Two
He didn’t kidhimself into thinking they weren’t firing wooden bullets at them. And either way, if one of them struck Asher, they would take his friend down.
Elena scrambled to her feet as the hunter and vamp ran toward the windows. There was no way she was going to let her father’s killers out of this room. Removing her stake from where she kept it holstered at her side, she sprinted after the murderers.
“Elena, get down!” Mateo yelled at her in Spanish.
She threw herself to the floor and kicked out as she rolled. Her foot hooked around the vamp’s ankle and swept his foot out from under him. When Elena lived on the compound, she didn’t receive any combat training as the men did, but once she left and was capable of paying for it, she spent hours training to fight.
Unlike the blissfully oblivious humans, she was well aware of what lurked in the night, and she would always be prepared to take on any vampire. She never left home without a stake, she was a black belt at Krav Maga, did kickboxing, and had taken self-defense classes. She was also an excellent shot and a decent fencer.
This wasn’t her first time going up against a vampire, and it wouldn’t be her last. But if she had her way, it would behislast day.
The vamp staggered and almost caught his balance, but the bullet slamming into his shoulder pitched him forward, and his hands hit the ground.
Elena jumped to her feet at the same time the vampire rolled, clasped her ankle, and yanked her foot out from under her. The move was so unexpected, and he was sofast, she couldn’t get her hands underneath her before her ass hit the floor.
