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THEY ALMOST MISSED the turnoff for Lake Road. The highway exit was so new, it had only a temporary sign marking it.
For the first half mile or so, there was little except announcements for new luxury homes. Then, a few dirt roads leading away from the street both left and right. Based on the map, the lake was to the right and so they concentrated on those roads, looking for evidence that they had been recently used.
Samantha forced herself to concentrate, hoping to pick up some sign of Diego. If he was still alive, that was.
At the third turnoff, she finally sensed some power. “Slow down.” She tried to focus, but it was still only a vague sense of another like her. At the next turnoff, it was stronger and by the next, even more discernible, but it dropped off shortly thereafter. “Turn back. It was the last road.”
As they drove down the dirt path, Peter murmured, “Looks familiar, doesn’t it?”
At her questioning glance, he explained. “Last time, Sloan held Melissa in an old stable. The road leading to it was a lot like this.”
“And so’s the building up ahead,” Diana added as they entered a clearing and encountered a one-story cement structure. There was nothing to identify it, but there were lights in the few windows along the front.
As Ryder stopped the van, the sound of gunshots shattered the night and Samantha experienced a huge surge of power. “It’s Diego. He’s been hurt, but...” The energy was too strong to belong to just one vampire. “Meghan and Blake. I think they’re here as well. And alive.”
“Let’s go, then.” Diana slipped out of the van, her gun drawn.
Peter followed behind her, while Ryder and Samantha trailed along, defenseless except for their vampire powers.
The front door was unlocked. Diana raced down the hall, Peter at her back.
At the open doorway farthest from the entrance, they paused and then rushed in, guns drawn.
Samantha and Ryder stepped in behind them to find an almost unbelievable tableau.
Three vampires kneeled naked before an older man, who had a gun trained on them.
Samantha didn’t think. She rushed to them. The old man said in warning, “Not another move or I kill all of you.” When she laid her hand on Diego’s shoulder, the chill of his skin alarmed her. He was almost insubstantial.
At her touch, he whispered, “Silver. The bullets are silver.”
She glanced down and noticed the blood covering the front of him. The silver was keeping him from healing. Worse, if it stayed inside him long enough, it would poison his system beyond repair.
“Drop the weapon, Sloan,” Diana called out, inching slowly along the right side of the room.
Peter mirrored her actions, flanking the left side. Slowly, the two detectives shifted together until they formed a screen between Sloan and the vampires.
Sloan called out, “Stay out of my way.”
“It’s over. There’s no sense in hurting anyone else,” Peter said softly.
“You don’t understand. They hold the key to life.” Sloan waved the weapon. His tone was wild and Peter didn’t know if they’d be able to reason with him.
“Is that what Frederick Danvers discovered? Is that what was in the journal you stole?” Diana asked.
A look of shock crossed the old man’s features. “You know about the journal? About Melissa?”
“Remember me?” Ryder said and finally stepped forward where Sloan could not fail to recognize him.
Samantha realized the old man had lost what little control he’d possessed. He raised his gun, and she saw his intent. She couldn’t let it happen.
Morphing, she raced in front of Ryder as Sloan and Diana fired.
Pain seared through her upper chest as the sound of gunfire erupted in the small room.
Ryder’s arm came around her midsection as her legs buckled.
“Why?” Ryder asked as he kneeled beside her.
“Silver to the heart...fatal,” she said and was surprised by how weak her own voice sounded. But she’d had no choice. The shot would have killed Ryder.
“Hold on, Samantha.” Peter was there pressing his hand to her upper chest to staunch the blood.
“I have to get the bullet out,” Ryder said. “There’s a medical bag in the van. I’ll be right back.”
As Peter held Samantha, he watched Diana examine the body of Sloan for a pulse. Apparently there was none. Her bullets had done their work. Despite that, Diana turned over the old man and cuffed his hands, almost as if she didn’t trust that he was really dead.
Peter didn’t blame her. Sloan had already proven them wrong once before.
In the middle of the room, the one large vamp who’d been shot—Diego, Peter assumed—was now on the ground and the two younger vamps were hovering over him. They were trying to stop the bleeding much as he was. And much like he was, they seemed to be fighting a losing battle.
Peter looked down at Samantha, who had a small smile on her face. “It doesn’t hurt,” she said.
