Bitten by Darkness (21 page)

Alucard's
nostrils flared. “How dare you.”

“Count
Librae
is right,” a woman's voice rang out. “You are
clearly weaker than you have been in the past. You should step aside. I have
looked. There is no such contract. You lie.
Badly.”

Sienna
gasped as Sara stepped out from behind one of the pillars.
What the hell is she doing here?
Sara's hands gripped each other
tightly, the knuckles white. She looked a little gaunt, as if she'd forgotten
to eat for a day or too.

Alucard
whirled around. “Remove yourself from my sight! I did not give you permission
to speak.”

Sara
pressed her lips together as she walked closer, holding herself rigidly erect.
She seemed to be under a great strain. Beneath her hand, Jasper's forearm had
gone rigid. Sienna risked a glance at his face. He was angry. She didn't think
anyone else could tell, but she knew him, which was ridiculous because they’d
really only just met, but still… He kept a lot of himself hidden, probably as a
survival mechanism, and she couldn't help but approve.

“You
enslaved the Countess Lawrence? You dared?” Jasper said, very quietly. His
voice ripped through the silence.

Enslaved?
Sienna swallowed her horror, all smugness over her knowledge of Jasper gone,
and looked back toward Sara. The older woman trembled. When
Alucard
gestured at her again, she swayed, sweat breaking out on her forehead.

“Enough,
father,” said the man on
Alucard's
right.

Alucard
tossed his son a contemptuous glance.

“Sebastian
is right, father. Enough,” the other man standing near
Alucard
said.

Alucard's
face tightened into a thunderous expression. “You may be my sons but you live
on my sufferance.”

“Father,
you should not have done this to her. It is against our laws. Nicholas and I
are agreed on that. We were agreed on that particular point centuries ago. If
we had
know
Violet Lange belonged to Count
Librae
, we would not have helped you take her for your
own.” Sebastian stepped closer to his father's chair, his intent clear. He
meant to challenge the old man. He was tall and blonde and if he hadn't been
arguing with his father, Sienna would have dismissed him as irrelevant. His
brother nodded in agreement, his brown hair falling into his eyes. Sienna
glanced at Jasper, wondering what he thought of this new development.

“Countess
Lawrence's status is not in question here.”
Alucard
said, settling deeper into his chair. “You overstep your place.”

Sara
glanced at
Alucard’s
sons, her expression a mix of
fear and worry. With a start, Sienna realized that she knew them. Sara had
obviously been working to undermine their father's authority with them. Her
respect for her grew.

“You have
two women who belong to my family,
Alucard
. When I
leave here, they come with me.” Jasper's voice was strong.
Unwavering.

Sienna
let herself feel a burst of hope, but it quickly died when
Alucard
rose to his feet. “Leave us,” he said to the group of people watching.
Most left without a backward glance.
Several men, dressed
all in black, stayed.

They must be guards
, she thought. Sienna slid a hand around Jasper's back,
seeking comfort. His spine was rigid under her fingers. The only bright spot so
far was that no one seemed to know about Jasper's
nanites
.
She hoped that Sara didn't know.

“Ambrose
Lawrence wasn't your true brother. And Violet here—”
Alucard
paused and ran a hand over her mother's hair as though she were a favored pet.
“—belongs to me.
She may be a mother to that woman you
brought with you, but I see no sense in allowing you to claim either of them as
yours. We do not mate with humans. Why do you think it was so easy to take dear
Sara from your so-called brother?”

Just as
Sienna's anger at his treatment of her mother made her snarl aloud, Jasper
surged forward, his fists sinking into
Alucard’s
suit
jacket. “Sienna is my true mate. Her mother belongs to me,” he growled through
clenched teeth then let
Alucard
go when one of the
guards took a threatening step forward.

Whoa
. Sienna hadn't seen that coming. She never thought Jasper
would lose his temper like that. She risked a glance at his face and saw that
he’d wrestled himself back under control. She frowned.

“You have
no proof of familial relationship,”
Alucard
sneered.

At this
point Sienna was almost willing to try violence to get her mother out of there.
If it weren't for the
nanites
—
She
looked at
Alucard's
sons, then at his guards. They
were outnumbered. Even with Jasper's strength and skill, she knew the odds were
not in their favor. She ground her teeth.

“I can
give you proof.” Jasper bit off each word.

“Oh
please, don't be absurd,”
Alucard
sat down, brushing
a hand over his clothes as though something had soiled them. “There is only one
way to prove it and I doubt you'll be willing to fuck your precious human in
front of me.”

Jasper
flexed his hands until his knuckles cracked. “You know nothing.”

Alucard's
eyes flared. “So be it.” He snapped his fingers. “Sara, be a dear and take
Violet to my bedroom. I'll
be wanting
to break her in
shortly.”

Sienna
surged forward this time, intending to slap the look off of
Alucard's
face, but Jasper caught her arm. “If we prove this to your sons' satisfaction,
you will release Sienna's mother Violet Lange and Sara Lawrence into my
custody.”

Alucard's
sons nodded immediately.
Surprisingly.

“It will
be as you say,” Sebastian assured them.

Sienna
noticed that
Alucard's
face tightened again, but he didn't
contest the terms. She supposed his son Nicholas' hand on his shoulder had
something to do with it.
Not
so
strong as you used
to be, huh old man?
she
thought at him, bitterness
like a thick candy beneath her tongue. Another quick look at the sons’ faces
told her they didn't care about Jasper or her mother or even Sara. Something
else entirely was going on here. She risked a glance at Jasper. His face was
smooth, but she could see his brain going a million miles an hour behind the
bland expression. He looked out the window, then back at
Alucard
and his sons. His shoulders tensed and abruptly, Sienna knew what was going on.

