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A LONG CORRIDOR STRETCHED out ahead at the foot of the staircase. I estimated we were two floors down. The facility reminded me of the EERI compound in Texas. Cells lined the hall on both sides. Instead of metal bars, the rooms were separated by dense glass walls. Completely devoid of furniture or fixtures, scorch marks on the concrete floor indicated they’d been designed for one purpose; disposal.
“What is this place?” Pricilla asked in a hushed whisper. Her sense of self-preservation warned her that she was in danger.
Katrina was the only one who didn’t seem to be affected by the menace we could all feel. “The master is behind that door,” she said and pointed at a heavy metal door at the far end of the hall.
We were halfway down the corridor when a small window opened in the door and light pierced the darkness. Even in silhouette, I recognized who it was. It wasn’t a vampire at all, but was instead someone who hunted our kind for a living.
“Hello, Katrina,” Mark said. “I wish I could say it’s nice to see you again.”
I smiled at her gasp of terror as she realized she’d been led into a trap. Fear spread through our group when sprinklers descended from the ceiling. I’d only been a minion for a relatively short time, but I was ready for my servitude to end. My premonition of doom was coming true and we were all about to be eradicated.
Moments after that thought, a glass door beside me slid open and Reece sprang into action. He threw himself at me and his momentum carried us both inside the cell. Moving with the blinding speed that only vampires could achieve, Katrina dove in behind him. The door slid shut, trapping us all inside.
Liquid spurted from the sprinklers a moment later. The confused vampires made exclamations of disgust and fright when they became soaked. The metal door cracked open and Mark’s hand appeared holding a lighter. He brought a flame to life, then tossed the lighter into the hall. He slammed the door shut as fire swept from one end of the death trap to the other.
Screams of terror and agony rang out. Katrina’s original four servants turned to their master, pleading for her to save them. I watched without emotion as Benjamin, Orlando, Pricilla and Candice were reduced to ash along with the new arrivals. Katrina beat her hands against the glass and shrieked in impotent rage as her small army was destroyed.
The glass walls kept the odor from us, but I imagined the smell must have been terrible. Instead of an EERI base, we were in a PIA facility that I hadn’t even known existed. I was beyond the ability to be shocked that they’d created death chambers designed to destroy our kind.
When the flames finally died, the sprinklers came on again. This time, it was water rather than a flammable liquid that squirted out. Vents appeared in the floor and the remains of Katrina’s fledgling army were washed away.
When the metal door opened again, Mark stepped out and he wasn’t alone. Katrina’s gaze swept past Mark, Kala and Flynn and came to rest on my father. Through our link, I felt a flash of despair and an echo of longing from her. “I’ll end you all for this,” she promised them in a vicious tone. “But before I kill you, dear husband, I’m going to make you regret joining forces with these murderers.”
Turning, she leaped at me. Not even Reece was fast enough to stop her this time. Slamming me into the glass wall, her hands went around my throat and began to squeeze.
“Stop!” a deep voice commanded and she froze. I sensed her horror as she recognized the speaker. “Let her go,” the man ordered and her hands sprang away from me.
Cringing away, she turned to face the human who strode down the hall. Kala was scowling down at the damp floor as if she was trying hard to control herself. Flynn watched the stranger warily. Mark was trying to control his distaste and was failing miserably. Whoever the man was, none of them trusted him.
My father ignored everyone in favor of watching me. He’d aged since I’d seen him last. Lines of worry were etched into his forehead. He spared a brief glance for Reece and a slightly longer one for Katrina before turning to me again. “How are you feeling, Lexi?”
“I don’t,” I replied.
He was puzzled by my emotionless answer and frowned. “You don’t what?”
“I don’t feel.” That seemed to cause him pain and his frown deepened.
“I am sure I will be able to remedy that,” the strange man said.
Moving slowly, as if hoping she wouldn’t be noticed, Katrina sidled around until she was behind me and was shielded from his view. The stranger moved to stand in front of me until we were separated by a few inches of glass. Tall and lean, he had black hair and dark brown eyes. He would have been handsome if his mouth hadn’t had such a cruel cast to it.
There was something familiar about him, but I couldn’t remember ever meeting him before. Like my mother, he spoke with a Romanian accent. He wore a black suit, a dark gray business shirt and appeared to be in his late forties. His hair was slicked back from his face and was just long enough to brush his collar.
“Who are you?” I asked, feeling as if I should have known the answer.
“That doesn’t matter right now,” Mark said firmly. “Viktor is going to try to cure your vampirism.”
Viktor bowed as if we’d been politely introduced, then turned his attention to my mother. “Ah, Katrina. It is so good to see you again after so many years.”
“I’d hoped you were dead,” she said just loudly enough for him to be able to hear her. I couldn’t understand why she would be afraid of a mere human. I was also puzzled that she’d obeyed his command to release me.
