Page 60 of Bound in Blood
Mateo nodded, willing to play along so long as it made the night move faster. “We made it to America. Saw the end of the war.”
“We’ll never have to worry about growing old. About one of us dying before the other,” Marco said quietly. That had been a constant fear of theirs as children, being without each other.
“And Logan,” Mateo added, a little softer this time. “We have him now.”
Marco didn’t reply right away, but Mateo didn’t need him to. The warmth that pulsed through the bond in quiet agreement was more than enough. It was strange, how easily someone could slip into your world and become part of it. How quickly Logan had taken up space they didn’t even know they’d left empty.
“I didn’t believe Isabella, back in the day,” Marco admitted. “When she said a mate would improve your life in ways you didn’t know needed improving.”
“I never listened to her long enough to hear her say any of that.” Mateo waved him off. “But I suppose she was right.”
“Thank God he didn’t meet us seventy years ago,” Marco said, huffing out a laugh.
Mateo exhaled a slow breath in quiet agreement, tipping his head back to stare at the sky. The clouds above were low and heavy, lit from beneath by the amber wash of city lights. The rain had gone misty now, drifting more than falling. It clung to their coats and lashes, made the world feel hushed and far away.
They moved in silence for another block, weaving through shadows, cutting behind dumpsters and broken fences. Mateo kept his senses wide open, listening for the faintest scuff of a boot, the rustle of fabric, the telltale rush of blood.
And then he stopped cold.
“Do you hear that?” Mateo asked, voice barely audible.
Marco had gone still beside him, head tilted slightly. “Yeah.”
Somewhere up ahead, at the edge of the alley where the dim glow of a motion-activated porch light flickered to life, a shape darted past.
Too fast for a human. Not fast enough for one of them.
He took a step forward, and then another, ignoring Marco’s quiet warning behind him. Just enough rain clung to the light above them to blur the figure’s outline, and Mateo needed to get closer.
“Mateo, we promised if we saw him we’d call?—”
“We don’t know if it’s him yet.” But somewhere deep inside Mateo, heknew.That if he got closer, he’d catch the familiar stench of stale blood, see the pitch-black eyes of ferality. So hehadto get closer.
Mateo took another step.
The figure was just ahead now, paused at the mouth of the alley like it hadn’t expected to be seen. The rain veiled him like static on an old TV, but the next time lightning flashed—brief, distant, silent—Mateo caught a glimpse of his face.
Logan was right. He lookedyoung.Like the college kids that flocked to the clubs in the area. But there was something old about him, too. Something nagging on familiar, but Mateo just couldn’t?—
Lightning flashed again, and this time the boy made direct eye contact with him and Marco, his face twisting up in what Mateo could only describe as pure terror.
The feral boy lifted his arms up in a protective pose, like his base instincts told him only to feed and save his face… when Mateo saw it.
The scar.
And suddenly, the familiarity made sense.
A big, jagged scar, like something—or someone—had taken a chunk of the boy’s flesh. Because someone had.
Mateohad.
The air left his lungs, even though he didn’t need to breathe. His body reacted on instinct. Shock flaring. Denial rising. Memory pressing up from the depths like a hand reaching for his throat.
And then the boy ran.
Not at them. Not toward Logan’s bar. Just away.
“Mateo?” Marco’s voice snapped him out of his trance, “Mateo, he looked just like?—”
