Page 113 of Taste of Forever
“Where is she?” I could feel her nearby, sense her heartbeat and the deep sorrow that overcame her.
The humans didn’t answer. They instead patted my legs and torso, inserting their hands into my pockets.
“I gave you my weapons,” I snarled, straining against the cuffs. The burning was a constant irritation, but it didn’t feel like there was enough silver to burn my hands completely off my wrists. I suspected the liquid silver was also a small concentration. Enough to be a deterrent, but not lethal.
The humans continued to ignore me. One held up my phone that he took from my jacket pocket and placed it on the table with all the other devices. Then they shoved me toward a door at the far end of the cabin. It was pushed open to reveal a set of stairs going down to a basement level.
The air from below wafted up with the scent of salty tears and the woman who made my life complete.
“Heather!” I broke free from the two humans grasping my elbows and hurried down the rickety stairs.
“Laith!”
Her voice was desperate and full of pain, but it made my blood sing with relief. She was alive and well enough to talk, at least.
I hit the basement floor to see Heather sitting slumped over in a chair that was bolted to the ground. Her hands were cuffed in front of her and there was a swelling bump on her head. In front of her stood a man with a gun, facing me with only the slightest surprise on his face.
“Get away from her,” I snarled, heading straight for him. Even if I couldn’t use my hands, I still had my teeth.
He raised the gun. I dodged. A shot fired and Heather screamed. I wasn’t sure where the hit landed. Not until my shoulder blazed with pain.
The shock of it sent me stumbling into the wall. My vision still wasn’t fully healed, but I could make out the damage to my jacket shoulder. The smell of burned leather hit my nose. But I couldn’t feel any blood dripping and the pain was quickly subsiding. A graze, most likely. And no silver in the bullet, if my healing was already taking over. Thank Temkra.
I pushed off the wall with my opposite shoulder and faced the human. He was about my height, with the coldest blue eyes I’d ever seen. It wasn’t that they were the color of ice, but they lacked any emotion whatsoever. Humans usually had instinctive, visceral reactions when meeting the eyes of a vampires. Often it was fear, or at least caution. This human had no reaction at all.
The sound of his heartbeat confirmed that. There had been no spike of his pulse since I entered the cabin. The pumping of blood through his body was calm, if even slow. As if he were completely at rest. Even his scent held no markers of stress. I’d never run into a human with such flat emotional responses before.
I wanted to look at Heather, to inspect the injuries on her head and make sure she was all right. But my full attention needed to be on this cold human if I wanted to get her out.
“Are you him?” I said after a few seconds of staring each other down. “The one who’s been threatening her?”
His face lit up like he was actually pleased. “So she’s told you about me.”
“Oh yeah.” I put on a feral grin. “Enough to make sure that you will absolutely not make it out of here alive.”
“How do you figure that, vampire?” The human nodded at the others who stood behind me. “You’re cuffed and outnumbered.”
“I’m a pretty lucky guy.”
If my hands were free and I had access to my weapons, I was pretty confident I could take at least the ones here in the basement. But, right then, my bravado was almost as much for myself as it was for Heather. This shit didn’t look good, and Blood ‘til Dawn had no idea where we were.
The clan would hunt these humans down and make them pay, but that could be weeks from now. At this rate, I wasn’t certain I’d be alive to see it.
But Heather would be. She had to be.
The only solution became increasingly clear as seconds passed.
“Look, I’ll do you a solid.” The cuffs bit and chafed at my wrists. I felt a trickle of blood run over my palm as I lifted my chin. “Let Heather go and I’ll turn myself over to you. No resistance. No tricks.”
The human’s eyebrows lifted as Heather said, “What? No.”
I forced myself to ignore her, focusing solely on him. “I’m what your government really wants, right? A real, living vampire in the flesh. You won’t need to do your shadowy intel gathering if you’ve got me.”
“We took his phone,” one of the humans supplied. “He can’t call anyone.”
“Laith, no.” Heather shook her head desperately from the chair. “Don’t do this.”
“We could just keep you both,” the cold one said. “It’s not like you have any leverage to make an exchange.”
