Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
“Where are we?” Lucas managed the same few words each time he woke before losing consciousness for another couple of hours.
“In a motel. Just rest.” I gave up my attempts to feed him blood while he was coherent. He refused to accept it. It was easier to feed him while he was out. His subconscious—or more likely his beast—wasn’t as squeamish about taking my blood.
By the time I gathered my purse and took a last glance around the room, he was sleeping again. Besides his meager bandages, he was naked under the covers.
Before leaving the truck stop earlier that evening, I’d bought water, two sets of sweats—one for him and one for me—what bandages they had, and a pen flashlight. It wasn’t enough, but it was a start.
Fixated on how the vamps were tracking us, I crawled under the rental car and made my way along the frame, inch by inch, running the flashlight along every nook and cranny. We had already ditched everything we’d packed for our trip, including our nice suitcases, in exchange for duffels, new clothes, and cosmetics. Lucas had rented another car, yet the vamps still found us.
Did the vamps have time to plant a tracker? If there was something to find, my money was on the car. With Lucas bleeding in the backseat, time pressed in, and I was giving up hope of finding anything until I spotted a lump on the far side of the fuel tank. I ran my hand over it, and after tugging hard, it fell into my hand.
I ran the flashlight over it and watched a tiny red light blip on and off. It was definitely a tracker. Fuckers. I took the time to run over the car again and, thirty minutes later, determined there was only the one.
I’d considered going through each piece of clothing, shoes, and the duffel itself in search of other tracking mechanisms, but who was I kidding? I’d already tossed all my favorite clothes days ago. So, after changing into my new sweats, I gathered everything else and threw it in the truck stop’s dumpster.
I stared at the tracker and considered crushing it. Other vamps might already be monitoring us, and I glanced around the parking lot, not really expecting to find any, but that didn’t mean they weren’t out there. I needed to throw them off our track, and then I remembered something from some TV show. If I glanced in a mirror, would I see a diabolical smile?
I wandered the parking lot and scanned the license plates of the big trucks. Then I found the perfect one. Idaho. Close enough. Maybe they’d think we’d given up and were heading home. I glanced around, and not seeing anyone, attached the tracker inside the front wheel well of the semi.
With a satisfied grin, I fell into the driver’s seat, but another thought sobered me. All the attacks had involved two vamps. But there had been three at the last hotel before Lucas was injured. Where did the third vamp go? Or was that an entirely different group? Maybe they used one vamp to manually track us while the other two stayed behind to take us out. When the vamp doing the tracking didn’t hear from them, two more were sent. It was possible that Venizi, or whoever was sending them, used vamps from allied Houses. The answer to that would require Lucas’s experience.
I shook my head. It didn’t matter now. The tracker was gone. I had driven the back roads until I found a town with a fair amount of restaurants and stores, and grabbed a room at a bearable motel. Now, as I took a last glance at Lucas lying on the bed, I hoped I was doing the right thing. The TV was tuned to a classic movie channel, and when I closed the door, I hung the “Do Not Disturb” placard on the doorknob.
The town was large enough to have a twenty-four-hour combination grocery and hardware store. I bought two sets of clothes for each of us, two sets of sheets and towels, a new duffel, toiletries for both of us, first aid supplies, a cooler, a case of water, two gallons of orange juice, cookies, fruit, and veggies. The orange juice and cookies were to restore me after I gave blood. If it was good enough for the Red Cross, it was good enough for me. After I packed everything in the car, I realized I’d forgotten something and ran back in and bought a new burner phone.
When I got back to the room, Lucas was still sleeping, and his major wounds still leaked blood.
“Hey, baby. Can you wake up?”
No response.
I hauled everything in from the car, set up the cooler, then began working on his injuries. The minor cuts seemed to have healed, which gave me hope, but the deeper ones still oozed blood. Once I had new bandages in place, I took the old shirts and towels and tossed them in the tub, wishing I’d bought detergent. I filled the tub with enough cold water to cover the items and left them to soak.
I crawled into bed next to Lucas and cut my palm.
“Wake up, Lucas. It’s time to feed.”
The call to feed must be instinctual because his lips tightened on the cut, and he drank. A flutter of hope rose as each suckle was stronger than the last. He just needed rest. If I only knew how long we had before someone else tracked us down. We were miles from the closest interstate, but we couldn’t stay long. At this point, we were nothing more than sitting ducks.
