Page 51 of Claimed By Blood

The scent of the sewer wall is imprinted into my palm.

Ireallyneed to wash my hands. Fuck, maybe I should’ve just walked in the sewage with the rest of them…

Shit. Samuel has Eve and we have no idea where we are, or how to contact our people to tell them.

“Get up,” I growl, kicking out again. “We have to find her.”

Silas is on his feet first, and together we manage to wake up Vane, who looks around groggily, scrubbing a hand down his face before coming to the same realisation we have.

“Evie.”

He’s on his feet, only to stumble and crash into a bin seconds later.

“What the hell did they drug us with?” He groans.

“I don’t know, but Morwen’s still out cold.”

Silas rolls his eyes and scoops the vampire psycho into his arms and over his shoulder. Both Vane and I raise our brows at him in unison.

“What?” he demands. “Mia will kill us if we leave her knocked out in an alley.”

Vane’s shoulders slump, and he rolls his eyes. “Fine, but does anyone have any idea where we are?”

I walk out to the mouth of the alley, and stare at the ocean. We’ve been dumped on a street lined with restaurants on one side, and sun-drenched beach on the other.

“They must have known the salt water and the scent of food would cover their tracks,” I grumble.

“Wait here,” Silas mutters. “I’ll see if there’s a sign or something that tells us where we are.”

“Fuck figuring out where we are,” I reply. “We need to go after Eve.”

“We can’t do that if we don’t know where she is. We need the rest of the pack. Finn must be able to track her. He’ll have a better idea of where to look.” Silas has a point, as much as I hate to admit it.

When did he become the reasonable brother?

Vane grunts and shoves past me. “You’ll draw too much attention. I’ll go.”

I’m about to ask why the hulking lycan is going to draw less attention than I will, but he just shakes his head.

“Silas is hauling an unconscious woman, your fangs are out and your hair is covered in shit.”

Great.

It turns out, Samuel—or his minions—have dumped us in a town over seventy miles away from the resort where we set up base.

Unfortunately, the unrelenting heat has another unwelcome side effect. As the day wears on, whatever gunk is in my hair is slowly baked until the stench of it becomes unbearable. I don’t want to waste time dealing with it, but the others evidently think differently. In the end, the brothers take matters into their own hands, shoving me off the end of the pier and into the sea for an impromptu bath.

So when I burst into our rooms, I’m encrusted with salt and in a foul mood. Something which only gets worse as I take in our omega curled up on the sofa, clutching a cushion as Mia, Immy, and Gideon argue over the top of him.

A hush descends as the three of them realise we’ve returned. They turn and stare at us.

Mia descends on her brothers in a whirlwind of curses, prying her girlfriend from over Silas’s shoulder and running her hands over the vampire’s body, searching for injuries.

“Calm down,” Vane mutters. “I already checked her over. She’s fine. They must have just dosed her heavier than the rest of us.”

I don’t blame our captors for being unwilling to take the chance with an elder vampire. But it’s annoying that Morwen slept like a baby while the rest of us were forced to run the entire distance home.

Mia grumbles more, curses, and hauls Morwen off, muttering about getting her cleaned up.

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