Vampires and Sexy Romance (37 page)

The alley wasn’t hard to find.  The moment Min had woken she’d known exactly where Luca had fallen.  It was part of a long crisscross of alleys running between four near identical seven story building.  They housed everything from restaurants and coffee shops, to lawyers, accountants, a nail salon and a florist.

Andy had taken dance classes at a studio there when she was young.

The alley in question was directly behind the nail salon.  Min found the alley deserted, and no sign of a struggle…unless you counted the small pool of blood that shimmered inhumanly in the light of the full moon, right beside a particularly putrid smelling dumpster.  She knelt and dabbed her finger into the cold black shimmering substance, then drew it to her nose.   She may not be a werewolf, but she knew the smell of vampire blood.  She especially knew the sweet, near intoxicating scent of Luca. 

In a few hours the sun would rise in the sky.  Had the werewolves killed him, or would they use him as leverage, thinking that Elaina would come for him? 

Min knew
from Luca’s memories that that was a mistake.  Elaina would not risk herself, not for him, especially if he’d picked Min over her.  Min shook the knowledge that he loved her out of her mind.  It was making her heart race and her breathing catch in her throat—not productive things and she had to concentrate.  She knew already that Günter knew Luca was her lover.  She just had to hope he wouldn’t try and kill her when she came to collect him from him.  After all, he should just take her word that Luca, the vampire, wasn’t evil anymore. 

Yeah, that would happen… 

She had to get him back.  But first she needed to know where they had taken him?

Well,
she thought
, I’ve got some blood—nothing’s more personal than that—so now’s the time to show some magical capability. 
Min pulled the chalk out of her pocket, and the origami hummingbird.  She put the bird by the drops of blood, and then drew a small circle around them both.  Extending her will out to it, the circle sealed with a silent pop of magic.  She told the bird to wake, in the old language of her people, and when it stirred, stretching its wings and turning its head with rapid motions, she told it to “Find the owner of this blood.” 

The little bird chirped and hopped delicately over to and pecked at the pool of blood, drinking it.  Min then reached down and broke the circle with her finger and a bit of will. 

The bird fluttered into the air, faltered, turning, suspended in midair, and finally taking off, zipping down the alley.  Min took off at a dead run, her heart pounding in her chest, her eye never leaving the rocketing bird. 

~*~

Luca woke to the sweet scent of maple trees and
nearly
fresh air—he could still hear cars passing along in the distance, so he knew before he opened his eyes he was still somewhere in the city.  He also woke to the searing pain of silver chains biting, burning into his flesh.  He jerked against the chains, and though they were thin, they kept him in place well enough.  If anything the thinner chains cut more easily into the flesh, something a werewolf would know all too well.  The silver in the chains would keep Luca from using his powers.  No strength, no ability to glamour; he was screwed and in pain.  And from the rough unyielding hulk of what he was chained to, he guessed it was a tree.  A really big one, though with silver chains, a sapling would have held him just as well.

Another scent, rank and unmistakable, told him that he was surrounded by the pack of werewolves.  He glanced around: Those few in human form were armed with swords and other hunting finery.  More than a dozen were already shifted into their beasts, and they were pissed, growling, their slathering jaws gaping to show off long, sharp teeth.

A woman cackled, and Luca looked to her.  Her copper hair was long and curly, and framed her lean, angular face.  Her mouth was full and sensuous, but those eyes, though lovely, held true insanity.  Either that or she was a ravening bitch by nature.  Either way, Luca cringed as she stalked closer to him.

“My, my, my…the pretty vampire has finally woke up.”  She stopped only a foot from him, her eyes meeting his without a trace of fear, which either meant she really was crazy, or she knew that the silver chains would dampen his power to mentally push and glamour her.  She pursed her lips.  “About damn time.”

Luca tried again to pull at the silver chains, only causing himself even more pain as the chains cut deeper into him.  He groaned and felt his stomach turn as he smelled his own flesh burning. 

“Don’t worry, leach, with you alive and bleeding still, your whores will come for you soon enough.  And when they do, the witch and the vampire die with you.”        

Luca looked up into the woman’s eyes, his voice shattered, no more than a breathy groan.  “I’ll kill you if you touch her!”

“Which one?” asked a man that the other werewolves parted to clear a path for.  He was of average height, but everything else about him said power.  Broad shoulders, a well built body, coupled with the handsome, angular features of Eastern Europe.   His head was shaved, and his dark eyes were sharp.  “You’ll kill us if we touch her…but which
her
are you speaking of: the witch or the vampire?” 

The woman moved around the man, her body language obvious—she wanted him, yearned for him.  It might be part of the reason she was so crazed, for the man didn’t seem to register her even being there.  A woman in love, a woman scorned, was always dangerous—preternatural strength or no.

“Which is it, vampire…Min or Elaina?”

Luca stayed perfectly still, not letting a bit of his inner reaction to Min’s name show through. 

The werewolf smiled knowingly.  “Ah, so you wish to protect the witch.  Surprising.”

“Touch her and I will end you.”  Luca said low and cold.   

The werewolf looked amused.  “Really?”  He looked Luca up and down.  “You’re bound in silver.  Forgive me if I don’t see how you’re going to make good on any threat you make right now.”

Hate bubbled up inside Luca.  Anger and panic, and his chest rumbled with it as he bared his fangs.

“Don’t worry, vampire.  Though she has soiled her soul by taking a creature as of you into her bed, the pack has no quarrel with Min.”

“Günter…you can’t be serious!” the copper haired woman roared in an animalistic version of her own voice.  She seemed on the verge of losing control, her human traits melting away before she even transformed.  “She knew damn well her leach lover was in league with the vampire that killed Marina.  She deserves the same fate as the vampires.”

