What will you do if we take your brother? Will you speak up for him?
I won’t watch him die, but I won’t stand in anyone’s way.
Do you have any regrets?
Yes.
Are you proud of yourself?
Actually, yes. I cured cancer. I developed treatments that saved a lot of human lives. And now I plan to use what I learned at Daedalus to help vampires. So bite me.
Bite you? Now or on the next full moon?
Okay, so she’d have to learn that vampires took things like “bite me” very literally, and she’d have to watch what she said. But otherwise, no one could say she was shrinking away from either the good or the bad that she’d done. Everyone in the clan was welcome to grill her about her past, and the sooner the better. She wanted the air cleared so everyone, including her, could move on.
But moving on might not be so easy with Myne. She hadn’t been able to face him since he’d left her alone at Riker’s place two days ago. He hadn’t made an effort to see her, either. At least, Katina had been an invaluable help with navigating the new world Nicole had just joined.
Tomorrow, Katina planned to teach Nicole how to hunt humans.
With any luck, Nicole wouldn’t be around to learn. At least, not anytime soon.
She stood before Hunter in his chamber, wondering how the guy was going to react to her announcement. He hadn’t really liked her when she was human, and she still couldn’t get a read off him. Especially because at the moment, he was sprawled on his fat leather couch, video-game controller in hand, cursing at the purple dragon flying around the TV screen. Strangely, even though he was immersed in a cartoon game, the vibrant aura of power and leadership that always surrounded him wasn’t diminished in the least.
“Spyro is flying like he’s drunk,” he muttered. “What the fuck, dude. Through the rings, not over them.”
She eyed the screen. “Is that a children’s game?”
“It’s rated All Ages,” he said defensively. “Why are you here?”
Right to it, then. “I want to go to ShadowSpawn.”
Hunter’s head came up, making his black hair drape like silk over his broad shoulders. “You what? You can’t just move from one clan to another like humans move from city to city. And if this is to be with Riker, trust me, you won’t be with him.”
No, it wasn’t to be with him. He’d made it crystal clear that he didn’t want to be with her. But that didn’t mean she didn’t want to help him. God help her, she loved him. “It’s to save them both. Riker and Lucy.”
She couldn’t believe ShadowSpawn had refused to give up the girl. What could they possibly want with her?
“Fuck. Now I’m dead.” He dropped the game controller. “I’m working on a way to get them out of there.”
“Really? Because it looks like you’re playing video games while Riker and Lucy could be hurt, suffering, or dying.”
A vein in Hunter’s temple pulsed, and when he spoke, his tone was glacial. “I’m going to let that pass, since you’re a baby in our world. But you should know that I think best when I’m playing video games.” He stood, forcing her to crane her neck to look up at him. “Now, what makes you think you can help Riker?”
The way he said it, as if he were humoring a child who wanted to heal the world with a tea party, pissed her off. A lot. “What’s the one thing troubling your race?” she asked, a little too impatiently, if his withering stare was any indication. “Besides humans killing and enslaving you, anyway.”
“It’s your race, too, now,” he pointed out.
How long would it take to get that through her head? She had to start thinking like a vampire if she wanted to survive. And if she wanted to prove herself to everyone who would have a hard time seeing beyond her Daedalus roots.
“Okay, our race. What problem plagues it?”
“Low birthrate,” he said.
“Exactly. What do you think babies would be worth to ShadowSpawn?”
Hunter narrowed his ebony eyes at her. “What are you getting at?”
“Grant and I have been poring over the files I took from the lab . . . There’s so much more, but I believe Daedalus has discovered why vampires have difficulty conceiving and giving birth. That’s what the breeding experiments have been about.”
“They want vampires to conceive?” His skepticism rang clear as a bell.
“No. Well, yes, because the goal is to fully domesticate vampires. Engineer them into docile, harmless creatures and then breed them like cattle.” She watched his hands open and close into fists over and over, and she wondered if he was imagining squeezing any particular human—or recently turned vampire—between them. “It’s too much work and too expensive to catch wild vampires and enslave them. Too much risk when things go bad. And only the wealthy can afford vampire slaves.”
