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“I highly doubt he was a holy man.” The memory of how Hunter had licked me had my cheeks warming.
Kase didn’t acknowledge my statement, simply kept listing options. “Necromancers, some demons, some mages.”
I took the ice pack from him so I could hold it against my neck myself. I didn’t care for him being so close to my pulse… “There was smoke that surrounded the poltergeist. In fact, the man turned into smoke before he looked like a human again.”
Kase lifted his lip, showing off his impressive fangs. I would never understand how people couldn’t know about vampires, not when their teeth looked likethatall that time. All the stories of their fangs retracting or only sharpening when they were about to feed were bullshit. Theyalwayslooked like rottweilers. I think people just tended to only see what they expected to see, and we humans were great at explaining away anything we didn’t want to believe.
“Hellhound.”
“What’s a hellhound?”
Kase set his arm over the back of the couch and crossed one ankle over his other knee. How he could look regal even whenrelaxing,I didn’t understand. “They’re demons who reside in the underworld.”
“So like…demon werewolves?”
“No. They’re not called ‘hounds’ because they resemble dogs, but rather because they patrol the underworld to ensure nothing gets out that shouldn’t. They also track down such things in our world when they do escape. It is rare for them to venture into our world unless on a hunt.” The way he spoke made me take notice. His words were careful, as always, but clipped slightly. Was that concern?
“Are they dangerous?”
“Everythingis dangerous. I explain this to new vampires who believe themselves invincible. I once knew a vampire, one of the strongest I’ve ever known. He thought himself beyond the point of needing to worry about humans—or anything else. Then, one day, he crossed the wrong person. A human walked into his home and set it aflame. He burned inside along with the human, and that has always driven home the point No matter how weak something seems, no matter how strong something else seems,everythingis capable of being dangerous.”
I swallowed at the weight of his gaze. “And hellhounds?”
“Even the coven gives hellhounds a wide berth when we discover them in our territory. While they rarely care about anything in the mortal realm beyond their hunt, they also care little about getting rid of anything in their way. You should be very cautious, Ava.”
I nodded, then handed the ice pack back to him. When he took it, he frowned at a red mark that remained on the white pack.
“Sorry.” I turned my hand over, the one Grant had cut, to find that sure enough, I’d managed to tear open the scab.
“What happened?”
“Grant needed my blood for the wards.”
He frowned, as though he disliked the idea. “He could have done less damage.”
“That’s what I said, but he said it was about thesacrificeof the action.”
Kase lifted his thumb to his mouth and pressed it against the tip of his fang. He didn’t grimace, didn’t show any reaction to the wound.
Blood welled at the top, a red so dark it was almost purple.
Which sent me bolting. I jumped to my feet, wanting that blood nowhere near me.
Kase didn’t grab me—and I knew damn well he could have, because vampires were terrifyingly fast—but he stared. “Really?”
“I may not always love my life, but I do love being alive. No thanks tothat.” I waved at his thumb.
“How can you be so ignorant of our world? You can’t be turned into a vampire from a little blood.”
“That sounds like men who say a girl can’t get knocked up because it’s just the tip.”
“I am sterile, so that isn’t an issue I deal with.” Kase spoke with such flatness of his voice, I almost missed that he’d made a joke, even more so because he so quickly moved on from it. “To be changed from mortal, a person has to die. My blood will help to heal you, but it won’t change you since I, again, don’t plan on killing you.”
I pressed my lips together, then responded slowly. “You know, I normally don’t spend so much time around people who have to keep telling me they don’t plan on killing me.”
“Would you rather I not tell you that?”
“I’d rather you notneedto tell me that.”