“What?” He applied greater pressure as yet more blood leaked from between his fingers.
“Dying. It doesn’t hurt as much as I thought it would,” she said in surprisingly calm tones.
He wanted to argue with her. He wanted to tell her she wouldn’t die, but she was losing way too much blood. He didn’t want to waste her last moments with a lie. “I love you.”
She smiled, but it turned to a grimace of fear as she struggled for breath.
“Easy, love. Easy.” He battled back the fear in his own voice to ease her discomfort.
Samantha cradled the side of his face. “I’m sorry we didn’t have more time together.”
Ryder returned and kneeled beside them. As he saw her condition, his look turned grim. “Whatever I do may not be enough.”
“Hurry,” Peter said, removing his hand from Samantha’s wound so Ryder could reach it.
Diana stepped over to assist Ryder. She tore away the upper part of Samantha’s shirt to expose the wound and dabbed the area with gauze to keep the area clean so Ryder could locate and extract the bullet.
Samantha moaned and shifted with Ryder’s probing.
Peter held her tighter and murmured calm words to gentle her. It seemed to take hours for Ryder to pull out the silver bullet, although Peter knew it had only been minutes. Almost immediately, the flow of blood slowed, but she was still too pale and her breathing was shallow. Erratic.
Ryder moved away to help the other wounded vampire. “What can I do?” Peter asked Diana, fearing that what Ryder had done had not been enough.
“She may need to feed. Ryder has blood in the van.”
With a nod, he took Samantha in his arms and followed Diana outside. She helped him get settled in the back of the van and removed a blood bag from a small refrigerator. “Do you need help?”
“I’ve never done this before.”
She kneeled opposite him and brought the bag to Samantha’s mouth. At the contact of the plastic with her lips, she roused. He saw confusion on her face, and then shame.
He realized she was hesitant to feed in front of him.
Cradling her cheek, he bent his head close to hers. “Please, Samantha. I don’t want to lose you.”
As he pulled away, her eyes began to glow and her fangs slowly inched down. He held the bag to her lips again and watched as she punctured the bag and fed.
He thought he would be repulsed, but instead, it was fascinating to see the change in her as she drank the blood. He could feel her body growing less limp and more substantial. Her skin warmed and gained color.
But not enough, he realized as she finished the bag and sagged back into his arms. The blood had only temporarily helped. Diana went back to the refrigerator, but there was no more.
“We’ll have to get her back to town. There’ll be blood at either the shelter or at Ryder’s place.”
Although Samantha’s breathing was a little stronger, it was still too weak for his taste. “Can she make it back to town?”
“I don’t know, Peter. Maybe Ryder can tell us once he’s done inside,” she said. “I’m going to go see if they need my help.”
Peter nodded and leaned back against the side of the van, holding her tight, as if he could warm her with his body. Give her a little bit of his strength just with his nearness.
But with each minute that passed, her body became weaker and once again her breathing grew shallow and barely noticeable. He kissed her forehead. “Don’t leave me.”
He had barely uttered the words when the side door of the van slid open. Meghan and Blake sat on either side of Diego, holding him upright. A second later, Ryder tossed in the bodies of both Sloan and his assistant.
“Why are you bringing them?” Peter asked.
Ryder looked his way and, seeing Samantha’s condition, he picked up the dead assistant’s body. “No way,” Peter said.
Ryder snarled at him, “Squeamish? Well, they need to feed if they’re to survive. Seems to me it’s only fair.”
“Ryder.” Diana laid a hand on his arm. “Let the other three help themselves to these two. I’ll take care of Samantha.”
“No way, darlin’. I should be the one.”
“Drive, Ryder. We’ll need your strength to get all these people up to your apartment,” Diana said.
As if recognizing the truth of her words, Ryder nodded, exited the van and closed the door behind him.
Diana moved over to where Peter held Samantha. As the three other vamps shared the corpses, Peter tried not to notice. Diana pulled closed a curtain to seal off the sight of what was happening.
Ryder started the van, jostling them.
Diana reached out to him. “She just needs a little to hold her over until we get back to the apartment. I can do that.”
A confused whirl of emotions created a tumult within his brain. He wanted Samantha to live. He knew what it would take, but couldn’t imagine anyone doing it. Much less his friend Diana.
