Born In Blood (Born Hunter Book 1) (3 page)

              Cara shoved hard against the bastard of a vampire standing behind her, forcing him a couple of steps back. She swiftly turned around, her eyes alive with rage. “If you ever
attempt to mind fuck me again I will castrate you.”

              Cara was livid at the uninvited entry into her mind. What both terrified and pissed her off even more was the possibility of what could have happened had she not picked up on the psychic intrusion and blocked it. The result would have been as much a physical rape as a mental one.

              “I would never and have never.” He had the audacity to sound offended.

              “I mean it. Stay the fuck out of my head,” Cara shouted as she brandished a dagger. She would feel guilty for shedding blood in her grandparents’ home but God help her she would if this vampire did not back off with the mind games.

              “I’m not in it,” Aiden annoyingly smirked.

              “Your eyes as much as your blood and your body betray your thoughts. Especially, when you’re worked into a tizzy. You may want to be more careful about that in the future.”

              Aiden had permitted Cara to push him a small amount of a space away from her, but he refused to allow her any additional room. He resealed the distance between them, binding Cara’s wrists within his vice-like grip.  He walked them backwards until she was trapped between the balcony’s banister and him. Aiden freed the wrist whose hand held the dagger and snaked his own arm around Cara’s waist. He tugged her a fraction closer.

              “For instance, when you first sensed my presence out on the balcony, your body stiffened and your instinct was to turn toward me. Even though you fought against it, you still angled your body in my direction ever so imperceptibly. Your heart beat increased its pace and your blood began to vigorously pulse in your veins.” Aiden let go of her remaining imprisoned wrist so he could trace a finger over the thudding pulse in her neck. “Kind of like it is doing now.” He leaned into her neck and lightly flicked his tongue of her beating pulse. “But let us be clear. It would only be deemed rape if you did not want it, and clearly you do.”               His gaze pointedly lingered on the hardened buds that rubbed against her silk blouse.

              Cara averted her eyes but crossly folded her arms over her chest, refusing to acknowledge the moisture that was embarrassingly pooling between her legs.

              “And do not dare try to accuse me of compelling you again. We both know that even though I may have slipped through them the first time, your mental barriers are far too powerful for me to do it a second time. They are so powerful that it begs the question how much of your reaction to my efforts was due to the compulsion attempt and how much was due to your own dark desires? It was a rather intense reaction for a failed effort don’t you think?”

              Cara wanted to refute the accusation, as arrogant and conceited as it was.  However, she could not deny the truth in it.
All vampires possessed the power of compulsion. They could rather easily bend most humans to their will. The only defense against it was constructing and maintaining mental barriers in the mind that blocked such efforts. It was a skill that all new recruits were required to learn during intake training and before being placed into the field. Cara not only learned but mastered it. Her mental shields were impenetrable even to the most powerful of vampires and telepaths.

             
“What. Do. You. Want?” she gritted out. She was tired of beating around the bush. She was not dead yet which meant the vampire wanted something from her.

              “You,” the vampire replied unwaveringly.

              “That is not a real answer.” Cara let the annoyance and exasperation she felt seep into her tone.

              “It will have to be a good enough answer for now. The question you asked is one that I have not yet determined the answer to myself.”

              Aiden released his hold on Cara’s waist. He took a few steps backwards and executed a superfluous but gallant bow. Cara was just as sure it was meant to mock her as she was sure Aiden had never bowed to anyone in his life.  The facetious spark in his eyes paired with the knowing smirk on his face all but confirmed the former and the latter for Cara.

              “I must consider what I have learned of you in our few short encounters. I will
definitely
be in touch, but for what reason I cannot yet say. Until next we meet, Hunter.”

              Aiden turned away and left, leaving Cara more confused about his intentions and motives than ever.

Six

             
“S
he is not going. As Field Director all field assignments and active hunters fall under my command. Which means I have the final say about who is assigned what missions and Cara will not be undertaking this one. Select someone else for the assignment Director Ford.”

              Reiya could be one frightening bitch when she was standing up for something that she believed in or someone she loved. Her loyalty was unwavering. It was one of the many reasons Cara loved her like a sister.

