Page 37 of Resurrecting His Soul
Melina looked up and down Ricardo’s body and Lisandra lunged around him, but he pulled her back and Melina laughed. “I think we both know what I want, Ricardo,” Melina said. “But if I’m going to have you, that bitch has to go.” She looked back at Jameson, then turned back to Ricardo. “Since Jameson wants her, seems like the best scenario for everyone is for you to let him have her, then I’ll have you to myself again, and we’ll let her stupid human go. Not like she poses a threat to us, anyway.”
Ricardo grabbed Melina. “Not fucking happening!”
Before he could do anything else, Lisandra rushed forward and kicked him away from Melina. The shock and hurt on his face when his sapphire gaze caught hers broke her heart all over again. But she had to do this. She wouldn’t let them kill Allison over her. “I have to go,” she said, her eyes still locked on his.
“No!” He was up and grabbed her in the next second, but she shoved him away again.
“I can’t let them hurt Allison,” she cried.
She moved fast. Before he could get up again, she ran to Jameson. Melina moved in front of Ricardo. “Chase us and we will make sure she dies before you can take us both out.”
“You can’t take me,” he said. “Neither of you.”
Melina shrugged. “No, but we can kill her before you get to both of us. You willing to take that chance?” When he didn’t move she nodded. “That’s what I thought.” She cleared the distance between her and Jameson. “Let’s go.”
Jameson grabbed Lisandra and took off into the tree line behind Ricardo’s property. They ran for miles before he stopped. “You have to let her go,” Lisandra demanded. Jameson still held Allison by the throat and she could tell the speed they were dragging her friend along was wearing on her. “I came with you. Now let her go.”
Jameson laughed. “See, I don’t think I will.”
Lisandra went after him, but something pricked her from behind and her vision went blurry. Just before her head hit the ground the world started to spin, and then everything was dark. As she faded away the only thought that she had was,I failed.
ChapterTwenty-Four
Ricardo
He ran faster than he’d ever ran before, chasing them through the woods. Although he could have easily caught up to them, he knew there was a chance that Lisandra and Allison could get hurt before he could take out both Melina and Jameson. They stayed far enough apart from each other he couldn’t kill them both at the same time. If he was honest, he wanted to save Lisandra, then worry about Allison after he knew she was safe, but Lisandra would never forgive him if Allison was hurt or killed while he rushed to save her.
Knowing Allison was in the most danger, he decided to go against his instinct to get to Lisandra, and he ran for her first. Jameson had her and he knew he wouldn’t have a problem taking down the young SOB.
“No!” Lisandra screamed.
Her scream was laced with so much fear it hit Ricardo like a ton of bricks, and he lost his footing and nearly face-planted into a tree, but he quickly righted himself and changed direction towards Lisandra. He’d barely begun running towards her when his world turned upside down. Lisandra’s eyes rolled back, and she fell, face-first into the ground. Then she was just still. He roared and kicked up his pace, but before he got to her something caught his attention out of the corner of his eye. He turned his head just in time to see Melina pull a bamboo shoot to her mouth, then something stuck in his chest. Before he could look down and focus on what had hit him, he felt the darkness pulling him under. Somehow he managed to take a couple more steps towards Lisandra before his vision was completely gone, and all that was left was the cold dirt beneath his face, and darkness.
****
Ricardo could not remember the last time he’d felt groggy, but that was definitely the sensation running through his head when he peeled his eyes open. He was still laying on the ground, now wet with the early morning dew. Slowly he stood up, taking a moment to regain his bearings.
“Lisandra,” he said quietly.
The events of the previous day hit him all at once. He had to find them, but when he moved, everything tilted and he had to grab ahold of a nearby tree to steady himself. Apparently, Melina had been really busy planning everything out to capture Lisandra. He’d heard about a special herb that knocked vampires on their ass, but he’d never seen it in action, and he’d damn sure never told Melina about it. Truth be told, he thought it was something of a fairytale. Something that had been told to make vampires feel less invincible. Obviously, he’d been wrong in his assumption. Still, he had no idea how Melina would have learned about the herb, and even less of a clue how she’d found it, but the dizziness pumping through his head was a clear sign that she’d done just that.
He needed to feed to get his head back on straight and find where they had taken Lisandra and Melina. If Lisandra had been knocked out the way he had, he hated to think of the vile things Jameson and Melina might have done to hurt her while she couldn’t defend herself. He had to get his strength back and find them, fast.
Getting home took longer than he’d liked. He stumbled around a bit before the herbs wore off enough for him to try to run, and he still hadn’t gotten near his full speed. When he got home, he headed straight to the fridge where they kept their blood bags, and he drank until he amassed a sizable pile of empty blood bags on the floor and was sure he’d sucked down enough blood to fill several vampires. The blood did as he’d hoped, and when he took off back towards the tree line, the effects of the herb Melina had shot him with were nothing but a memory.
****
Ricardo spent most of the day running through the woods, trying to find a new trace of Lisandra, something to point him in her direction, but it was as if they’d been lifted from the woods and flown or driven away, leaving no scent behind for him to track. Everything felt like it was closing in on him and he fell to his knees with his head in his hands and cried. Anger, fear, and heartache had him worn down beyond his final recesses of strength. Living eternally had never felt like such a heavy burden as it did right then while he contemplated living without Lisandra in his life. He had to find her before anything worse happened. If Jameson and Melina threatened to hurt Allison, Lisandra would do anything they wanted to keep her friend safe. Ricardo rubbed his hands across his face and wiped away his tears. It wasn’t the time to break down and become weak. He had to find her.
Running back to the house to get his phone, he was planning to try to convince Melina he was sorry for kicking her out and trying his hand at convincing her to come over. If he could get her in person, he was almost certain he could convince her to tell him what Jameson was planning, and maybe even use her to find where Jameson might have taken Lisandra and Allison. He knew she felt a deep bond with him as her maker, and he was hoping that would give him the advantage he needed to get some information out of her. Hopefully he hadn’t put too big of a hole in her bond with him and she’d be willing to give up her new progeny to make him happy.
He was in such a hurry when he ran through the house, he ignored all of his senses. He didn’t pick up her scent, the sound of her tapping her nails on the counter, or even see her sitting at the kitchen table when he ran past it towards his room. When he had his phone in his hands, ready to begin pulling up her name in his contacts, his senses finally kicked in. The part of his brain that had noticed her when he ran inside pulled him back to the present, and he had to grit his teeth and take several deep breaths to calm down. He couldn’t kill her before he got what he needed out of her.
“How long are you planning to pretend you don’t know I’m here,” Melina’s voice traveled from the kitchen.
Pinching the bridge of his nose, he took one more deep breath before he walked back out and to the kitchen where Melina sat. She was drinking from a wine glass filled with blood. He wanted to slap the glass out of her hand. When he had defended her with Lisandra, when he’d tried to get her to give drinking from bags a shot, she had turned up her nose and refused to make any strides at changing her feeding habits. To see her sitting in his kitchen, in the home he wanted to spend his life in with Lisandra, who she had run off, made him livid.
“I wasn’t ignoring you,” he said finally. “I was just preoccupied.”