“But if they bred their own mindless, spineless drones, they could mass-produce them and make a fortune selling to the average citizen.”
“Exactly.”
Hunter snarled. “I hate humans.”
Not long ago, she’d have been insulted. Now she was right there with him.
“So what’s your plan?” Hunter asked, all business and impatience.
“I’ll promise ShadowSpawn as many pregnancies as they want in exchange for Riker and Lucy. And don’t worry, I’ll make sure Grant has all of the information he needs to help MoonBound make babies, too, just in case anything goes wrong with ShadowSpawn and I’m, well . . . not able to come back.”
“No.”
She uttered an exasperated curse. “How can you say no? This is the best shot we have of getting Riker out of there alive, and you know it.”
“He wouldn’t want this, Nicole.”
“I don’t care what he wants. He’s not here to make the decision, is he?” She wheeled around, paced a few steps, and came back, more determined than ever. “This is my choice. If you don’t agree, I’ll find a way to do it. I’m nothing if not resourceful, Hunter. I got out of here before, and I can do it again. So either I do this with your backing, or I go alone. Which is it?”
Hunter thought about that for a long time, his shrewd gaze never leaving her. Finally, he said quietly, “When do you want to go?”
“I need a day to get everything together.”
There was a knock at the door, and Hunter barked, “Enter.”
Myne appeared in the doorway. He didn’t meet her gaze. “Nicole left me a message to meet you both here.”
Hunter crossed his arms over his chest and shot her an accusatory look. “Did she?”
She nodded. “I want Myne to take me.” For some reason, Myne jerked like he’d been stuck with a cattle prod.
“Take you?” Myne’s voice sounded strangled.
“To ShadowSpawn,” Hunter said, and Myne blew out a relieved breath before he squared his stance, as if preparing for danger. “But you’re not going alone. I’m going with you.”
“Is this about Riker and Lucy?” Myne asked.
Nicole closed her eyes, relieved and happy to be able to help. “I think I can save them.” She opened her eyes to find that Myne was finally looking at her, but his cheeks were flushed pink. “I also have something I think you can use.” She gave herself five seconds to change her mind, and then she said very deliberately, “Chuck is always at the Daedalus Ridge Golf Course on Thursdays.”
COLD. PAIN. HUNGER. Riker was close personal friends with all of them. Most people would have called them enemies, but Riker knew what an enemy was, and in comparison with ShadowSpawn vampires, even starvation seemed friendly enough.
Shackles bit into his raw wrists as he shifted from his knees to sitting against the rock wall with his legs stretched out in front of him. Those were the only two positions available to him, and neither was comfortable, given that his arms had been bound behind his back. He’d been stripped and beaten, but on the second day of his captivity, one of the chief’s daughters, the one with the limp, had brought him a pair of flann
el pajama bottoms. They were too short, but he’d been grateful nevertheless.
Of course, he’d also been suspicious as hell, but no matter how many times he asked the female, Aylin, why she was giving him clothes, she didn’t respond. Her twin sister, however, had left him bleeding and nearly blinded just two hours earlier.
Rasha was a royal bitch.
He wondered how Bastien and Nicole were doing. He regretted not having more time to spend with the boy, but maybe those few hours they’d spent together before this all went down would leave Bastien with positive memories. The idea that all he’d ever known of fathers was pain and abuse was too horrible to bear.
And Nicole . . . Jesus.
He closed his eyes and rocked his head back against the wall. She’d been at the gathering of the two clans. She’d seen him chained and dragged away. He’d heard her. Sensed her. And all he could think of was how he’d left things between them.
He’d yelled at her for making herself at home in a place where she should have been welcome. Instead, he’d freaked the fuck out. He’d been so full of guilt over how Terese had lived and died that he hadn’t been able to let anyone else in.