The voice soothed him.
When he tried to open his eyes—he didn’t have the strength.
Before Lucas could give it another thought, sweet honey touched his lips. He didn’t question it, clasping his mouth around the soft skin. A familiar scent floated around him as he suckled the life-saving blood. Then the beast took over, and he fell into the memories.
Lucas dropped into the chair across from his bed, the opened letter still in his hand. A tear escaped down his cheek. He didn’t bother wiping it away as he stared out the window, not noticing the Spanish moss rustle in the breeze as it hung from the large oak trees. Nor did he hear the twilling of birds as they flitted among the branches. The scent of magnolias and the humid air had no impact on him. He might as well be in a vacuum that matched the silence echoing in his ears.
The bastard had done it.
He had destroyed his beautiful sister. She had endured a strict and sheltered life with little love from their father. And now, she’d been traded in marriage to a stranger from an allied House as if she were nothing more than a fine piece of china to be displayed on a shelf. Their father completely disregarded her desire to marry another—a vampire from a strong House who loved her as deeply as she did him.
But he was a mere second son. Not the eldest like her newly betrothed in the Bertrand House. Lucas had begged her to ignore Father’s wishes. In reality, Magnus Maynard couldn’t force her, but the rebellious child of his youth had been battered with verbal abuse into a submissive female who would do what was expected of her.
From the spare letters he received from her, she’d been the young sister he’d known in her childhood. Her happiness and love for Eric were plain to see in her words. He briefly wondered how Eric had taken the news. Had this been less civilized times, Father’s decision could have precipitated a war between the Houses.
He slowly crunched the paper into a ball before letting it drop to the floor. He barely heard the knock on the door and ignored it when it opened. He assumed it was his valet as it was nearing dinnertime.
“I take it you received bad news. Was it from home?”
Lucas jumped up and turned, bowing his head to his new House leader, Girard Lafitte. He’d been in his service for barely a year and was still getting his footing. “Yes, sir.” He noted Lafitte’s glance at the crumpled letter on the floor. “Not the best news but nothing that would impact House Lafitte. I’m sorry it distracted me from my duties.”
Lafitte studied him. “Grab your jacket and follow me.”
Lucas did as ordered, trailing after his leader as they strode down the stairs, through the house, and out the front steps. Two saddled horses waited for them. Lucas mounted the one the stable boy handed him and waited while Lafitte issued instructions to the head of his cadre.
Then Lafitte took off without a word, and Lucas followed. He hadn’t failed to see the sheathed swords that had been attached to both saddles. They rode for twenty minutes, and as the horse cantered behind Lafitte, Lucas swayed to its rhythm. His anger rode just beneath the surface, but it began to fade as his attention gravitated to the beauty of the passing landscape. The sticky warm air caressed the restlessness in his soul.
He shook off his melancholy when he glanced at his House leader. His view of the road they traveled immediately shifted. With only the two of them, Lucas’s role had elevated to bodyguard should they run across an enemy force. Although it was rare these days, it wasn’t unheard of, and he gave his new responsibility his full attention.
When they came to a glade next to a lake, Lafitte stopped near a tree and dismounted. Lucas remained on his horse and studied the tree line along the edge of the glade. After a couple of minutes, he was satisfied they were alone. He jumped down and looped the reins over a branch. His brow rose when Lafitte removed his sword. So, this was to be a training exercise. He drew his own sword but held it down, waiting for Lafitte’s command.
Lafitte stalked to the middle of the glade, turned, and lifted the sword so it was directly in front of his face. Then he swung it in a wide arc toward the ground.
Lucas performed the same opening sequence, and then they danced.
Lafitte’s movements with his blade were swift and decisive, whereas Lucas focused on the precision of his footwork. He moved effortlessly between one form and another. That alone had gotten him out of trouble on numerous occasions. He gave the same care to his measured strikes.
Lafitte lunged, but Lucas blocked and parried with a stab. Lafitte had anticipated the move and jumped back, then attacked with a powerful strike that Lucas barely dodged. They circled each other. He’d been a decent swordsman by the time he’d left home. He was sent to House Lafitte as a trade his father made in exchange for a debt owed. Just another child to use for barter.