              “With all due respect Ms. Montgomery, the Dark Prince himself contacted our office and requested Cavanaugh. Perhaps you should put your personal feelings aside. We have a huge opportunity here. The vampires are a secretive group. We know very little about the species other than what they allow us to find out. Working alongside one of them, especially one in his position, could provide Cavanaugh an opportunity to get close enough to learn their weaknesses. We may end up with information that makes it a hell of a lot easier to hunt the bloodsuckers down.”

              Cara did not like the Executive Director much. She regarded him along with everyone else in the executive branch of the North American Division of Hunters or N.A.D.H for short as a bunch of overstuffed bureaucratic windbags too afraid to do any real work and get their hands dirty. Though she grudgingly had to admit that the work they did was just as important to the Division. Whereas the Field Operations Branch was responsible for doing the nitty gritty work like tracking down and killing vampires that had gone too far, the Executive Operations Branch was responsible for handling the day to day runnings of N.A.D.H like managing its funds and acting as a liaison with the government. When Ford did not back down in the face of one very scary and very pissed of Reiya it gave Cara a new level of respect for him. Many men before the director had attempted to stand up to her and ended up turning tail or giving in. She knew she should stop eavesdropping outside the cracked door of Reiya’s office and intervene but she held off for a few moments longer. She was having too much fun listening to the banter between Reiya and Ford.

              “It is
Director
Montgomery, and with all due respect
Director
Ford, I do not give a rat’s ass about how advantageous this assignment could be to the Division. I am not forcing Cara into the lion’s den. I am sure there are plenty other operatives who would jump at the opportunity. Pick one, any one. Just not Cara,” Reiya all but yelled.

              Cara grinned impishly and decided she was a horrible friend for not immediately marching into Reiya’s office and putting a stop to their bickering. The decision was hers to make after all, if you could even call it a decision. Cara had made her decision the moment she heard about the request, but for different reasons than Director Ford. Cara was positive Aiden had an end game and what better way to find out exactly what it was and shove a wrench right in the middle of his schemes than to work up close and personal with him. Besides if she was working alongside Aiden he had a clear path to get to her and would no longer need to go through her family and friends. The farther away she could keep them from him the better off and safer they would be.

              “Director Montgomery if you can just consider things from Central’s perspective. The Dark Prince adamantly demanded he work with Cara. He made it clear no other hunter would be suitable. It appears he has a particular interest in her. Now I don’t know why or what it means, but if she is able to infiltrate vampire society and gain his confidence she could deliver us the inside track we need about the inner workings of their society. I am sure there are more than a few closely guarded secrets and weaknesses that we could find out about and exploit with the right intel. Again, he made it clear he will not receive any hunter other than Cara nor will he accept no as an answer. So we are left with a choice between not sending anyone and incurring his wrath or sending Cara and possibly gaining the upper hand on those bastards in the future.”

              “Fuck his wrath…” Reiya started in but Cara figured she should cut her off before she really landed herself in hot water with Central Office. It would be a shame to get demoted so soon after receiving a promotion. Cara took a deep breath and readied for her own showdown with her best friend.

              “Enough, Reiya. I’m going.” Cara said as she marched into her office.

              Reiya immediately turned her wrath on her. “Like hell you are!”

              “Look, Reiya, I appreciate your concern and I know you don’t agree with it, but I am taking this assignment,” Cara told her in a soothing but firm tone.

              When Reiya started to object, Cara held up her hand. “Just listen Rey, will you?” Cara knew addressing her by the nickname Cara and no one else called her would get through to her. It was an endearment from back when they first met during intake training as teenagers. They had become close friends so fast they were calling each other “Rey” and “Cair,” by the end of the first week of intake.

              Reiya let out a defeated sigh and sat down exasperatedly in her chair. Cara walked over and sat sideways on her desk.

              “Director Ford is right. I have to do this. But not for the bullshit political reasons Central cooked up. You know I don’t give a rat’s ass
about learning more about vampires either. A dagger to the heart or a sword cleaving their necks from their body exterminates them permanently. That is all I need to know. But I do care about you, and Reyes, and my grandparents. Remember the anonymous admirer you and Reyes saw hitting
on me at the bar in Chelsea? That was the Dark Prince. Then he showed up again last night at my grandparents’ house. He posed as a new resident moving into their building and tricked my grandfather into inviting him to a dinner he knew I would be at. He is stalking me instead of killing me like he tried to do during our first encounter. He wants something and I am going to find out what it is.”

              “Oh my God Cara why didn’t you tell me sooner.”

