“No way are you going to feel guilty for that!” Because she so rarely drank or used medications, the pain meds hit her in a warm wave. “Wow, this is sort of nice.”
He chuckled and brushed a kiss over her shoulder.
“Anyway, unless you were in some conspiracy with her to lure me out there to kill me, you can’t possibly be held responsible for what she did. I’m alive right now, and that’s what counts. Also—” she giggled, “—I told her I was going to start calling her Pirate Polly. We need to make that happen.”
He groaned. “I should have been sneaking morphine into your food long before now if I’d known you’d react this way.”
“Are you saying you want to drug me, Scion?”
“To keep you malleable and out of trouble, it would be worth it.”
She snorted and then shivered a little when his fingertips brushed the side of her breast.
“Are you warm enough?” He kept bathing her.
“Yes, that was a shiver of delight. Not that I’m in any shape to have sex with you or anything.”
“Glad you told me. The cast, bruises, stitches and sling didn’t clue me in, sex maniac that I am.”
“Oh, you made a joke.” She giggled again.
He finished up and helped her back into the gown. “I’ll have you know, I’ve got a wonderful sense of humor.”
“Sure, you do. If I need a chuckle about pocket squares or neckerchiefs or hand-sewn loafers, I always think of you first.”
Clive looked at her, laughing. Only she could make him laugh at a time like this.
She settled back and he pulled the blankets up, tucking her in. Her eyes had drifted halfway closed as he’d gotten the water and other bathing things cleaned up. By the time he got seated and put his feet up, she’d started to drift off.
For the first time since that night, the sight of her falling out of consciousness didn’t fill him with panic.
“I love you, Hunter,” he murmured, really liking the sound of it. He’d decided to say it more often because it pleased him. Because he’d nearly lost her. Because it flustered her, and because it was the truth and he didn’t like to lie to himself.
“You told me that. That night when you found me.”
Her eyes were closed, but her mouth curved up into a smile.
“I did.”
“Sorry I scared you.”
He swallowed as he watched the rise and fall of her chest.
“I was scared too.”
That tore at him. She was invincible. The boogeyman of Vampire bad dreams. Rowan didn’t get scared. She did the scaring.
She’d never really shared anything like that with him. Coming from her it was more intimate than a declaration of love.
“You were?”
She swallowed. “There was a point, toward the end, and I thought, Oh, I’m going to die and it’s going to suck because she will win. I didn’t want to die, Clive. I love you too, by the way. I don’t really want to. You’re uptight and bossy, and you iron your underwear.”
Though he grinned at her doped-up confession, tenderness swamped him. This hard-as-nails woman got to him in ways he’d never imagined possible.
“I’m glad you didn’t die, Rowan. And I’m glad you love me too, even if I am uptight and bossy.”
“Okay.”
She drifted off and he knew it wouldn’t be any time soon before she shared with him with such intimacy again. So he cherished it nearly as much as he cherished the fact that she lived. Against the odds, she was simply too much of a hard ass to give in to such incredible injuries and die.
She’d be back to annoying him on a daily basis soon enough. She had pushed through the amendment, and now she had a new task. Nothing could keep her down for long, and he knew she’d do everything she could to recover if for no other reason than she wanted to hunt down Enyo to kill her true.
He and The First had agreed after the first time she’d died on that table that there would be the worst kind of painful lesson for Enyo. He had people on it already. As did the First. Both men ached to kill Enyo, but both knew Rowan needed to do it herself. Needed to take control and kill the Vampire who’d nearly ended her.
When she was well enough, they’d start the hunt. The First would remain in the Keep. It was the only way to keep the peace while they hunted one of their own. It was too big a risk to have such a powerful Vampire out and roaming all over the place. And though he’d never say it aloud, Clive was glad he wouldn’t have to risk any sort of deterioration of The First’s mood or mental state.
Warren would come along, as would Recht. Rowan would have plenty of backup to keep her alive.
But he’d be there at the end, and when Enyo was dust, he’d finally convince Rowan to go on that vacation.
* * * * *
Look for the next installment of Rowan’s story, BLADE ON THE HUNT,
coming from Lauren Dane and Carina Press in Fall 2014.
Rowan, along with her team of Vampires and human Hunters, follows the bloody trail Enyo leaves in her wake. While Rowan is familiar with her smooth-talking, designer-suit-wearing Scion, Clive shows Rowan the ruthless warrior he’d only hinted at before...
She is a vampire’s worst nightmare...
Get introduced to Rowan Summerwaite in Goddess with a Blade, available now!
Goddess with a Blade
Rowan Summerwaite is no ordinary woman. Physical vessel to the Celtic Goddess Brigid and raised by the leader of the Vampire Nation, she’s a supercharged hunter with the power to slay any vampire who violates the age-old treaty.
A recent string of murders has her at odds with Las Vegas’s new Scion, the arrogant and powerful Clive Stewart. The killings have the mark of Vampire all over them, and Rowan warns Clive to keep his people in line—or she’ll mete out her own brand of justice.
Though her dealings with Clive are adversarial to say the least, Rowan is intensely aware of her attraction to him. But she can’t let it distract her from her duty—to find and battle the killer before more women die.
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About the Author
The story goes like this: While on pregnancy bed rest, Lauren Dane had plenty of down time so her husband took her comments about “giving that writing thing a serious go” to heart and brought home a secondhand laptop. She wrote her first book on it before it gave up the ghost. Even better, she sold that book and never looked back.
Today, Lauren is a New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of more than fifty novels and novellas across several genres. Though she no longer has to deal with Polly Pocket and getting those tiny outfits on and off, you may catch her in a nostalgic moment when the house is silent because the kids are all in school and she can get work done. Just a moment, though.
Visit Lauren on the web at www.laurendane.com, by email at
[email protected] and on Twitter @laurendane. You can write to her at: P.O. Box 45175, Seattle, WA 98145.
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ISBN-13: 9781426897634
BLADE TO THE KEEP
Copyright © 2013 by Lauren Dane
Edited by Angela James
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All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
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Lauren Dane, Blade to the Keep
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