Page 61 of Life Blood
“And until then, we drink from the bags and stay the hell away from each other,” Braden said resolutely.
“Who’s staying with Elle? We can’t just leave her to fend for herself because Logan fucked up,” Zac said.
“I will. Unlike Logan, I can control myself around her.”
“Enzo’s scout won’t talk,” Zac said.
“Don’t worry, I’ll beat the truth out of him,” Braden said, “better than killing Logan.”
“Fuck all of you. She’s staying with me tonight. That’s the end of it.”
I stepped around the corner to see Logan and Braden moving so fast in a whirlwind of fighting that I couldn’t tell who was who.
“Stop it!” I shouted.
The blur became two people, two fang-exposed vampires, that is. Black eyes, dark, menacing faces, ready to kill.
“Stop!” I shouted, looking at them both with fear. “It was my stupid idea. Stop blaming Logan or trying to kill each other. I thought if he fed without killing me, you all could. I didn’t think it would screw with his mind and break up your family.”
Braden’s face was the first to recover. Zac stared at me in confusion, Cole studied me like I was a science project, and Logan’s eyes swallowed me up body and soul. I felt drawn to him the most, and it was taking everything in my power not to run to him.
“You feel it, don’t you,” Logan said.
His voice wrapped around me like velvet. “Yes,” I said in a voice of defeat.
“We can’t act on these emotions,” Logan said with a look of pain. “I can’t do this to you or them.”
“For starters, I can do whatever I want with whoever I want, how about that?”
“Elle,” Cole shoved his hands in his pockets, “Like we talked about earlier, letting Logan feed on you has had some damaging after effects. We need to understand how this bond works before it destroys us.” He let out a breath, “We appreciate you not wanting us to be in control, but you have to trust us right now, or this will never work. We can’t protect you if we’re fighting each other.”
“That makes sense, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry I started this whole thing.”
“Don’t be sorry just help us by being part of the solution.”
“I’ll do what I can. Do you guys have books, journals?” I looked at Cole, “You mentioned something about journals earlier?”
“I have a friend bringing some in from out of state.” Cole looked back at Braden and Logan, “He said that we have to flush the blood out of you two. A spell has to be in place for us to drink from a Life Blood without personally claiming them.”
“Sounds like a lot of weird shit has to go down so this crazy relationship will work for the five of us,” I said.
“It’s a serious and complicated thing, yes,” Cole confirmed. “We’ll get to the bottom of it.”
Logan rolled his eyes and folded his arms, “Along with everything else we have swirling around in chaos too, right?”
“Enough, Logan.” Cole retorted.
“What is he talking about?”
“Ah, I don’t know…the simple fact that Enzo is most likely on our ass since we got into it with one of his scouts. The idea that everyone thinks we can play this shit out for your sake, you know keeping life as normal as we can until—”
“Shut the fuck up right now!” Braden’s growl could have shaken the Earth. “Quit trying to scare her just to make her run to your arms.” He looked at me, “Everything’s fine.”
“Really?” I lowered my voice. “Because right now it doesn’t seem that way.”
“It’s fine,” Cole said with a warning glance at Logan. “If anything does go bad, we’ll know it before you can even question it.” He turned to leave, “I’m done with this conversation. Logan and Braden, go feed, or we will be locking you up until every last trace of lifeblood is gone. End of discussion.”
“Fuck off, Cole!” Braden said before he took off in a blur toward the forest.