              “I needed time to process it all and what it meant. And I wanted to protect you and Reyes, which I am still trying to do. I don’t know why he is in Manhattan or what he wants with me, but it has nothing to do with the reasons he gave Central. I have witnessed his level of power and what he is capable of. He does not need my help or anyone else’s to track down a rogue vampire. There is an ulterior motive at play, one that is probably a threat to all of us. The only way I can protect you, and Reyes, and my grandparents and everyone else is to find out what he is up to and circumvent it.”

              “So that’s it. You’re just going to go to him like a sacrificial lamb to the slaughter, and expect me to sit around and do nothing,” Reiya all but spat at Cara.

              “I lost my father to one of them
Rey
. I cannot lose you or anyone else I love to another one.” Cara tried to make her best friend understand.

              “Fine,” Reiya bit off. “But know this
Cair
. If he so much as lays a finger on you, I will hunt him down and carve his heart out myself.”

              Cara took her best friends’ hands in her own and gave them a gentle squeeze. “I know you will want to but promise me if the shit hits the fan you will go running in the opposite direction.”

              “Would you?” Reiya countered.

              “You know I wouldn’t.”

              “Then don’t you dare ask me to.”

              Cara sighed resignedly. Reiya was loyal to a fault. She treasured her for it and was grateful to have someone in her corner that would back her up and fight for her unconditionally. She only hoped the loyalty that she loved her best friend so fiercely for would not get her as dead as her father.

Seven

             
C
ara silenced the engine of her yellow Ducati. She left it parked across the street from the New York coven house. As she walked up the ridiculously steep stone steps toward the front entrance she sent off a quick text to Reiya. Alerting her of her arrival as well as her safe departure was one of the conditions Reiya placed on her acquiescence. Cara paused in front of the ornately carved wooden door. How did one announce their presence at a vampire residence? Ring the doorbell? Knock? Simply stand and wait for the bloodsuckers to detect your scent? Cara shrugged her shoulders and decided to proceed as she would in any other instance. She balled her hand into a fist and moved to rap it against the door. She could have rung the doorbell but that would have been too polite and she was not here to make nice. Before her fist connected with the wooden door it swung open on its own accord. Behind it stood a tall, pale vampire outfitted in a formal black jacket with matching cummerbund and slacks and a crisp white collared shirt.

              He did not immediately invite her inside. He paused for a moment to examine her. His eyes roved over her in a dismissive manner.  He regarded her as if she was inferior and yet he was the one that held the station of a servant.
So vampires have butlers too
, Cara mused. It figured they would be every bit as elitist as any other Upper East Side resident.

              Cara stepped over the threshold inviting herself in. She broke the silence first. “Don’t tell me. Your name is Jeeves.”

              The look of utter indignity that Jeeves’ face contorted into was near comical. “My name is Phillip,” he responded stiffly.

              “Well Jeeves I am here as Aiden requested, and I would like to know exactly why that is sooner rather than later. Plus being in a house full of vampires makes my hands itch for a blade. The sooner I can get out of here the better it will be for everyone involved. So instead of standing here looking down your nose at me why don’t you help speed this along and show me to His Darkness?”

              Again, Jeeves face contorted into utter indignity. This time it was damn comical. Cara did not bother to stifle her laugh.

              Jeeves cleared his throat. “Prince Aiden, His Grace, was called away on pressing matters. You will be meeting with the Master of the New York Coven House.” Jeeves ushered her down a narrow hallway and motioned toward a closed set of double French doors. “Master Michaelson awaits you.”

              He gifted Cara with one final sneer before sharply turning on his heels and disappearing back down the way hall. Cara thought about turning sharply on her own heels and leaving too. The nerve of the arrogant bastard. He had practically summoned her to a meeting he could not even be bothered to attend. She stayed figuring it might be easier to pull information out of the head of the coven house than Aiden. He might be too conniving and calculating for her to easily gleam his ulterior motives but the Master of the New York Coven House might be fool enough to let a few choice pieces of information slip.

              “His Grace sends regards for his absence,” The dark haired vampire spoke with an Old English lilt.

