Page 34 of Property of Mako
Inside the gate, we parked under the shadow of a leaning magnolia tree, the cicadas screaming like an alarm no one else could hear.
“Creepy doesn’t even begin to cover this place,” Lyra quietly murmured.
“This is just the welcome mat.” I slid a blade into my belt and placed my earpiece. We did a quick check that the comms were working, then I added, “If this is tied to the Crimson Auction, we won’t be alone. Let’s go.”
Dexter stayed with the bikes to watch the entrance. Warily, the rest of us walked up the tree-lined driveway. At one time, it must’ve been beautiful. Now, it was overgrown with weeds popping up through the old bricks.
The main house appeared through the moss-draped oaks like something out of a fever dream—three stories of weathered white columns, black shutters hanging crooked, and a roofline that seemed to sag under the weight of centuries. The air was thick with the smell of damp earth and something sweeter, almost metallic.
Blood.
Old, but not old enough.
Lyra grabbed my sleeve, making me pause. She glanced toward the house. “What’s the plan?”
“See if anyone’s here. Figure out if the girls are being kept on-site or just processed through. Then get the hell out.”
“And if they’re here?”
I met her worried hazel gaze. “We improvise.”
The inside was worse.
The foyer smelled of mildew and dust, but underneath it was a faint copper tang. The walls were lined with portraits—gaunt men and women in antebellum dress, their eyes following us with unnatural intensity. I was surprised the place hadn’t been looted or at least cleaned out by some previous resident.
Crypt Keeper’s voice crackled in my earpiece. “North wing’s clear. But there’s fresh prints in the dust—someone’s been here recently.”
Spook chimed in next. “South wing has these cushions all over the place and chains bolted to the walls. Empty, though.”
Chains. I didn’t like what that meant.
Lyra and I moved deeper into the house, down a hallway where the wallpaper peeled in curling strips. That’s when I saw it—a thin trail of dried blood leading toward the rear of the house. I followed it into a ballroom, the kind made for waltzes and champagne.
Now, it was nothing but broken glass and the faint outlines of symbols painted in something dark on the floor. A staging ground.
Lyra’s breath caught. “What are those?”
“Wards,” I said. “Binding circles. You put prey inside; they don’t get out.”
A whimper escaped her, and her hand brushed mine, unintentional, but enough to send that now-familiar jolt through me. The one that told me this woman wasn’t just a complication—she was my mate. And that made her presence here even more dangerous.
Through a broken pane of the dust-coated windows, something caught my eye. Movement in the tree line.
Too slow for a vampire, too careful for a human.
“Mako,” Crypt Keeper’s voice came low. “We’ve got company—lots of it. East side, converging. Armed to the teeth.”
I glanced at Lyra. “Time to go.”
We slipped out the back, into the overgrown garden where moonlight silvered the weeds. As we ran for the bikes, I could feel them closing in—Covenant scouts, no doubt coming for us.
This wasn’t the Crimson Auction.
But it was certainly a feeder house.
A holding pen.
Which meant Lily likely had been here. I had a feeling they had recently been moved—likely because we were closing in.
