Out for Blood

21. Deacon

Chapter twenty-one

Deacon

I accompany Vasile and the others back to Kieran’s pack house. Chaya has control of our wolves and knows what needs to be done—she made copies of Quinn’s list before we even left, and Naomi has a few to distribute, as do Njáll and Elle.

There is nothing more for me to do tonight, beyond joining the searches myself, but one sharp look from Chaya ruled that out anyway. I gave Vasile the same look when he suggested it, though I can’t blame him for the impulse.

His prolonged inactivity is beginning to chafe on him, I can tell. I brush our shoulders together in the back of the car. I can think of at least one way to burn off some of that impatience.

Vasile rolls his eyes, but a smile plays around the corners of his mouth as we pull up outside the building. Kieran’s the first out of the car, stretching his back as he waits for Lucien. Sam climbs out of the front, and I turn to him as his scent changes, panic and anger lacing it.

“Get behind the wards!” Sam snaps, then hurtles around the car, grabs Kieran’s arm and shoves him further up the path. Vasile looks as bewildered as I feel, but I tell the driver to go—whatever’s here shouldn’t be worried about her—and follow Vasile, keeping myself between him and the rest of the street.

Kieran frowns, looking at Sam. “What? What did you sense?”

“A wolf.” Sam’s eyes are narrowed as he searches the shadows. I trust his senses, and besides, I can scent them too. Whoever they are, their scent is familiar, almost like—

“Oh, no,” I mutter, and Vasile turns to look at me. Sam’s jaw clenches and he nods. He knows.

Kieran’s frown deepens. “Who—”

All the colour drains from his face as a man steps under the streetlight across the road. He looks to be in his mid-forties, though as a wolf he could well be older, and it’s clear he’s Kieran’s father in the clenched, angry look on his face.

Kieran doesn’t make a sound. Lucien reaches for him slowly as though he’s not certain he’ll be welcome, but Kieran clings to his hand, holding tightly enough that Lucien’s skin goes white.

The man—Alpha Darren, I remember Quinn calling him—crosses the road slowly as though each step pains him. I growl when he gets close to where the wards are. Not that I care much if he walks into them, but I don’t want him pushing it.

Why is he here? Silver twists in and out of his eyes like he’s fighting his own wolf.

“What are you doing here?” Kieran asks. He’s still holding on to Lucien, but his voice is strong and even, and his scent betrays absolutely nothing.

“Kyle—”

“Kieran.” The word cracks through the air and the man’s jaw clenches in response.

“ Alpha Kieran,” I say, and from the look Kieran shoots me, I don’t think he’s grateful for it. I don’t care. This wolf should not be here, whether he’s Kieran’s father or not. He faintly trembles when he looks at me, but there’s no fear in his scent.

If he’s been spending all that time with Tamesis, maybe he’s out of fear.

“Alpha,” he says, nodding to me and then, with some more hesitance, to his son. “I came to tell you what happened.”

“With Tamesis?” Kieran shakes his head. “We know he got to you. To your pack.”

“No. With your mother.”

“I—” Kieran cuts himself off. He looks just as confused as the rest of us. “I don’t know what you mean. I don’t—I don’t know why that matters.”

Darren growls. He takes a careful step back when he does, shoulders stiff. Does Tamesis know he is here? I doubt it. He could track him down through the pack bond he’s clearly manipulating, but he won’t just know where he is.

He knows who Darren is speaking to, though. Of that I have no doubt.

“Your mother was a witch,” Kieran’s father says, and Sam flinches at the word. “A seer. She ran a shop in Manchester with Pris, and a week before she died, a vampire came for a reading.”

Kieran shakes his head. “I know. I know . Pris already told us that he—”

“He wanted to know his future,” Darren interrupts, though I don’t miss the dark flash of his expression when he hears Pris’ name. “He wanted to know who would kill him.”

Next to me, Vasile leans forward. I doubt he even knows he’s doing it. Kieran’s gaze flicks to Vasile, too. Vasile killed Tamesis first, after all.

“What did she see?”