“No, my dear,” he replied with a sly smile. “I am the master of death. It shall never rule me.” I felt it then, the death magic that he’d somehow managed to hide from us all. It swelled until it began to feel as if his power would awaken every dead thing in the entire world. He allowed it to pour over us for a few seconds before it abated. It wasn’t gone this time, but clung to him almost like it was a living entity. Like me, he was a true born necromancer. Unlike me, he was a master of the art of raising corpses. I was the lowest novice compared to him.
“Can you reverse their vampirism or not, Viktor?” Mark asked, getting the man back on track.
“I can help them, but it will not be easy,” he said haughtily. Kala rolled her eyes at his pompous tone and Flynn gave her a quick smile.
“What do you need?” Mark queried.
“Blood.” Viktor smiled and it wasn’t friendly. “Theirs to be precise.” He pointed at Kala and Flynn without looking at them and their amusement faded.
“If you try to do anything that we didn’t agree on, I’ll empty my gun into your skull,” my dad warned him. He put his hand on his weapon for emphasis. “Not even a necromancer can recover from that.” Viktor’s lips thinned, but he didn’t reply to the threat.
Mark pulled his tablet out of an inner pocket of his jacket. He typed a command and thick steel bars descended from the ceiling. Moments later, the glass wall in front of us slid upwards. The sickening smell of gasoline and burnt flesh rolled over us. The water hadn’t been enough to wash the odor away completely.
As deftly as a magician, Viktor pulled a small ceramic bowl and a small, but sharp dagger from beneath his coat. Kala and Flynn reluctantly stepped forward and offered him their wrists. He cut into their flesh and filled the bowl, then approached the bars. “First, I must destroy the master who created these two halflings,” he said then sent a falsely apologetic look at Katrina. “I am sorry, my dear, but I assure you this isn’t personal.” His smile was decidedly nasty and indicated that this was very personal. I didn’t know how they knew each other, but they clearly had some kind of history together.
“No!” she screamed and leaped at the bars. Instead of trying to attack the necromancer, she appealed to my father. “Please, Philip, if you ever loved me, don’t let him kill me!”
My dad hunched forward as if he’d received a punch to the gut. Kala put her hand on his shoulder to steady him. “You’re not the woman I loved,” he said hoarsely. “It will be a mercy to finally put you to rest.”
Her face turned ugly at his reply. “I never loved you,” she spat viciously. “I only agreed to flee to America with you to get away from him!” She snarled at Viktor, who retaliated by dipping his fingers into the bowl and flicking blood onto her. Reece drew me back until we were out of the splatter zone.
Speaking in his native tongue, the necromancer chanted as he continued to flick the liquid onto her. Katrina shrieked in rage each time the droplets hit her. When the bowl was half empty, he handed both it and the dagger to Mark.
Lifting his hands, Viktor drew on his dark magic and wind stirred, which shouldn’t have been possible since we were trapped beneath the ground. Green fog rose when the wind went still, obscuring our vision as he shouted a command. Katrina fell to her knees with a gasp. I felt her agony as the death magic that had been keeping her in a state of unholy life was slowly drawn out of her.
Her youth began to disappear as she aged rapidly. The last of her vampirism was drawn out and for the first time, I saw my real mother. Lines and wrinkles had formed on her face, but she was still beautiful. She now looked like she was in her early forties rather than in her twenties. She looked at me and I saw profound regret in her dark eyes. “I am so sorry, Lexi,” she said in a voice that was barely a croak. “I wish I’d been strong enough to resist the creature who stole me from you. My weakness has ruined your life.”
It was obvious to me that she was near death. Her vampirism was gone, but nothing could bring her soul back. She couldn’t survive without it now that she was human again. Even with my emotions buried deep inside me, I couldn’t let her die thinking she was to blame for everything that had happened to me. “It wasn’t your fault,” I said. “This was all fated to happen. Nothing we could have done would have changed any of it.”
Her smile of gratitude turned into a grimace of pain as blood began to seep from the old bullet wound on her forehead. Looking away from me, she saw my father and crawled over to the bars. He went to her, knelt and reached out to take her hand. Tears stood in his eyes as blood sheeted down her face. The wound that he’d given her eighteen years ago had returned to take her life. “My love,” she whispered and smiled at him tremulously. “Can you find it in your heart to forgive me for leaving you and our precious daughter?”
He nodded and pressed her hand to his mouth. “I love you, Katrina,” he said as her eyes fluttered shut and her heart ceased to beat. She slumped to the floor, lifeless and my father wept as the wife that he’d never stopped loving died again. This time forever.
With our master’s death, Reece and I were released from our bond to her. We went insane with rage and loss even though we’d felt no real attachment to her. I sprang at the bars, intent on tearing everyone in the hallway apart. A red haze had descended over me. I was berserk to the point where I barely even knew who these people were.
“Finish the ritual!” Mark shouted.
