AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He pressed his hand over her mouth as she began to scream, but with that moment of clarity, reason abandoned him. He knew only the craving. The hunger. The need.
“Mine,” he said. And like a thing possessed, he took her and fell to the ground with her, closing his mouth over the wound the Angel had made for him, then drawing in the life. The light.
His light.
* * *
“I came here planning to punch you in the face,” Nick said, his perfect face twisted in anger. “Now I’m postponing my assault, however much you may deserve it, as I’ve got something more pressing to talk with you about.”
“My relief knows no bounds,” Luke said.
“Oh, what the hell.” And then, before Luke could anticipate it, Nick’s fist shot out and slammed into his nose. Bone and cartilage shattered. Blood oozed down the back of his throat.
And somewhere deep within Luke, the serpent bared its fangs and hissed.
Luke forced himself to be calm. Forcing the anger back down where it belonged, taking hold of the chains and twisting, trying to choke the life from the beast. And only when he was certain that he could control it did he look up at his friend.
Nick took a step forward. “You locked me in a coffin. And I had to wake up to Ryan Doyle’s ugly face.”
“About that, I truly am sorry. No one should have to suffer that way.”
“Dammit, Luke, after everything we’ve been through, and you pull this shit? Play anyone else you like, line up your pieces however they make sense to you. But you do not play me. Not me. Not ever. We clear?”
“We are.” Luke understood Nick perfectly, which wasn’t the same as acquiescing, but he didn’t feel compelled to point that out. “Now tell me what’s gotten under your skin.” He needed to speak to Nick about the escaped serial killer and the vampire who had helped him, but that conversation would have to wait. Something was up, and Luke quelled a growing sense of unease as he waited for his friend to speak.
“Ryback called,” Nick said, as dread latched its claws into Luke. “Tasha wasn’t in the apartment.”
“There’s more,” Luke said, a slow, boiling fury replacing the dread. “Tell me.”
“He found goblin blood.”
Dear gods, Tasha.“You tried her cell?”
“I did. No answer.”
“You go there,” Luke said, his voice tight with fury. “Use my jet so you can travel by day, but go there, find Serge, and find out what the fuck has happened to my ward. And get my bail hearing moved up. I cannot be in here with Tasha lost in the world. She’s a child, Nick, trapped in the body of a woman. She needs protection. She needs me.” He looked hard at his friend. “Do whatever you must to make it so.”
“I will,” Nick said, “though your actions tonight might make that more difficult.” Luke lifted his brow in question. “Constantine’s pool deck,” he continued. “Caught the news as I was coming here. The human cops have swarmed the place. Apparently some girl had the blood sucked out of her. She’ll live, but dammit, Luke, you had to go and feed?”
“As a matter of fact, I did.”
“It’s a crime to suck the life from a human,” Nick said mildly. “Or hadn’t you heard?”
Luke shot him a look that had his friend recoiling, but all he said was, “The girl is alive.”
“If the prosecution connects the dots, that’s not going to help your case on bail.”
“The prosecution already knows,” Luke said, then waited for Nick to connectthosedots.
It didn’t take long. “Dammit, Luke. You told her? A gung ho prosecutor with something to prove? She might make a fine asset, Luke, but don’t let the game turn into something more.” He cocked his head, as if rearranging a puzzle in his mind. “Oh, no.No. Don’t go there. She’s the prosecutor.Yourprosecutor. That’s all she is, and all she ever can be. Whatever fantasy you’re clinging to, you need to let it go.”
Ironic, thought Luke, that his friend could find that one sliver of hope despite all Luke’s efforts to hide it. “Don’t worry,” Luke said. “I know who and what she is.” What she was, he thought, was dangerous. A woman who would imprison him. Who must surely hate him for what he’d taken from her, and yet he couldn’t regret telling her the truth.
She was also the woman who saved him from certain death. And she was the only woman who had ever calmed the darkness within.
He did not know if he could have a future with Sara, but he knew that he had no chance if their path was paved with lies.
Nick eyed him warily. “You know who she is,” he repeated. “But don’t forget who you are, too. Who you are, and what you do.”