But as she rolled up the sleeve of her black shirt to expose her forearm, he saw the scar there. The long-healed mark. In his mind, he pictured the two punctures in the middle of that wound before it healed as vampire bites did.
She pulled out a pocket knife.
“No.” He stopped her when she would have cut her forearm.
It was almost as if stopping her had made the decision for him. He held out his free arm. “Cut me.”
She knew him better than to question his instruction. Undoing the cuff on his dark blue shirt, she rolled it up to expose his skin.
She raised the point of the knife to his wrist. “Ready?”
At his nod, she cut through his skin, just enough to bring blood to the surface. “Now what?”
She motioned for him to bring his wrist to Samantha’s mouth.
As soon as his bleeding arm touched Samantha’s lips, she became alert. At first she only sucked with her mouth, but then her fangs slowly emerged.
Diana laid a hand on his shoulder. “The feeding...it may arouse other hungers.”
Her meaning was clear. When he nodded, Diana left, closing the curtain tight to give them privacy.
When Samantha sank her fangs into his wrist, the pain jolted him from other musings. A mixture of revulsion and fascination swept over him as he observed her, and then something else awakened.
With each pull of her mouth came a tug at his groin, dragging passion to life even as he weakened.
“Samantha,” he cried out as his erection became almost painful.
She pulled her mouth from his wrist and sat up, her color restored and her breathing stronger. She straddled him, returning to normal, her eyes losing their glow and her fangs retracting.
“Samantha,” he pleaded again although he wasn’t quite sure what he was begging for. But if he didn’t get it soon, he’d die.
She knew. Her hands were warm as she stroked him. She kissed his lips and made love to him with her mouth, her tongue wet and deliciously wild as it danced with his. He clenched his hips and flexed upward into her hands, close to climax. So near to a release unlike any other he’d experienced before.
She took him into her mouth. Used her lips and tongue to drive him over the edge. His body was shaking. He was nearly close to losing consciousness when she reversed their positions and cradled him to her breasts.
“Peter, do you want me?” she asked even as she undid the buttons on her blouse.
Another jolt raced through him at the sight of her breasts and he immediately hardened again. He groaned and his head whirled with the untamed desire sweeping through his body.
Samantha asked again, “Do you want me, Peter?”
He answered her by taking the tip of her breast into his mouth and sucking on it.
She moaned and whispered, “It can be like this always, Peter. Always.”
Oh please. He bit the tip of her as she stroked his erection. The thrall of vampire passion raced from her body to his. Desire so intense he knew it wasn’t natural. It wasn’t human.
“Is this what you want for us?” he asked even as he sucked at her breasts and, worked his way up to the edge of her lips, where the tiniest hint of fang was emerging. That didn’t stop him. On the contrary, he traced the edge of her teeth with his tongue. When her fang nipped him, drawing blood, the coppery taste of it spiced his mouth.
Samantha’s body was shaking and hot with the taste of his blood. Aching from feeding on his sexual release. It wasn’t the woman holding him, even though she was fighting to retain her mortal form. It was the vampire, wanting him to give in. To beg him to be with her always.
It was why she couldn’t answer him. She was afraid it would be the vampire answering. The vampire offering to make him like her so their love could be for always. So this passion would never end.
The van jolted over a bump, reminding her suddenly of where she was. Of why she was experiencing this sudden surge. Because he’d saved her life by feeding her. Because he loved her.
With a shudder, she forced away the unnatural hunger, and, like a balloon popping, the desire evaporated between them.
They were suddenly just sitting there, facing each other. Clothes torn and gaping open. Their breathing rough from the aftermath of the vampire desire.
Peter’s eyes were wide, his pupils dilated with passion. “Is this what you want?”
It took all of her strength to take a deep breath, battle away the vampire and say, “I want you, but not like that. I want you to want the human in me.”
It took a moment for her statement to register. Then he reached out and buttoned up her shirt. Reached down and put himself back in order.
Samantha wrapped her arms around herself, self-conscious, but he drew her close. She crawled into his lap and grabbed hold of his shirt. “It’ll be all right.” He brushed a kiss across her forehead.
But as she considered all that had happened, she wondered how anything could ever be right again.