“She told the vampire she saw nothing. I don’t know if she meant she told him she couldn’t get a read on him or that she’d made up something else, but she told me the truth…” He swallows hard, hands clenching into fists by his sides. “Our son would kill him.”

Kieran opens his mouth, then closes it. He pales, and Lucien moves a little closer to him, a move that Darren tracks. Silver bleeds into his eyes again, and I let a growl rumble out of my chest. His gaze snaps to me for a second before he lowers his eyes.

“She wouldn’t tell me more than that,” he says. “We were all on edge. She said he was dangerous, so we locked the pack down. Kept watch. The night she—”

He lets out a shaky breath and swallows hard. Kieran clenches his jaw.

“The night she died,” he says. “What happened?”

“Someone scented a vampire on the other side of the village. Pris went with a wolf, said it was the same vampire who’d been at the shop. So we went. I left her at the house with you boys. I thought—I thought there was no way he could get to her. There were too many of us. Our house was so protected, with Pris’ wards and the wolves between us and the edge of the village… It wasn’t enough. By the time I felt her fear, I knew it was too late. I-I felt her die, and I knew I had to make it. I had to get back for you boys.”

“You didn’t make it,” Kieran says. “Not before he turned on us.”

“You were still awake when we got there,” Darren says, and his voice is hushed now, his wolf apparently unable to fight the emotions coursing through him. I can scent them all—his guilt, his fear—but I know they mean little in the face of all that he’s done. “And he was dead. Drew was in his crib, screaming like he knew just what was wrong, and you were between him and this monster—”

He drags in a shaking breath and Kieran’s expression doesn’t waver. “I know that,” he says. “I was there. Why are you telling me this now? We’re already planning to kill him.”

“Because after we took his body into the forest, I went back. The next day, I went back to the spot we’d dumped him, and I tried to tell myself that the wind had picked up the ash and blown it away, but I couldn’t convince myself it was true.”

“You knew he was alive?” Vasile’s voice is quiet, very carefully controlled. “All this time?”

Darren growls. Recognition flickers across his face as he takes Vasile in, and I answer with my own snarl, my wolf pushing to the surface despite Sam’s wards. Vasile gives me an arch look. I know he doesn’t need my protection here. As if any of the five of us wouldn’t be perfectly capable of keeping this wolf down.

Still. It’s the principle of the thing.

“I wasn’t… certain,” he says after a moment. He looks at Kieran again as though focusing on his son will help him to keep control. “But I couldn’t stop the doubt from lingering. That’s why I pushed you boys so hard. I needed to be sure you, especially, could defend yourself. He wouldn’t have bitten you if you had a wolf. Vampires can tell.”

Kieran stares at him for a long moment. His scent is so tightly controlled that I can’t be certain what he’s thinking, but Lucien must feel something because he squeezes Kieran’s hand and shakes his head.

“You think you were protecting us?” Kieran asks, and the hard tone of his voice has the hair on the back of my neck standing on end. I fight the urge to reach for Vasile and put myself between the two of them. Kieran isn’t a threat to him—to us—but my wolf doesn’t like that tone anyway.

“It was all I could do.”

“It was all—” Kieran scoffs and lets go of Lucien’s hand, then takes a step closer to the wards. Sam lifts a hand as though to reach for him, then looks at Darren and drops it again. “You think that what you put us through protected us? You think you protected Drew?”

“He needed—”

“He needed a father! He needed you to be there for him, not to try to turn him into some kind of weapon. You—You hurt us, and you used us, and the things you taught us never helped us the way you thought they would. And now you’ve gone and got the rest of your pack caught up in this too because you were too fucking short-sighted to think things through and help your sons instead of hurting them.”

Silence follows, and none of us move. Darren swallows twice before he speaks again. “He needed to leave of his own accord. He was never going to do that if I didn’t push him.”

Sam’s expression twists in anger, scent spiking with a fury that is echoed in Lucien’s. Kieran merely sighs, shaking his head. I don’t think his anger is gone.

“That’s why you promised him to Hale?”

“Yes. Nothing less than that would make him leave.”

