Page 67 of Life Blood
I couldn’t watch as Braden continued his torture of the vampire. Skin removal wasn’t something I could stomach, though I wished I could, knowing that monster had his disgusting tongue on my neck.
I saw Zac stalking—more like playing—with a female in a dark leather suit, “Damn, you’re sexy,” he taunted, “Sucks that you’re playing on the wrong team.”
“Touch me, and Enzo will know that you have the Life Blood’s child,” she lashed out, walking in a circle, facing Zac like they were in a cage fight waiting on one to make the first move.
Zac stopped, crossed his arms, and laughed, “You think we’re that fucking stupid?”
“I know you are,” a guy who was dressed just like the girl said as he walked up to the two that were now in a face off.
Zac lifted his chin, glancing over at the muscular, pale-faced man, “Finally,” he let out a laugh. “I was beginning to think this wouldn’t be a challenge for us.”
In another vamp blur, the girl and the guy moved toward Zac. I watched Zac plant a foot, ease to the side, the girl’s super speed coming to a screeching halt as Zac sent her to the ground. At that moment, he reached toward her chest, ripped her heart out, and turned to shove it into the mouth of the other guy that he had managed to catch by the back of his neck. He twisted the man’s neck so hard it ripped off, and the two bodies lay there lifeless as Zac wiped the blood off of his hands on the man’s shirt.
He glanced over to where I was, winked, and was gone the next second. My ears were ringing as the sound of wailing and screaming filled the air followed by laughter—from my vampires—until all grew quiet.
“They aren’t giving up the location,” I heard Cole say.
“Let’s fucking burn them and get Elle out of here,” Zac ordered.
“Any word on her mom?” Logan asked.
“She’s gone. The bastards took her a day ago,” Zac said.
I felt so in shock that I could hardly think. All I could see was the gruesome images in my head of what Braden and Zac had done to those vampires. I was afraid to look around and see the rest of the carnage, knowing how it all sounded before my guys finished them all off with laughter.
As I went to stand up, a crystal-eyed woman with reddish-blonde hair and extended fangs was in front of me in a blur. “Your little Banners are too busy celebrating their victory to realize that your mine now, little Life Blood,” she said in a thick Creole accent.
She lunged at me, and before I could scream, her head was instantly off her shoulders, rolling down the lawn beside her feet as her body dropped.
“Zac!” Braden shouted from behind where she stood and kicked her head away from her body, “We need to get Elle out of here now!”
Zac was at my side and lifting my shaking body up into his arms, “I’m on it. We’ll meet you at the safe house.”
“There are at least two dozen more coming our way. We’ll keep them distracted, get her and her scent out of here.”
I was moving at light speed in Zac’s arms, shoved into a sleek car, and racing out of the location quicker than I could process it.
“You okay?” Zac asked in a low voice. The deadly voice that all of them had been using since they saved my ass.
“My mom,” I answered, tears beginning to make their way to the surface. “She was…” I couldn’t finish.
“A Life Blood too,” Zac said without any expression in his voice. “She’s gone. We have to get you to safety.”
“Val’s dead. This is all my fault.”
“Val had that coming when she took you out of our protection,” Zac glanced over at me, and to my relief, placed his hand on my leg. “Damn it, Elle,” he said, voice filled with concern instead of anger. “You can’t ever run off like that again. We almost lost you.”
I covered his hand, feeling the protection and love bleeding off of it, “How did you even find us out here?”
To my surprise, Zac’s face softened. He took my hand in his, brought it to his lips, and smiled over at me. “Because Braden and Logan have had your blood in them, something about that helped them connect to you when we all thought we lost you. Logan felt it stronger than Braden, but we followed the pull they had. The closer we got, the stronger your scent was to them.”
“I guess feeding them my blood came in pretty handy, then, huh?” I said in a shaky voice. The whole situation starting to weigh down on me now.
“You’re our Life Blood. You may not have seen or picked up on how serious that really is before, but I hope you understand it now. No one fucks with you. Period,” he said, face growing dark again.
“I swear I thought I was safe.”
“Your first mistake,” he said, gripping the wheel tighter and accelerating down an empty street. “One thing you need to know about us is that we won’t ever control what you do unless we see that it can place you in danger. Isn’t that why you took off with Val?”
