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“Eris.” Ashe’s angry voice snaps her name and my heart starts beating again. “You were told to meet me in the garage.”
The vampire who always has a smile to offer me is transformed in this... creature’s presence. Malachi and Kasar always give off vibes of “fuck around and find out,” but I’d put Ashe in a bit of a cinnamon roll category. Now, though, he looks like hell incarnate and I’m glad it’s not me he’s directing that fury at.
Eris, whatever she is, looks at me with mock repentance. “Oops. Looks like I’m caught.” She stands up and is tall enough to almost look Ashe in the eye. She walks by the enraged vampire, tapping her nails against his clenched jaw in a mockery of an affectionate touch.
Each nail draws a drop of blood to the surface, but Ashe doesn’t flinch or push her hand away.
She opens the door to head inside and tosses me a sultry grin. “If you ever get tired of Ambrose and want to play, come find me at the Acropolis.”
Ashe growls something too low for me to hear, and it makes her toss her head back and cackle before striding back into the house, not in the least bit intimidated.
A huge breath leaves me in a whoosh as I wilt against the wicker chair, my heart racing like I just had a brush with death. I really need more of Joséphine’s cookies. And when I’m sure my legs aren’t water balloons, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
Chapter Seventeen
Ambrose
Kasar watches Eloise hurry out the door with a wry—for him—expression. Only those who have known him as long as I have are able to read the amusement in his otherwise blank face.
My second has been with me since almost the beginning. We share a sire, though we were turned months apart and had no knowledge of each other before then. We were Sir Mhichíl’s first children and we bonded through the hell that transition can be without guidance. Mhichíl was a true-born, descended from the first Children of the Night, our forsworn ancestors from before history. They were legends by the time man first put a chisel to a stone tablet, and now only the oldest of us remember our history at all.
Modern vampires, as we’re called now, have no reason to care about a history so far in the past even I struggle to comprehend it. Little does anyone know that this history and the fallout of our kind becoming forsworn are the reasons why humans are able to be turned into weaker Children of the Night.
Kasar looks at me, his passive face dropping as he cocks his head. “So, that’s the way it is, hmm?”
I snort and lean back in my chair, in too good of a mood to let Kasar’s ribbing irritate me. Had it been anyone else, maybe I’d growl and snap. But not with my oldest friend, who’s stuck by me through hell and death and traveled the globe as we survived a practically immortal life with me.
I roll my head to the side, glaring without any heat behind it. “It is. Haven’t told her yet,” I confess. It’s too soon to tell Eloise that she’s my mate, the one soul meant for mine for the rest of our lives. She has the genetic trait to be turned into a vampire, but the older the human race is, the more recessive the gene becomes. If she’s turned, she’ll become a vampire—whether or not the gene is strong enough for her to survive the transition is another thing entirely.
“Never thought I’d see the day,” Kasar says as he drops into the chair on the other side of my desk, reaching into his pocket for a cigarette. Even if we don’t have to worry about lung damage or cancer, I don’t understand his penchant for them. At least he keeps to the pure tobacco rather than the shit ones sold today with all sorts of chemicals. He lights up and doesn’t bother offering me if I want one. He gestures to my office with the antique lighter. “This place reeks of sex.”
I bark out a laugh and gesture towards him. “You’re one to talk. Sex, blood,andRapture.” I smirk. “Your job was to rescue Deidre and return her home safely. Not fuck her.”
Kasar, to my surprise, looks away towards the window, his gaze unfocused. He inhales deeply, the glow of the cigarette flaring to bright orange before cooling. When he breathes the slightly sweet smoke, I stiffen as I pick up the trace of Rapture’s tart scent. I lean forward, pushing aside the keyboard and resting my forearms on the desk, my fingers laced together. It’s not as if Kasar hasn’t done Rapture before. Hell, we all have, but Kasar cut himself off when he found himself using it too much.
“Brother.” I keep my voice low, not wanting to let anyone else overhear. Ashe is prowling in the garage; Joséphine is in the kitchen; and Lan is holed up in his room upstairs. “Should I have Malachi take over?”
The snarl and dark look Kasar sends me, pure fury and defiance in his golden eyes, almost makes me snarl in response. A challenge like the one lining every muscle in Kasar’s tense body has the primal beast in me rearing up, wanting to leap across the desk and squash the challenger and prove myself the victorious king.
But this is Kasar, and he isn’t a threat to my position. Never has been. I breathe out, forcing calm, and Kasar does the same. I watch patiently as he squeezes his eyes shut and pulls the Rapture-laced cigarette from his lips. If Deidre is pulling Kasar back into the world of Rapture, a world he made it clear he never wanted to return to, I will do what it takes to protect my brother.
“I’m managing it,” Kasar says at last, his eyes half-opening. He stubs the cigarette out on his thigh without flinching. “I told you they doped her up. I’m helping her get through withdrawal, and you know what that means.” He holds up the stub. “This helps me keep my own shit together and from reaching for the shit myself.”
I nod, understanding, and look towards the open door, thinking about Eloise. I’m not surprised my thoughts are more concerned about her well-being when she learns about Deidre’s condition, instead of the status of our bargain. Still looking away, as if I can conjure Eloise back to me by will alone, I ask what I need to know. If not for me, for my mate.
“Will she live?”
The thing about Rapture, and one reason the Nightshade vampires control it so fiercely, is that humans, once truly addicted, deteriorate fast. It’s not like human drugs, where the withdrawal will be hell on earth but there’s hope on the other end if you hold out. Rapture, by its supernatural components, alters the body. Indulged in, it’s safe enough and humans will never feel the side effects and their bodies will heal, none the wiser of the risks.
If Deidre was forcibly addicted, which is entirely possible given enough Rapture, it means her human body is battling the evolution to the supernatural. Kasar has to keep giving her the Rapture to keep her alive, lessening the doses each time; but the most important step is after it’s in her system, he has to feed from her. To drain her blood and force her body to create new, pure blood. Forcing it to return to its human nature.
So he’s ingesting Rapture to save Deidre, and battling his own demons as he does so.
“Fuck,” I bite out. Kasar just nods. The situation is fucked. I hate this goddamn drug, but it’s better in my control than rampant on the streets.
“You have news,” he says, waiting expectantly. It’s why I called him here.
The garage door slams and we tense as Ashe blitzes through the house and up the stairs. He’s following the path Eloise took, and I rise, panic skittering across my arms. Then I hear him sayhername, and I snarl, but force myself to sit my ass down. Ashe will handle Eris, and she might be a chaos demon but Cassandra is still in there enough to control her from harming humans.