“Because he wanted to look after his pack. He wanted to do the thing you should’ve been doing, and I—” Kieran’s voice sticks in his throat. Lucien makes a low sound, but Kieran shakes his head. “I always thought you just lost it after Mum died, you know? And it hurt a little to think that we weren’t enough for you—or that I wasn’t, at least—but I was beginning to understand how easy it might be to lose yourself after something like that.”

He looks at Lucien, and I can’t help the way my gaze is drawn to Vasile. I don’t find the same sympathy as Kieran has apparently felt. After I lost Vasile, I ran. I took myself away because hurting anyone else—How could I? And maybe I should be sympathetic, or empathetic, or whatever the fuck else, but…

He had his boys. He had some connection to the mate he lost. And he hurt them, abused them, and I don’t believe him. I don’t think it was because of Tamesis at all.

“But you’re here now, trying to tell me that it was justified ?” Kieran takes another slow step forward, and for once, his father shrinks back, shoulders coming up around his ears. I fancy if he shifted, he’d be showing his belly, whether his son has a wolf or not. “You’re a fucking coward. And I’ve been trying to find a reason why you’re not, but I’ve always known the truth, haven’t I? Because making sure we were ready to defend ourselves against Tamesis never even entered your mind the night I left, did it? You were ashamed that I beat you and scared that you’d lose what little power you had left, and if Drew hadn’t come in when he did, you probably would’ve killed me.”

Lucien’s the one to growl now, and Kieran shivers when Sam moves his hands.

“Get out of here,” Kieran says. “Go back to him. Go work with your mate’s murderer.”

Silver floods Darren’s eyes, and he lunges forward, stopping just short of the wards. “You little—”

“Enough,” I snarl, and the undertone of my voice has Darren looking over at me. His entire body shakes, but he doesn’t back down. “Unless you have anything more useful to tell us, you need to leave. You clearly do not have control of yourself.”

“Do you have a way to stop him?” he grinds out in reply.

Kieran opens his mouth, but I nod. “Yes. We believe so.” We can’t trust him to know our plan. If Tamesis has this kind of control so far away, then telling him Kieran will be bait… Tamesis will know. He’ll get it out of him.

“Leave,” Kieran says, and there’s no more emotion in his voice. Oh, I’m sure he’s still angry. Still hurting—because that’s the truth of it, isn’t it? But he hides it well, and I’m sure, too, that he’s able to do that because of the man standing before him.

How much did Kieran learn from his father and how much did he learn because of him? Because he needed to keep himself and his little brother safe?

Darren deflates all at once, as though he’s having the same thoughts as I am. “Kieran,” he says faintly. “I am sorry , I—”

Kieran tenses, and Lucien moves faster than any of us, is through the wards before even Vasile could hope to stop him. He grabs Kieran’s father by the throat and drags him close, lifting him so they’re eye to eye.

“You heard what he said,” he snarls, each word low and perfectly clear. “Leave. Before you lose the opportunity to do so.”

Everyone is silent for a long, tense moment before Darren nods. Lucien places him back on his feet and doesn’t move, staying between Kieran and Darren until the wolf slinks away.

Sam makes a quiet sound. He’s looking up at the window to his flat, where Drew is standing, face pale. “Are you all—Can I—”

“Go,” Kieran says. He sounds tired, and Sam glances at him once before he nods and darts up the path. Lucien still watches the shadows, shoulders tense, and angrier than I’ve ever seen him. “Lucien…”

He turns at the first sound of his name, moving back to Kieran’s side. Kieran launches himself at him, wrapping his arms tight around Lucien’s waist as he buries his face in his chest. He’s shaking, I realise, and there’s fear in his scent now that his father is gone. Fear and grief.

“Apologies, mon amour,” Lucien murmurs, “but I could not stand by and—”

“I know,” Kieran replies. He doesn’t lift his face, his voice muffled against Lucien’s chest. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Vasile sighs, rocking back on his heels. If he’s surprised by Lucien’s sudden viciousness, he doesn’t show it. He probably isn’t. Lucien attacked a hunter, after all. He may seem a tamed vampire, but when pushed far enough—

“Can you still do this?” I ask Kieran. “Can you be bait for Tamesis, knowing your father’s there?”