What if he couldn’t love someone the way she deserved to be loved? What if he didn’t imprint on the female he wanted? What if she died thinking she was nothing but a burden to him? An obligation?
Nicole had been a burden at first. Definitely an obligation—nothing more than part of his mission gone awry. And he’d treated her as exactly that.
But at some point, his feelings toward her had changed. He’d discovered that she wasn’t the evil Daedalus bigwig he’d believed her to be, and if anything, she had a bigger heart than many vampires he knew.
ShadowSpawn vampires, most notably.
Assholes. They couldn’t just kill him and be done with it, could they? No, they were going to drag out his humiliation and death for as long as possible. Not an hour went by when someone wasn’t coming into the dungeon to torture him. And every night, they hauled him to the common room, where they chained him to a whipping post for some wholesome family entertainment. While the entire clan looked on, he was beaten, cut, stabbed, whipped, pissed on—yeah, it was all great fun. He especially liked it when they threw rotten food at him and tried to force him to eat it.
Aylin always came into the dungeon after the family fun night events to clean him up, but she never spoke. Not that he was in the mood to chat by that point. Usually, he couldn’t see, let alone speak, through the blood and swelling.
The chamber door creaked open. Squinting at the bright light streaming through the opening, he braced himself for whatever was coming next.
A squat male who was built like a brick filled the doorway. “You have five minutes,” Brick said, speaking to someone outside.
Riker smelled Nicole before he saw her, and his heart screeched to a halt so fast it must have left skid marks on his ribs. Gripped by shock, he could only gape as she entered the dungeon.
“Oh, my God.” She ran to him and knelt at his side, taking his face in her hands. “What have they done to you?”
His injuries weren’t important. The fact that she was here and was staring at him with silver eyes was.
“Holy shit, Nicole . . . you’re a vampire.” His voice was as trashed as his body. His mind seemed to be equally trashed, because he couldn’t focus his questions or his thoughts. And like a dolt, he’d also just told her something she already knew. “Why are you here? How?” He swallowed. “When did you turn?”
“Shh. First things first.” She stroked her thumbs over his cheeks, her touch extremely light and gentle on his bruises. “I’m here to free you and Lucy.” He wrenched his fists futilely behind his back, wishing he could touch her. “They’re letting you go. Lucy is already with Hunter and Myne.”
Thank God, Lucy was safe. But his situation was a little more serious. “That’s not possible,” he said. “Kars wants to wring every drop of life out of me.”
“I have something he wants more than he wants you dead.” She smiled, revealing her new pristine white fangs. “Oh, and obviously, the vaccine Chuck gave me didn’t work.”
Riker couldn’t stop staring at her mouth and the way the tips of her fangs peeked from between her parted lips.
“Are you okay?” he rasped. “I know you didn’t want this—”
She pressed her finger against his lips. “I’m fine, I swear. I’m still getting used to it, but I’m really okay. And if nothing else, it cured my lip-biting habit.” She gave him a sheepish smile. “At the end of the first day, I had a super-swollen lip, and if I’d had quarters, I’d have had a full swear jar.”
He strained against his chains, desperate to get closer. Mere inches separated them, and he could barely move. He needed to touch her, needed to feel for himself that she was healthy and whole. Kars thought he was being so clever with his torture methods, but this . . . this was by far the worst thing Riker had been put through.
“You look amazing,” he said, loving the dusky blush that spread over her cheeks.
He’d thought she was gorgeous before, but the dental makeover, along with the new sensual energy that vibrated the very air between them, had transformed her from a sleek, elegant housecat to a muscular, powerful tiger. He wished he could hug her. Wished he could whisk her away, strip her, and make love to her until she swore to never leave him.
“Wow,” she whispered. “I can feel your desire.” She licked her lips, and his body, abused as it was, fired up like the trusty engine in the old Land Rover he’d bought after graduating from Army basic training. “I can actually smell it. This vampire thing is . . . incredible.” A dark, crafty gleam sparked in her eyes a split second before she captured his mouth with hers.