Günter didn’t take his eyes from Luca’s.  “Min will not be touched, Giselle.  I have—”

“His whore is as guilty as he is.  Her hands are as stained with Marina’s blood as—”

With lightning speed Günter turned and struck Giselle hard enough to flatten her to the ground.  His eyes had turned wolf gold, and his teeth were bared as he glowered down upon her.  “You’ll do well not to say her name again.”

Fear showed shivering in Giselle’s eyes. 

“And as for Min, she has been a friend and ally to the pack for many years.  Besides being a powerful witch and a well trained fighter, she—”

“She was your whore too!”

Something in Luca’s chest tore with grizzly pain as he realized Min had been with the werewolf.  He’d believed her when she’d said…but she’d kept this back from him.  It hurt, and he knew that it shouldn’t.

Günter’s eyes turned to molten amber, and his voice became chilled like smooth, glassy ice.  “You are the only woman I’ve been with that was ever a whore, Giselle.”

She gasped and bowed her head as Günter turned back to Luca.  She sobbed and then picked herself up off the ground.  Those around her didn’t bother to look at her, they just stood and listened to their leader.

“But your Elaina will die with you.  All we have to do is wait for her to turn up.  And with such alluring bait as you, how can she resist?”

All too readily,
Luca thought.  The werewolf doesn’t know Elaina at all.  She had been toying with them, stringing them along with murder and the need for vengeance, as she led them straight to him.  Whatever they thought, she knew damn well the danger he was in, and she didn’t care.  If anything, she’d orchestrated it.

“And once she does,” Günter continued, “We’ll capture her, and what’s left of her will meet the loving touch of dawn alongside you.”

A cheer erupted from the pack of werewolves, human voices mingling with feral wolf howls and growls.  In that moment Luca hoped that his death would be enough to sate the werewolves thirst for vengeance, so they would stay away from Min.  For he knew there wasn’t a chance in hell that Elaina would show her face, not to save him.  Maybe she was somewhere close enough that she could watch.  Now
that
sounded like Elaina.

Luca smile to himself.  Günter saw it and moved closer, peering into his eyes.  Then with that lightening quickness from before he belted Luca across the mouth.  “Don’t be mistaken, you’ll see the light of day soon enough, vampire.  If your mistress doesn’t come for you, then you’ll meet the sun and go to hell alone.”

He turned away from Luca and walked to the other side of the clearing, unsheathing a sword and swinging it absently as he moved.  “As for Min, even though she has soiled her body and soul with you, once our business is through we will leave her in peace.  I can only hope once you are but dust she will regain her sanity.”  He turned and looked Luca in the eye.  “Surely you have her in a spell, pushed or glamoured into a slavery of sorts.”

Luca laughed, feeling the chains dig further into his chest as he did so.  He kept laughing through the pain, alternating with pained groans and grunts.  He tasted his own blood from the punch the wolf had given him.  It made the beast in him stir, though the silver chains kept it bound as tightly as they bound Luca.  A thought came to him, that the last blood he’d taste in this world would be his own.  It made the beast in him whimper and then scream with impotent rage.  

“What’s so funny, vampire.”  Günter stared with cool curiosity, holding the sharpness of his silver blade against his palm, smoke curling from where it touched his flesh.

“You don’t know Min as well as you think.  She—” Luca fell silent.  He realized with a cold surge of realization that it would be better for Min if the wolves thought that she had indeed been pushed.  That the big bad vampire had taken her over and used her and that once he really was gone she would revert back to normal. 

“What was that vampire?”

What looked like a yellow humming bird fluttered into the clearing, but no sooner did Luca focus on it than it fell to the ground, just a crumpled piece of paper the wind was already blowing away.
Luca looked down to the cold earth beneath him.  The grass he stood on was scorched black.  They’d used this spot to execute vampires before.  Luca felt a pounding of terror rush through him, cold and lonely, and utterly overwhelming.  He’d just be the next to die here.  A foot note in the packs long history.  But then he closed his eyes and tried to hold onto one thought.  If he stayed quiet and just let it happen, Min would be safe, and probably never know what had really happened.  The thought of her safe and ignorant of his fate filled him with hope. 

The winds changed and Luca caught the faint scent of what he wanted more than anything on this earth. 
Min.
  It had to be his imagination.  But a moment later the entire pack stopped their howling and chanting to scent the air as well. 

Günter growled and then called out into the night.  “Come out, Min!  We can all smell you.”

Her laughter fell through the air like rain, touching everything as it did, making Luca’s flesh tingle.  From the look on Günter’s face he felt it too. 

Min appeared on the opposite edge of the forest, tall and strong and lovely, her raven hair streaming like shadows as she stood in the coming wind.  Her smile was crooked and beautiful.  “Should’ve known I couldn’t sneak up on a pack of werewolves.” 

They all turned toward her.  Some crouched, practically thrumming with otherworldly tension, muscles jerking in anticipation of pouncing on her.  But no one went for her. 

Günter raised his sword.  “We wish you no harm, Min.  I know this creature has you under its thrall.  Once we have him and his vampire mistress in an ashtray, we’ll leave you in peace.”

She laughed again, and it tickled at the back of Luca’s neck.  “You really don’t know me at all, do you?” Min said thoughtfully.  “Leave town now, and I’ll leave you the use of your legs.”

Günter smiled, and brandished his sword at her.  “I don’t want to fight you.”

“Why?  Afraid you’ll lose?”

There were snickers from the pack, sounds that should never have come from the gnarled teeth and lips of wolves. 

“I could end up killing you,” Günter said, ignoring the pack’s taunts.  “And I would forever regret that.”  

“Right back at you, big boy.”  She pulled a long, gleaming sword from her side.  It shone in the moonlight with silver grace. 

“Nice sword,” the werewolf said. 

“All the better to kill you with, my dear.”