Page 80 of Damian’s Conquest

“Shut up, bitch! I’ll deal with you later!” Then he turned his head back to Mick. “Tracy’s not here?”

“No. You have to find her,” Mick pressed out.

“He needs human blood,” Sebastian said, as he looked at the chain. “And I need a bolt cutter.”

“Check in the garage,” Grayson ordered. Then he grabbed Cynthia by the front of her parka and jerked her closer to his face. “Where’s the blood? And don’t you lie to me, or I’m gonna have him drink from you!”

With wide eyes, Cynthia stared at him. Grayson allowed his fangs to descend and his eyes to turn red to underscore his demand.

“In the filing cabinet,” she stammered.

He looked at it and saw that it was locked with a padlock. “Key?”

When she didn’t answer fast enough, he gave her a violent shake and growled in displeasure.

“My, my keys are in my r…r…right pocket.”

He let go of her parka so she fell back onto the ground so quickly that she had no time to brace herself. But he had no pity for her. She was draining a vampire of his blood, most likely to make a profit from it, and a crime like that wouldn’t go unpunished. He dug his hand into the parka’s pocket and found a keyring with several keys, just as Sebastian came back with a bolt cutter.

“Sebastian, open that filing cabinet. The blood’s in there.” Grayson tossed him the keys, before turning back to Mick, but he appeared too exhausted to be of use. He looked at Cynthia again. “Where are you keeping Tracy?”

“Not here,” Mick said with a weak voice. “Or I would have…tried…”

“Here’s the blood,” Sebastian announced and crouched down next to Mick, holding the open bottle to his lips. Mick drank greedily and gulped down the entire bottle.

When Sebastian set the empty bottle down, and picked up the bolt cutters to cut the iron chains around Mick, Grayson looked at the old radiator. It was rusted, and shouldn’t have been too much of an obstacle for a vampire, though getting out of the room would have been harder, since it was brick and mortar.

“I don’t see any silver,” Grayson said. “You didn’t try to escape? You could have ripped the radiator out.”

Mick lifted his head, already looking better. “I couldn’t, or she would have hurt Tracy.”

Grayson nodded, understanding. “That’s why they split you guys up.” Then his gaze fell onto the headphones and the sunglasses. From the headphones music droned as if to drown out everything else. He narrowed his eyes at Cynthia. “You knew that Mick could employ mind control, and you managed to block him out.”

“I tried, Grayson, but it didn’t work,” Mick added.

Grayson nodded. Cynthia had busied her senses with other stimuli so she wouldn’t be susceptible to mind control. “Clever little bitch. I suppose your brother is watching Tracy. Don’t worry, we’ll get him.”

“No!” Cynthia screamed and tried to sit up, but Grayson pinned her down. “My brother has nothing to do with this! You leave him alone!”

Grayson scoffed. “Yeah, not bloody likely!” He shifted his position and used his knees to keep her pinned to the ground, while he reached for his cellphone, and called Damian’s number.

“Grayson?” Damian answered the call.

“Mick is secure. And we’ve got Cynthia.”

“Is Mick okay?” Damian asked.

“She drained quite a bit of blood from him, but he’ll be okay. We’re heading back to HQ with them in a few minutes.”

“And Tracy?”

“They’re keeping Tracy locked up at a different location. My guess is her brother is watching her.”

“Okay, we’re going in now.”

Grayson disconnected the call and looked at Mick. “Don’t worry, Damian will free Tracy. And then we’ll dole out punishment.”

He glared at Cynthia. If it were up to him, he’d make sure that the punishment was very painful and lasted very long.