An image of his sister crying in her bed resurfaced, and Lucas advanced, the anger making his strikes come faster. Lafitte matched each attack, returning them with equal force. They continued their match until their shirts were wet with sweat from the thick air of the bayou.
Lucas had no idea how long they battled before he fell to his knees, a stitch in his side and his breath heavy. “I surrender.”
Lafitte dropped into the grass next to him, tossing his sword aside. “Thank the heavens. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could stand.”
Lucas glanced at him, and when he saw truth in his leader’s gaze, he did his best to hide any emotion.
Lafitte smiled as he drew his arm over his forehead, wiping away the sweat. “I don’t remember you being quite that good when you first arrived.”
He chuckled. “My father and older brother would agree with you. But the same pattern of training doesn’t improve one’s abilities. It tends to make them lazy.”
Lafitte nodded. “An excellent observation. Something my cadre is quite adept at.”
“I’ll learn much here.”
“And what have you learned this afternoon?”
Lucas considered his words. “Two things, I think. The first is that I can’t change what I don’t control and what has already happened. And second, a sword fight is good for depleting hot emotions.”
“This is why I was so quick to accept your father’s proposal. Not to speak ill of the vampire, but he made a bad deal.”
“Oh?”
“You are the smartest of your Family. Skill with the sword might have been important a hundred or even fifty years ago, but now? Of course, fighting techniques are critical to protect me and my Family, but war is rare. We are moving into a future where the necessary skills are for business and trade. More so than it’s ever been. Industry will be our future.”
He stared at Lucas for a moment. “Your father also has the reputation of a man who stands on a hill of sand. His loyalties shift with each step he takes. It’s best you remove yourself from that stigma.” He stood and brushed off his pants. “We’ll soon be moving to my New Orleans manor.”
Lucas perked up at the news. Living at the Baton Rouge estate was a luxury, but there was little to do outside his duties and training. Fortunately, Lafitte kept a huge library where Lucas spent most of his free time. But New Orleans was the primary manor for House Renaud, and the largest Renaud Library in the States resided there.
Lafitte must have read his mind. “When you’re not on duty, I would like you to spend time at the Renaud Library. I know its purpose is to report on the past, but over the decades, I’ve learned there are many things to gain from our history. Ingenuity will sort its correct adaptation to modern problems. Like sorting cream from the milk. I believe you have the intellect to be one of those conduits. I want you to study the past and find those lessons that will strengthen House Lafitte.
“I’ve always wondered why our Family history began as neighbors to House Renaud. But it’s simple, really. Many vampire Houses believe that brawn or the size of their army will determine their status and longevity. But they’re wrong. Knowledge is the key to survival regardless of who is in power.” He shook his head and gave Lucas a rueful smile. “My children say I talk too much. But I argue that I’m the one everyone seeks out at parties.”
Lucas returned the grin. “I’m told parties are good for the soul.”
“Really? Who said that?”
He thought about it, then chuckled. “I think it was my grandmama.”
Lafitte threw his head back and laughed. “Ah, my young vampire, that’s another reason you’re fitting in so well here.”
When they reached the horses, Lafitte took him by the shoulders. “I heard about your sister’s betrothal. By your reaction to the letter you received, I assume you also know and are unhappy with the news. There’s nothing I can do to help you. You will need to come to terms with this on your own.”
He stepped back and gave Lucas a thoughtful look. “Let me leave you with this one bit of information. I know Mason Bertrand quite well. We have the same thoughts about the future and are strong allies. I don’t know whether love can grow between him and your sister, but know that he is a good and righteous man who will treat your sister well. He bears no fools, and while this marriage has strengthened his bond to your Father’s House, he won’t grant access to her if it causes her any pain. She will be protected.”
Lucas swallowed. He hadn’t known how much he needed to hear that. She would be safe. He blinked back tears and nodded. “Thank you for that, Father. I will be forever grateful for those words.”
They rode back to the manor in silence. When they handed off the reins to the stable boys and jogged up the steps to the manor, Lafitte patted him on the back before walking through the door.
Lucas stopped and turned around to view the old plantation. This was a foreign land to him, but for the first time in his life, he had a home.