              “His regards are duly noted.” Cara eyed Michaelson suspiciously. She trusted any vampire about as far as she could throw them. But the Master of the house seemed particularly more smarmy than most. The predacious glint in his eyes and the way the intonations in his voice slinked from one syllable to the next to form words into a sentence reminded her of a snake. Cara sensed he might strike out at any moment, provoked or not. She subtly shifted her weight to achieve a lower and more forward center of gravity positioning herself to be physically ready to defend or attack if the need arose.

              “Did he also send the details of this supposed hunt Your Grace insisted I assist with?” 

              The snake-vampire laughed as he rose from his plush leather chair. “Actually, His Grace did not.”

              The laugh left the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end and his latter comment left her palming the hilt of a dagger inside her right jacket pocket. One of the reasons she loved winter in New York was because her favorite purple pea coat contained all kinds of pockets for sharp and deadly objects to go unnoticed in. “So the business I have here is…”

              “With me,” Michaelson hissed at her. He slithered from behind the desk to stand in front of it, placing him much too close to her for her comfort.

              She no longer bothered concealing her weapon.  She brandished the palmed dagger as she released its twin into her left hand from its hidden pocket within her sleeve. “Care to elaborate.”

              Michaelson slunk closer toward her. “I will keep it short and to the point. You recently killed three vampires on the Lower West Side I was quite fond of. They were my made children and had been with me for half a century. The Vampire Lords may see them as disposable and be unwilling to seek vengeance for their deaths, but I will not standby and allow a lowly, filthy hunter to execute my children without repercussions. The business we have here is one of recompense and I will take my reparations in blood.”

              When Michaelson attacked she was ready for him. As predictable as any vampire he went for her jugular first. Cara dropped to her knees and drove a dagger through his sternum. She would have preferred it to be his heart. The fight would have been over as quickly as it began. But she thrust upward at an odd angle and was too close the ground, having to drop low to avoid being nicked. Cara swore she was experiencing déjà vu all over again. Without giving the vampire time to react or recover, she shot to her feet and drove her other dagger into his chest. She pushed it past his rib cage but it did not make it to his heart before she felt her body slam against the wall behind her. Two twin vampires who looked as if they could pass for professional wrestlers pinned her arms against the wall on either side of her.
Where the hell did they come from?
Cara thought to herself. Only she and Michaelson had been in the room and they could not have possibly entered via the door. It was behind her and the vampires slammed into her from the front.  Cara struggled against their grips but the twin wrestlers seemed intent on restraining her until Michaelson recovered.

              He straightened to his full height and sinisterly smiled at her. “You just forfeited a quick death.”

              One moment Cara was pinioned against the wall and in the next breath she was not. The pair of wrestlers parading as vampires lay dead at her feet. Gaping holes permeated their chest cavities. Cara looked up from the corpses to see Aiden standing silently in the middle of the room holding still beating hearts in each hand. He casually let them fall to the ground. In a morbidly pompous gesture he removed the handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped his hands free of blood. He then let it fall to the ground just as casually. He fixed Michaelson with a merciless glare and Cara saw true terror in the eyes of the haughty Master of the New York Coven. Michaelson’s eyes bulged as blood oozed from their corners. His lips parted but Cara was not sure if it was to beg for mercy or scream in anguish. Either way she never found out.  A short, gurgling sound was all that escaped the Master before blood seeped from his mouth as well. He was being made to asphyxiate on his own blood. A cold shiver passed through Cara. If the Dark Prince could inflict this much torment and pain on a person without ever laying a hand on them, she shuddered to think what he was capable of accomplishing when he did.  When he spoke his tone was laced with a detached coldness Cara never wanted to be on the receiving end of.

              “I believe it is you, nearly departed Master Michaelson, who has forfeited the quick death.  Fool hearted as their actions were, Ethan and Derrick were merely following their Master’s orders. You however are guilty of much higher crimes. You failed to carry out my orders regarding the hunter. Do you know what I like even less than disobedience? Disloyalty. For your treachery you will suffer as you are now until your torture no longer amuses me. At which point I will borrow one of the hunter’s daggers to carve out your heart piece by traitorous piece.”

              “Dorian,” Aiden beckoned to someone just outside the doorway.

              The newcomer stepped into the room and bowed exaggeratedly. “My Liege.”

              Aiden scowled at him. “Cut the crap. I’m not in the mood. See that the House is aware that anyone who attempts to ease Michaelson’s suffering in anyway will share in his punishment. And show the hunter to the library. I’ll join her in a moment.”

