Page 25 of Lucas
“Go. Perhaps your mother needs your services in the drawing room.”
That got a chuckle from his brothers, and Lucas, his cheeks tinged with anger, bowed his head and made his escape. He was still fuming when he reached the library and stomped to the sideboard to grab the decanter of whiskey. He drained half the cup and welcomed the slow burn. After taking two deep breaths, he walked along the bookcases. For all his bluster, his father had read some of the books, but he preferred talk of the old days as he walked through battle scenarios with his brothers and cadre, all battle-hardened men.
Lucas found a book that fit his mood and dropped into his favorite chair. In front of the slow-burning fire, the late spring evenings still cool, and with drink in hand, he lost himself in the political intrigue of King Henry’s court. His father might notbelieve in him—and at one time his respect mattered—but Lucas had learned something more important than swordplay. It only mattered if you believed in yourself.
Chapter Ten
“Where are we?”Lucas managed the same few words each time he woke before losing consciousness for another couple of hours.
“In a motel. Just rest.” I gave up my attempts to feed him blood while he was coherent. He refused to accept it. It was easier to feed him while he was out. His subconscious—or more likely his beast—wasn’t as squeamish about taking my blood.
By the time I gathered my purse and took a last glance around the room, he was sleeping again. Besides his meager bandages, he was naked under the covers.
Before leaving the truck stop earlier that evening, I’d bought water, two sets of sweats—one for him and one for me—what bandages they had, and a pen flashlight. It wasn’t enough, but it was a start.
Fixated on how the vamps were tracking us, I crawled under the rental car and made my way along the frame, inch by inch, running the flashlight along every nook and cranny. We had already ditched everything we’d packed for our trip, including our nice suitcases, in exchange for duffels, new clothes, and cosmetics. Lucas had rented another car, yet the vamps still found us.
Did the vamps have time to plant a tracker? If there was something to find, my money was on the car. With Lucas bleeding in the backseat, time pressed in, and I was giving up hope of finding anything until I spotted a lump on the far side of the fuel tank. I ran my hand over it, and after tugging hard, it fell into my hand.
I ran the flashlight over it and watched a tiny red light blip on and off. It was definitely a tracker.Fuckers.I took the time to run over the car again and, thirty minutes later, determined there was only the one.
I’d considered going through each piece of clothing, shoes, and the duffel itself in search of other tracking mechanisms, but who was I kidding? I’d already tossed all my favorite clothes days ago. So, after changing into my new sweats, I gathered everything else and threw it in the truck stop’s dumpster.
I stared at the tracker and considered crushing it. Other vamps might already be monitoring us, and I glanced around the parking lot, not really expecting to find any, but that didn’t mean they weren’t out there. I needed to throw them off our track, and then I remembered something from some TV show. If I glanced in a mirror, would I see a diabolical smile?
I wandered the parking lot and scanned the license plates of the big trucks. Then I found the perfect one. Idaho. Close enough. Maybe they’d think we’d given up and were heading home. I glanced around, and not seeing anyone, attached the tracker inside the front wheel well of the semi.
With a satisfied grin, I fell into the driver’s seat, but another thought sobered me. All the attacks had involved two vamps. But there had been three at the last hotel before Lucas was injured. Where did the third vamp go? Or was that an entirely different group? Maybe they used one vamp to manually track us while the other two stayed behind to take us out. When the vamp doing the tracking didn’t hear from them, two more were sent.It was possible that Venizi, or whoever was sending them, used vamps from allied Houses. The answer to that would require Lucas’s experience.
I shook my head. It didn’t matter now. The tracker was gone. I had driven the back roads until I found a town with a fair amount of restaurants and stores, and grabbed a room at a bearable motel. Now, as I took a last glance at Lucas lying on the bed, I hoped I was doing the right thing. The TV was tuned to a classic movie channel, and when I closed the door, I hung the “Do Not Disturb” placard on the doorknob.
The town was large enough to have a twenty-four-hour combination grocery and hardware store. I bought two sets of clothes for each of us, two sets of sheets and towels, a new duffel, toiletries for both of us, first aid supplies, a cooler, a case of water, two gallons of orange juice, cookies, fruit, and veggies. The orange juice and cookies were to restore me after I gave blood. If it was good enough for the Red Cross, it was good enough for me. After I packed everything in the car, I realized I’d forgotten something and ran back in and bought a new burner phone.
When I got back to the room, Lucas was still sleeping, and his major wounds still leaked blood.
“Hey, baby. Can you wake up?”
No response.
I hauled everything in from the car, set up the cooler, then began working on his injuries. The minor cuts seemed to have healed, which gave me hope, but the deeper ones still oozed blood. Once I had new bandages in place, I took the old shirts and towels and tossed them in the tub, wishing I’d bought detergent. I filled the tub with enough cold water to cover the items and left them to soak.
I crawled into bed next to Lucas and cut my palm.
“Wake up, Lucas. It’s time to feed.”
The call to feed must be instinctual because his lips tightened on the cut, and he drank. A flutter of hope rose as each suckle was stronger than the last. He just needed rest. If I only knew how long we had before someone else tracked us down. We were miles from the closest interstate, but we couldn’t stay long. At this point, we were nothing more than sitting ducks.
The voice soothed him.
When he tried to open his eyes—he didn’t have the strength.
Before Lucas could give it another thought, sweet honey touched his lips. He didn’t question it, clasping his mouth around the soft skin. A familiar scent floated around him as he suckled the life-saving blood. Then the beast took over, and he fell into the memories.
Lucas dropped into the chair across from his bed, the opened letter still in his hand. A tear escaped down his cheek. He didn’t bother wiping it away as he stared out the window, not noticing the Spanish moss rustle in the breeze as it hung from the large oak trees. Nor did he hear the twilling of birds as they flitted among the branches. The scent of magnolias and the humid air had no impact on him. He might as well be in a vacuum that matched the silence echoing in his ears.
The bastard had done it.
He had destroyed his beautiful sister. She had endured a strict and sheltered life with little love from their father. And now, she’d been traded in marriage to a stranger from an allied House as if she were nothing more than a fine piece of china to be displayed on a shelf. Their father completely disregarded her desire to marry another—a vampire from a strong House who loved her as deeply as she did him.