Kieran lifts his head, and his jaw trembles before he schools his expression into something stern and angry. “Of course I can.”

“I can take your place if not,” Vasile says, more gently than I expect. “He may know something is off, but we can work with that.”

“No,” Kieran says. He sighs, resting his cheek against Lucien’s chest again. “I’m just… He caught me off guard. I always knew he had some fucked-up reasoning for how he treated us because he had to, right? You don’t just do that. But I never thought it’d be connected to all this.”

“You are certain about this?” Lucien asks. His hand strokes up and down Kieran’s spine, gently soothing him.

They are both so dangerous, even as kind as they are. But here, like this, they are two men who hurt for each other.

“Yeah,” Kieran says. “He can’t catch me by surprise again, right? Besides, if he wasn’t lying, seems like either me or Drew will be killing Tamesis anyway.”

I huff. “Seers’ visions do not always come true.”

Kieran meets my gaze and shrugs. I get it. He’s irrevocably tied to this because of what his mother saw. Whether the outcome happens as she explained it is irrelevant. He got dragged into it the moment Tamesis walked into her shop.

“Let’s go inside,” I say. “You need to see to the others.”

It’s a few hours before Vasile and I can extract ourselves from Kieran’s pack. Drew handled the entire thing better than I thought, seeing his expression from the window, but I think that is down to the fact that Quinn did not.

He’s still pale when we leave, but he’s not shaking as much with Drew pressed up next to him. Adam and Sam are all but fighting to take the seat next to Drew, so when Vasile says he’s going to leave them to it, I follow him out of the flat.

He doesn’t acknowledge my presence as we walk down the hall. I slip into the flat behind him and quietly close the door.

“Are you all right?” I ask.

Vasile sighs. He doesn’t look at me, staring into the living room instead. He offered the flat up to Kieran earlier—there are so many of them staying in his now—but Kieran refused. I’ll talk to him again tomorrow. We don’t know how long it’ll be before we finalise our plans with regards to Tamesis. They all need to rest before then.

“No,” he says finally. “We shouldn’t let him do this.”

I frown. “What?”

Vasile turns to me, brow furrowed. “Kieran,” he says. “We shouldn’t let him be bait.”

“I don’t want it either.” I don’t. I’d rather put myself in harm’s way, but we all know Tamesis would just kill me, and what will that achieve? Kieran’s theory, that Tamesis might want more from him, is sound.

He has to know the same thing we do. It could be Kieran or Drew destined to kill him. And Tamesis might have focused on Kieran as the more likely of the two, but I don’t like his odds should he go after Adam or Sam.

Or Kieran, truth be told.

“Tamesis might kill him straight away,” Vasile says. “I know it is likely he will toy with him, but if he truly believes Kieran is the only threat to him…”

“If he believes that, then he can’t believe he can change it.”

Vasile fixes me with an incredulous look. “Of course he does,” he scoffs. “He believes he is more powerful than anyone and anything else. It is why the seer’s words enraged him so.”

“She told him that she saw nothing.”

“He was trying to figure out if I would kill him again,” Vasile replies. He is so certain, and I can’t argue with him. Vasile killed him, after all. Drained him. Broke every single rule to try to stop him.

“You’re right,” I say. “But I hate to say it—I don’t think we have a better choice.”

“I know.” Vasile shakes his head. “He’ll kill you or Moreau immediately. He’ll know something is wrong if I go to him. Kieran is right. You’re right. I just do not like it.”

His shoulders slump and I move closer, ever so careful as I take him into my arms. He melts into my embrace, and I sigh when his hands come up to land on my back.

“You have to promise me something,” he says, and I don’t like the tone of his voice.

“Vas…”

“I need you to do it.”

“Tell me first.”

“If it comes down to it, with Tamesis… You have to choose Kieran over me.”

I pull back, looking down into his face. “It won’t.”

His smile is faint. “I said if , my wolf.” His eyes search my face, and he sighs. “You’re so much better than his father. What our bond could have done to you… And he has his mate, but I think he might need you, too.”

