Page 73 of Bite of Passage
He stabbed his knife into the table.“Fuckers.They wanted to see if I could.Then Magdalene came up with that gem of a new prophecy.They panicked and sent you.Bet they figured you’d be the only one of their four Punishers I wouldn’t kill.”
“Technically, only two of us remain after VanFliet destroyed Zal and Kian.”Cade folded his hands on the table.“They were right.You didn’t kill me, but you could’ve.Maybe you broke the curse?”
“Doubtful.I was probably a loophole that is somehow serving the needs of those who cast the curse to begin with.If you want answers, go to the dwarves.”
“They won’t talk to me—or any of us.”
“I might be able to talk with them.We’ve had dealings in the past.I’m not inclined to do that for our people, though.No member of the Directorate has treated me as anything other than a leper.What about you?Where is this female you turned?”
Cade’s expression clouded.“She wasn’t with me for long.Eight months.”
“What happened to her?”
Cade ran his teeth along his lower lip before glancing up.“You killed her.”
“Me?I never kill vampires indiscriminately.I don’t remember you being around any vampire I killed.I’ve only killed two females.Tania and… Jasmine?”
Cade’s gaze darkened further, his muscles tensing.
“Please tell me it wasn’t Jasmine.”
Cade pressed his lips together.
Skarde released a harsh breath.“Oh, damn, I’m sorry.Jasmine …” Memories he longed to forget flickered in his brain.“She was an awful case.”
“What happened?”
“You don’t want to know, Cade, not if you had feelings for her.Perhaps, still do.”
He slammed a fist on the table.“Tell me.”
Skarde considered toning down the truth, making it something palatable.But if someone did that to him, he’d hate it.Cade deserved the truth.
“When I found her, she was half insane with demon possession and holed up in a shack, filthy from her kills.There were bloody bits of humans everywhere.The stench of death was awful.Did you see her like that?”
Cade shook his head.“Directorate business took me elsewhere.”
“She was covered in marks—the bleeding, raised symbols all over her body that demons use to mark their humans.Being a vampire, the creature possessing her put those things on her over and over every night after she’d healed them.I can’t even imagine the pain.Running around naked, her hair falling out, and her teeth…” He shook his head.“She was one of the hardest for me.I’m not saying that because you had feelings for her.If I’d known she was important to you…” If that’d been Gemma, he would’ve died to get her free of the demon, no matter what state she emerged on the other side.
“There’s more.Finish,” Cade gritted out.
He ran a hand over his face.“I didn’t know you and she… I swear, Cade, I would’ve tried harder, even died if I had to in order to get her free.”
“Tell me about her teeth.”
“She’d filed them to sharp points like a demon’s.”
A muscle in his brother’s jaw twitched.“Then you killed her.”
“It was more complicated than that.I didn’t waltz in and dispatch her.This is what’s behind the rift between us?”He blew out a frustrated exhale.“I tried an exorcism on her, which was risky.The demon wouldn’t let go.There was a moment, a few seconds, when I separated them.”He didn’t want to see Cade’s reaction to telling of this part.He didn’t want to deal with more pain over that vile encounter.“She was shredded.In those few moments she begged me to kill her.She couldn’t take…” He covered his face and whispered.“She couldn’t stand what that thing forced her to do.At first I refused to kill her, stupidly hoping she wasn’t lost.She was one of us.There are so few of us, even fewer females.I believed I could get her free, but the demon overpowered her and made her attack.It was her or me.One of us was going to die.I still have a scar from the chunk of flesh she took from me.”He raised his shirt to expose an indented mouth-sized scar over his chest.“She tried to chew out my heart.If I’d known you were linked to her, I would’ve brought you with me to help her.You might’ve been able to reach her soul.That’s what I needed—a connection, a reason for her to fight to survive.”
Cade buried his face in his hands with his elbows on the table.Hoarsely, he said, “We’d had a fight before she disappeared.I don’t know how she got mixed up with a demon.Did you find out why or how?”
“No.You know as well as I a demonic possession means she was likely playing with dark magic.Did you love her?”
Cade’s shoulders drooped.He rubbed the back of his neck.“I don’t know.I thought so, but then I see how Gemma is with you.”
“What do you mean?”
