Page 39 of Midlife Vampire Unexpected

“So, you’re going to live, but you’re not going to tell them anything about us. You’re going to say you were attacked and they got away. That’s it. You don’t know anything else. Do you understand?” I insisted.

“I’ll tell them whatever the fuck I want.” The vamp hissed.

“Then you die now.” Antonio pressed the wooden dagger so it pricked her skin.

“Get in the bunker and you live.” I stood up and stepped back, giving her room to make her decision.

Antonio got all up in the vampire’s face. “If you talk, we will hunt you down and kill you.”

She glared at me, knowing I had figured her out and knowing there was not a damn thing she could do about it.

She walked to the bunker and within seconds disappeared to its dark interior. I took off Bianca’s coat and threw it down to her. We were going to move quickly. Bianca wouldn’t need a coat in the amount of time it would take us to get to the truck.

I slung her over my shoulder and we moved outside.

“I’m going to take her back to the truck. You’ve got to stay here and see who lands and see what happens. Please don’t get caught.” I suddenly felt a pain in my chest at the thought of Antonio being captured by the bounty hunters.

“You can’t just go off alone,” Antonio growled.

“We have to split up,” I insisted. “I have to get Bianca to safety and we need to find out who’s responsible for the price on a werewolf’s head. It’s the same problem we’re facing with the cemetery. We need to cut off the head of the serpent or we’re going to be fighting it over and over and over again. Something I’m way past doing. So, you stay here and figure out who’s running the show.”

Antonio’s gaze shifted back and forth as he weighed my words before finally giving me a single nod. He shifted into wolf form and disappeared into the undergrowth.

Chapter 27

Getting Bianca back to The Estate was a lot less eventful than I thought it would be. I ran over the mountains with her on my shoulder and got to the truck, laying her down on the seat. When I pulled into The Estate, Branson and Mae ran out to greet us. Branson hoisted Bianca up, carrying her into the house in a little more dignified approach than I’d been managing.

“We should send for Matheus,” Mae said as we followed Branson

“I’ll let Matheus know she’s been hurt,” Branson said. “But the reality is we need him to find out some more information.”

He carried her into the red room and laid her on a sofa opposite the sofa Jane was on. I turned and looked at Mae for a moment and shook my head. “We’re dropping like flies around here,” I said. Hilda was in the kitchen with Trina.

“Where are the kids?” I asked, concern edging its way through my body.

“Down at the bakery,” Trina said.

Mae, Branson, and I moved to the red room.

“They’ll come back around. They’ve had a healthy dose of magic.” Mae nodded.

“We need to spend some time and look at the case,” I said, “because at the moment we’re losing the battle for our members and the cemetery.”

“Have you given any thought to finding our fifth member?” Branson asked as if they’d been having a conversation earlier.

“I don’t know how we find people,” Mae said. “What am I supposed to do? Put it in the personal columns or up on Facebook or something? Bianca and Jane and Chloe, they came to the pendant. I believe the pentacle called them and I think it will also call the fifth person to us much faster than I could ever find them on my own.”

“Finding the fifth person isn’t going to be the whole deal, right?” I pointed out. “There’s six stones on the Pendant of Time. We need the five people to be in a circle around Mae like the stones are on the pendant.”

Jane stirred on the couch. She rolled over and slowly sat up.

“Jane,” I said as Mae and I both rushed over to her.

“Are you okay?” Mae asked, scanning Jane’s body with her hands.

“Yeah, I am actually,” she said. “Where is Toern?”

“He’s out gathering information still,” I said. “We still don’t know who’s responsible for the assault on the cemetery or for the price on Bianca’s head.”

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