They’re staging a coup! Holy shit
, she thought. They wanted their father to
suffer—she could see it on their faces, the way they glanced at their father,
eyes narrowed. Sienna couldn't imagine what it must have been like to live
through centuries with such a man as a father, knowing that his death was all
but impossible. She thought she’d had it bad with her father’s dislike of his own
daughter, but really, her dad leaving was a gift compared to this. Sebastian
and Nicholas kept their expressions blank, but she could read their hatred in
the way they held their hands on
Alucard's
body, as
if to press him down into the ground.

Alucard
glared at her and Jasper, ignoring his sons' looming presence, then gave a
short, sharp nod.
“Very well.”

It took
her a moment to remember what
Alucard
meant, and then
all at once she remembered the terms and flushed. Sara looked at her, face
compassionate, before nodding to
Alucard's
sons. She
gently urged Sienna's mother to her feet. “I will take her someplace safe,” she
murmured.

Sienna
fought down a wave of panic-induced nausea. How could she let Jasper touch her
in front of this creature? She tried to ignore the guards, the sons, but all
the men in the room were looking at her as though she was meat.

“Jasper?”
She worked her suddenly dry throat.

“
Shh
,” he said, putting a hand to her neck. “Trust me.” He
looked to Nicholas and Sebastian. “The old rules say kinship can be proven with
blood.”

“That's
ridiculous!”
Alucard
burst out.

“Father,”
Sebastian said, warningly. He pressed the old man down and nodded at Jasper.
“Are you willing to take that risk?”

Jasper
nodded. “It is no risk at all.”

“What are
you talking about?” Sienna asked. He'd told her they would have to have sex in
front of strangers. She accepted that she’d have to submit to this arcane law,
however distasteful, in order to save her mother, but she didn’t have to
like
it.

He turned
to her, taking her face between his hands. “We need only share blood and
pleasure. Trust me.”

She
closed her eyes and leaned into his touch.
Trust.
It
was such a frightening emotion. It was easier for her to give her body. Easier
for her to say she loved him, but trust? The people she'd trusted most in her
life: her father, her mother—both of them had let her down, abandoned her when
she needed him most. Did Jasper know what he was asking?

When she
opened her eyes, the lights of the city glittered behind him. Dark had fallen,
but the look on his face told her he knew everything. His grey eyes were bright
with love. She swallowed and put herself into his hands.

Chapter Fifteen

Jasper
took a deep breath to steady
himself
, then leaned down
and kissed her sweet lips. He was already aroused, despite the situation. He
wished he had some way to explain what she meant to him, but there was no time.
He also wished he didn't have to make love to her in front of everyone—
such a barbaric tradition
—but it was the
only way, save using the
nanites
as leverage. He knew
Sienna understood how important it was for him to stop the blood trade. He knew
because she agreed to this blood price, despite her fear.

She
kissed him back, lips soft and trembling. She wasn't yet aroused, not after the
threats and horror of discovering Sara had been a slave all this time, but it
didn't matter. As soon as he nicked her skin and took some of her blood she
would be, regardless of who watched.

“Get on
with it,”
Alucard
said peevishly.

Jasper
glared at him, gratified to see his sons had already moved to prevent another
outburst. He forced a smile over his face and put every bit of insolence he
could into his voice. “Arousing a woman takes patience, but I suppose you
wouldn't know,
Alucard
.”

The old
man remained quiet. Nicholas and Sebastian's eyes didn't waver. They wanted to
see Sienna climax, he could see it on their faces. It made him want to rip them
to pieces, but he couldn’t afford to let his rage out just yet. He wanted to
destroy the entire
Alucard
family, but he knew from
many years' maneuvering on
Dekcol
that he had to be
patient. Each and every one of them would go down, eventually. The
nanites
would see to that, more thoroughly and painfully
than he ever could. For now, he had to coax Sienna into the ritual and prove
her status beyond any doubt.

“It is a
time-honored tradition among my people,” he said, tracing her cheek with his
finger. “When a man chooses a mate, he must prove their bond to the council. It
hasn't been enforced in centuries, but biology doesn't lie. Our mates are
sacrosanct.” He slid a thumb into her mouth. Her golden eyes widened, the green
flecks at the center fading as her pupils dilated.

“I would
never have asked you to do this, Sienna.” He kissed her cheek, inhaling the
warm scent of her skin. She was sweet, with an undertone of citrus. He could
smell himself on her, even though she’d showered this morning and spent an
entire day at work.

She
nodded. “I know.” She took a deep breath. “Just do it.”

He smiled
and kissed her again, letting his thumb slip out of her mouth. He ran it down
her jaw until he had her head tilted up. His lips followed his hand and he
nipped at her delicate skin, gratified to hear her breath speed up.

“I won't
hurt you,” he murmured.

She put
her hands in his hair and hung on as he walked her backward until her spine hit
the column nearest
Alucard
. The old man's stare was
almost enough to make the rage well up again, but then Sienna kissed his cheek
and he let his body push her into the rigid surface of the column. His erection
throbbed, distracting him, but he had no intention of taking off his clothes. A
little bit of pain was a small price to pay to prove their bond and he intended
on keeping as much privacy between them as he could.