Viktor hastily took the bowl back and began to flick blood on Reece and me. Howling as if his wolf was on the verge of taking over, Reece threw himself at the bars as well. Flynn yanked Viktor back a moment before his throat would have been torn out.
Pain erupted inside us both, driving us to our knees as the necromancer began to chant. Each time blood splattered us, it was like being set on fire. My vampire wailed when she began to be pulled from me and I shrieked in agony. Suffering the same torment, Reece screamed along with me. I knew with utter certainty that if the ritual was completed, we would both die.
My wolf and necromancer banded together and took hold of my vampire before she could be torn away. Reece reached out and grabbed my hand. Our physical contact was enough to save his vampire from being torn from him, but it would only delay the inevitable.
Viktor dropped the now empty bowl and raised both hands in the air. His voice grew in volume and command and the green fog began to rise again. Despite my agony, I mustered a smile. Finally, my torment was about to end. In a few more moments, my short life would be over and I would be at peace.
My certainty that I was about to die came to an abrupt halt when the air in front of me shimmered. Viktor broke off in mid-chant and silence descended when someone appeared from seemingly out of nowhere.
Through the fog, I focused on a pair of calf high black boots. I tilted my head back, following shapely leather clad legs up to a matching black leather jacket. The woman who stared down at me had long dark brown hair with blonde streaks. Her face was pale and utterly flawless. Her eyes were completely black, as if her pupils had grown to take over her irises completely. She was so beautiful that she couldn’t possibly be human, but I didn’t know what she was.
Taking in the situation at a glance, she spoke in what sounded like a British accent. “Holy crap, it looks like I got here just in the nick of time!” With that declaration, everything shifted.
In the blink of an eye, we were in a different place. Recognizing our compound in Denver, I staggered to my feet and spun around in a circle. I stopped when I saw the strange woman sitting on one of the black leather couches. Reece staggered to his feet as well. He held an arm across his stomach as his internal pain began to abate.
“Who are you?” I asked her in confusion. “How did we get here?” I put a hand to my head as thoughts and emotions whirled around, vying for supremacy.
“Never mind that now,” she said, waving my questions away. “First, I have to get rid of that wall you put up to stop yourself from feeling emotions.”
“No, don’t!” I protested, but it was too late. I felt her rummaging around inside my head, then every emotion that I’d suppressed since my mother had turned me into a hybrid came crashing back.
Driven to my knees, I pressed my hands over my eyes in a futile effort to hold back the storm. Reece crouched beside me and put his hand on my back in support. The tide eventually began to abate and the predominant emotion that I felt was betrayal. Dropping my hands, I looked at him. “You chose that pure blood blonde bimbo over me.”
“I know,” he said lamely. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” I laughed. It was ragged and completely lacking in humor. “That’s the best you can come up with? You’re sorry?” Standing, I put some distance between us. “You and I are done. No matter what happens now, I never want to see you again.” I turned away and he made the mistake of grabbing my hand.
“Let me explain!” His tone was desperate.
I didn’t give him a chance to speak. Whirling around, I punched him in the jaw as hard as I could. If he’d been anything less than a hybrid like me, the punch would have killed him. Dazed and in pain, he didn’t try to stop me when I hit him again. Tears were streaming down my face as I unleashed all of the sorrow and fury that had built up inside me. My fists were mere blurs as I rained blow after blow on him.
His bones were shattered in numerous places, but I didn’t stop until he went down to one knee. Reece looked up at me through swollen, bruised eyes. His facial bones had been reduced to pulp and blood dripped from his nose and mouth. He was so badly wounded that his body couldn’t heal him immediately like it normally would have. “I know you won’t believe me,” he said painfully, “but I love you, Lexi.”
That enraged me beyond reason and I moved with lightning speed. He didn’t flinch when the barrel of my gun came to rest against his forehead. “That’s a lie,” I said with deceptive calm. “You never loved me. I’m just a lowly mongrel. I could never be good enough for a pure blood like you.”
“I don’t care about pedigree,” he said. “There was never anyone else for me. You are the only one I could ever love.” I gave a harsh laugh at that lie and my response was to punch him with my left hand. He swayed and spat out blood onto the concrete floor, then straightened up and looked me squarely in the eye. “I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness. I just wanted you to know that I never cared about Gloria. My mother forced her on me, but my heart always belonged to you.”
Staring down into his eyes, my heart squeezed at the wealth of emotion that I saw inside them. Taking the barrel of my gun in his hand, he stood and pressed it against his chest so it was pointed at his heart. “If you truly believe that you can never love me again, then go ahead and pull the trigger. I’d rather be dead than to live without you as my mate.”
Remembering all of the torment that he’d put me through, my finger tightened on the trigger for a nanosecond before I dropped the gun to my side. Fierce joy lit Reece’s face, but it was replaced with confusion a second later. He staggered backwards, hit the couch and sat down. Slumping back against the cushions, he closed his eyes and lost consciousness.