              Dorian leisurely straightened out of the bow. A facetious smirk lingered on his face. “Yes, My Liege.” He only bowed from the waist up this time.

              He turned to Cara. He fixed her with a withering stare but offered his arm nonetheless. She was sure this new vampire that seemed to be close enough to Aiden to be facetious with him without losing life or limb would just as quickly and gleefully kill her as Michaelson would have done. However, she was also sure that unlike Michaelson he was much too loyal to Aiden to act against his orders, which obviously were for her to be unharmed. Cara hesitated briefly before deciding between the lesser of two evils. In that moment, the tanned vampire standing in the middle of the room in a tailored suit was not the same vampire who sat at her grandparent’s table. He was the Dark Prince, Heir to the Dark Throne, and every bit as terrifying as all of the rumors portrayed him to be. Cara welcomed the reprieve, however brief, from the chilling presence of this version of him.

              “What the hell is taking, His Darkness, so long,” Cara muttered to herself as she scanned volume after volume of literary classics.

              It seemed as if it had been hours since the blonde vampire with blue eyes as cold as ice and an attitude to match left her shut up in the library. Admittedly, it had been all of ten minutes but a two year old possessed more patience than Cara and she detested waiting. On the bright side the massive library she was holed up inside was a wet dream come true. Cara loved a good book. She could shut herself away from the rest of the world and read for hours upon days at a time.

              “If that is your idea of a decent wet dream, you have obviously had some really shitty points of reference.”

             
What the hell? Did I think that last part out loud?
Cara thought to herself before addressing Aiden. “And you obviously don’t harbor a love of reading. Otherwise you would know that a good book can rival a good orgasm any day.”

              She turned around to see Aiden coolly leaning against a bookshelf near the entrance. He had cleaned up since she last saw him and traded the blood-soaked Armani for a pair of nice fitting denims and a black sweater. It was a look that screamed arrogant and casual as opposed to the pompous and tailored style he sported before. The sweater clung to his broad shoulders and finely muscled chest. He oozed a heady combination of power and sex. It was enough to make her knees slightly weak. Cara blinked to clear the fog from her mind. When she opened her eyes Aiden was standing a hairsbreadth in front of her.

              “Like I said, really shitty experiences. Otherwise you would know orgasms are not meant to be good.”

              The way he said the word orgasm sent little jolts of electricity through her body, making her knees that much more unsteady.

              “Then what they hell are they meant to be?” Cara flung the question at him. Using snappishness to smother the embers of unwanted desire.

              Aiden leaned in closer to Cara and pressed his lips to the curve of her neck where her pulse beat below the lobe of her ear. “Mind-shattering,” he breathed into her flesh.

              Her pulse thrummed in sync with the movement of his lips against it. The flesh his mouth touched seared with heat and tingled from little electric currents that sprung back and forth from his lips to the sensitive spot on her neck. Visions danced before her eyes: Aiden picking her up and wrapping her legs around his powerful, chiseled frame, her back forcefully connecting with the bookshelf behind them, Aiden violently thrusting in and out of her… Her knees finally gave way and buckled from under her. Cara spied an empty chair beside her and rather ungracefully landed in it moments before she would have hit the ground. She picked up a book from the table within arms reach and pretended to read its cover. She fought to keep her voice steady. “This one looks interesting. I don’t know about mind-shattering, but definitely intriguing.”

              Thank God she did not sound as shaky as she felt. She would have died of mortification. Still, her voice came out too breathy for her liking.

              Aiden took the book from her hands and tossed it back on the table. “I’ll have someone deliver it to you later. Afterwards, we can compare notes. Discuss which was more mind-shattering, it or me.” Aiden extended his hand as if there was no other outcome but for her to accept it.

              Cara stared up at him offended. “I am not getting into bed with you. Not here and not now. Well actually, not later or ever either, but especially not here and now.”

              Aiden growing tired of waiting on Cara to take his proffered hand grabbed hers and yanked her to him instead. He snaked an arm around her waist and meshed their bodies closer. He slid his nose along the length of her neck and took in her intoxicating twin scents of wild summer storms and freesias. Before he completed his business in the Americas he would have her. This hunter was becoming infectious to him. She permeated his thoughts and stirred up intolerable emotions better left unfelt. The only way to excise her from his system was to bed her. Then he could forget about her and continue on as usual.