A moan of pleasure and a frustrated growl that he couldn’t touch her mixed in his throat. He leaned into her as best he could, meeting her passionate kiss with equal enthusiasm. He danced the tip of his tongue over her fangs, testing the sharpness, fantasizing about how they’d feel as they sank into his neck.
He breathed her in, reveling in the new Nicole. He’d sell his soul to be able to ravish her right here in the cell. Stretching his restraints to the limit, he kissed her harder, stroking his tongue up and down her fangs in a blatantly sexual tempo. He was rewarded with a groan that vibrated him all the way to his groin.
“Oh, my,” she gasped into his mouth. “Fangs are . . .”
“Sex,” he finished.
“I want—”
“I know.”
She shuddered and pulled back, panting as hard as he was. He wondered if arousal had turned his eyes blue the way hers had gone to glowing green. “They’re going to be back for me in a minute. I just wanted to see you before I started work.”
“Tell me what’s going on. What do you have that they want?”
“Babies.” She brushed her finger over a laceration on his cheek—given to him courtesy of Fane an hour ago. “I know how vampires get pregnant. I can help them conceive.”
Damn, that was huge. Now he understood why Kars might deal. He’d been waiting twenty-five years to get his hands on Riker, so he could wait another twenty-five if he had to. Ensuring the survival of his clan and the entire vampire race was worth it.
But . . . “What’s the catch?”
“I have to stay here until five females are pregnant,” she said, as if it was no big deal to be held by ShadowSpawn for God knew how long. “Tonight is the new moon, so if I can get the formula put together in the next six hours, it’s possible that we could know tomorrow. Pregnancy in vampires is detectable within hours after intercourse.”
“It’s too risky,” he said. “I can’t let you do this.”
“It’s definitely risky,” she said, and he wondered if she’d honed her brisk, businesslike tone in Daedalus boardrooms. “But I don’t know what gave you the impression that you have any say in it.”
Fair enough. But this was too dangerous for someone who had been a vampire for hundreds of
years, let alone for a brand-new vampire.
“Nicole, what if the conceptions don’t happen? You could be here for years.”
“It’ll happen,” she assured him. “As Hunter so kindly pointed out, I’m a baby in your world, but when it comes to this, I’m an expert. I know what I’m doing. By this time tomorrow, if five females pop a positive, I’ll be free.”
He leaned back against the wall, getting comfortable. “I’m not leaving until you do. I’m definitely not letting you feed from any of these Neanderthals.”
“Letting me?” She jabbed her finger into his sternum. “You gave up the right to have any input into my life when you chose a dead woman over me, so let’s stop with the he-man act. Besides, I don’t plan to feed from any of them. Vampires can skip a moon feeding or two.”
He shook his head. “It’s not good for you, especially during the first months after you turn.”
“This isn’t negotiable,” she said. “Think about Bastien. He needs you. You need to go home.”
“So do you.”
She smiled, a bitter upturn of her lips. “My home isn’t yours. You made that very clear.”
“Nicole—”
She poked him again. “Now isn’t the time for this.”
“Now is maybe the only time for this.”
The door slammed open, and Nicole, bless her heart, crouched in front of him like a fierce guard dog. Rasha stood in the entry, a deceptively attractive demon outlined by light. All she was missing were horns and hooves. Maybe the hooves were concealed by her knee-high boots.
“Time to go, female,” she said.
Nicole swung back around to him. “Don’t volunteer to stay. Let them take you to Hunter.”
All he could think about was Nicole, stuck here during moon fever, her new body craving male blood, and his inner he-man started pounding his chest. “You’re not feeding from another male tonight.”
She stood, all grace and elegance that went hand in hand with her snooty “I’ll feed from anyone I want to feed from.”
Possessive rage turned his vision red. “Who fed you during the turning?”
“Myne.”