I blink in surprise. “What?”

Vasile chuckles and rests his cheek against my chest again, not letting go of me. “You know what I mean, Deacon. He’s young, and you’ve put him in charge of his own pack. A true alpha. He needs someone to learn from. He needs you.”

“I need you.” My voice comes out rough and Vasile lifts his head in surprise. “I can’t promise you that, Vas. I can’t .”

He studies my face again, then leans up and kisses me softly. “I understand,” he says, and I’m surprised he doesn’t push the point. I can’t promise it, though, as much as I want to. What he said about Kieran makes sense. He does need guidance. We both know that if there wasn’t a threat on the horizon—even before we’d known it was Tamesis, we all knew something was out there—I’d have held off on pushing a pack on him.

But to sacrifice my mate, if push came to shove? I could never. My wolf whines and I kiss Vasile again, too hard if his sharp gasp is anything to go by.

He rests his forehead against mine when we part, both breathing hard.

“Your vampires seem to have things under control,” I say, an incredibly transparent attempt to change the subject.

Vasile laughs breathlessly, then takes my hand and pulls me through into the bedroom. “Njáll should have been crai,” he says as we pass through the doorway. “He would’ve done a much better job than I have.”

“They wanted you.”

“They wanted to tame me,” Vasile counters. “Keep an eye on me. I’m not a fool.”

“I know.” I turn him and wrap myself around him from behind. We stand next to the bed, and desire hums under my skin, but I’m happy to be here like this, too. Vasile rubs one hand over my forearm and leans back against me.

“The vampires have always worked well with or without me,” he says. “We are territorial, yes, but with few exceptions, we have always understood the necessity of forming alliances when it comes to close quarters such as this. Creating the clan just adds a level of bureaucracy to the whole thing.”

I huff. “Your vampires respect you.”

“They do,” he agrees, then falls silent. He’s thinking about something, ruminating on a decision I know he won’t share with me until he’s ready. I feel a faint tangle of emotions down the bond, but I don’t try to unpick it. Instead, I kiss the side of his neck and tighten my arms around him.

“Your wolves love you too much to lose you,” Vasile says, and I lift my head.

“What?”

He huffs a laugh. “You think they only asked you to come back because their alpha was dying?”

“That is why they asked me to come back. That’s why Chaya came to me.”

“And no one has challenged you since?”

“No one could beat me.”

Vasile laughs at that, and though I should be annoyed, I’m amused despite myself. I let go of him and he grabs me all at once, turns us and pins me to the bed.

I glare up at him, fighting a smile, and Vasile presses his lips to my forehead. His expression turns serious.

“They do love you,” he says. “It’s more than the respect I have from the other vampires. They know they can come to you and you will take care of them. And you love that, too. Looking out for them. Leading them.”

I fight the urge to squirm under his gaze. The truth of a mating bond is the complete vulnerability you hand over to another person—no one will ever know me the way Vasile does. It means he’s certain of what he’s saying, and I recognise the truth of it.

“I do,” I admit.

Vasile nods and hums, apparently still thinking something over. I’ve always been more of an open book to him than he has to me, and I try to read his face now.

He smiles. “Do not worry, lupul meu. I am not planning on leaving you. Never again.”

I flip us so he’s the one pinned to the bed and when I kiss him, he arches up against me. “You are not,” I agree. “And I don’t care what our lives look like after this. Whatever you’re planning. We’re going to survive this, and we’re going to make things work.”

“You’re not going to sacrifice what you love for me,” he says, the words coming out like an order.

I kiss him again. Kiss him until he’s panting, pushing against my hold.

“Sacrificing one love for another is not as hard a choice as you think,” I say, and his eyes widen, wonder and affection and fear pulsing down our weak bond. “I’ll do what I must to keep you safe.”

“Fine,” he says after a moment, and the word has a hint of bite to it. “Then I will do the same.”

I shouldn’t want that promise. I should be responsible. So should he.

But I kiss him anyway because, despite it all, that’s what I want to hear.