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nothing at all.
Chapter Four
I’m dead, I thought.
Of course, the ability to think negated the content of my thought. But if I wasn’t dead, where was I?
My being awake meant it was most likely night. The question then became was it the same night or had more time passed since I’d last been conscious? It couldn’t have been more than a day, given my speedy healing abilities, but then again, who knew what this witch was capable of?
Trapping me in a tiny, cramped box, for one. I had enough room I could adjust my position and roll over with a little effort, which ruled out a coffin. If I listened, I could hear the quiet sounds of wind. So, buried alive was off the list too. I tried moving my arms and then my legs, both successfully. The paralysis spell had worn off or been lifted. I checked for my gun, but it wasn’t there. When I struck out in frustration, my hand bumped against something, and I peered through the darkness to get a look at it. A tire iron.
This told me two things. The first was I was locked in a car trunk, the second was whoever had put me here hadn’t considered what common items could be used as weapons. I tightened my grip around the tire iron and shrank into the farthest quarter of the trunk, waiting.
Waiting dragged into agonizing hours alone in the trunk, anticipating nothing specific. The uncertainty was making me crazy. What did they want? Why would they come all the way to Elmwood to kidnap me?
It sounded like the start of a bad joke. A witch and a werewolf walk in to a bar…
I refused to loosen my grip on the tire iron, and my joints were aching and stiff. My stomach rumbled in protest of its emptiness, and I felt a sharp ache in my gums. If I didn’t feed soon, I wouldn’t be able to conceal my fangs much longer.
Not that I cared what these hooligans thought I was. As of right now my plan, if they didn’t let me go, was to bash in their skulls with the tire iron and then maybe rip out their throats. I was flexible on the details, as long as the end result was two dead kidnappers.
My breathing had slowed to a near stop, and my heartbeat was unhurried and regular. I could wait them out. As long as there was night left, I would wait. Once the sun rose, though, it would be a different story. I hadn’t fed enough to keep myself awake after sunrise. Dead to the world I was helpless, but in the dark I was a force to be reckoned with.
Several more hours passed, and a telltale sluggishness began to flow through me. Dawn was on its way, ignorant of my need to stay awake. If I’d had more than just a sip of blood at nightfall, I might have been able to stay awake longer, but as it was my grip started loosening on the iron, and I didn’t have much wakeful time left.
I heard footsteps and the heavy metallic noises of the trunk being unlocked. I had the will to fight but was running out of the power to follow through. The trunk lid lifted, and I swung with all the energy I had left.
There was a satisfying sound of metal meeting flesh and a cry of surprised pain. I vaulted out of the trunk, but my foot caught the body of one of my kidnappers, who was now nursing his bloody face, and I fell. I tried to break my fall, but my hands were locked around the tire iron, and I hit the ground face first. Gravel and bits of broken beer bottle bit into my cheek. I pushed myself up with my palms and managed to find more shards of glass when they pierced the dry pads of my hands and jabbed into my fingers. Still, I fought to regain my footing, warm blood dripping off my chin and onto my yellow tank top, creating a grim Rorschach test over my cleavage.
I tried to get a bearing on where I was but couldn’t orient myself. The car was parked on an old highway in the gravel lot in front of a motel. My heart sang with hope for help, until I saw the large, aged For Sale sign with evidence of many unsuccessful price reductions.
Abandoned.
Around us was nothing but forest, empty road and the purple threat of sunrise peeking over the trees. My werewolf half told me to run and take my chances in the bush. My more logical, less-impulsive vampire half told me running into the woods meant certain death at dawn, while my captors might actually want me alive.
I slumped to the ground, my limbs unwilling to push me in either direction. This allowed the werewolf I’d smashed in the face to grab me under the arms and drag me towards one of the motel rooms.
“What do you want?” I rolled my head back, loose as a rag doll, to look at him. His face was familiar, but I couldn’t place how I knew him. He was young, not even twenty, and had probably been handsome before I’d broken his nose and part of his cheekbone. He had catlike green eyes and a mop of dark hair. He looked away from me, but his expression was calm, not angry.
“I just want to do my job. Are you hurt bad? I’ll catch hell if you’re hurt. ” His voice sounded of the South, but not like Grandmere’s. He wasn’t Louisiana South, more like Texas South. Again, I struggled to remember how I knew him.
His attitude surprised me too. I’d shattered his nose, and he was worried about me? I groaned and moved my jaw. Nothing felt broken, and the glass and gravel were already being forced out of my skin. Healing would be slow this close to sunrise and with no blood in me.
Blood.
I noticed the fresh spill of it on his face in a new, different light as he paused to knock on the door marked 9 but had most likely once been 6.
“I’ll live,” I whispered, licking my lips. My darkening eyes must have given me away, because he knocked on the door more urgently, not stopping until it opened. The witch was waiting inside and looked a little paler when he saw me slumped on the ground and both the pup and I covered in blood.
“Holy Hecuba,” he swore. “What happened?”
The pup grumbled something and hoisted me over the threshold into the dark room.
“Is he here?” the boy asked.
“I think so. But he said to leave her in the room at sunrise and get the hell out. ” The witch had a suitcase in one hand. “He’s going to be pissed about her face. ”
Their voices were getting slow and deep, like the world was going the wrong speed. I crawled out of the wolf’s grasp and towards the bed but only made it a few inches before my strength abandoned me.
