Chapter 8 Kayla #3
They stopped about ten feet away, but even that distance wasn’t enough to make me relax, and Sebastian didn’t relax, either. I’d never known him so tense. He was like a tautly drawn bow.
Even his face was tight with the tension of the situation, his jaw set, but he didn’t speak. He just looked at the men, his eyes burning like two fiery coals.
“We’re looking for the new king.” The one who spoke was gruff, his voice like stones scraping against each other.
“I’m regent for New Orleans in the king’s stead. I’m his brother,” Sebastian said in reply, his tone calm and confident, even if his stance didn’t change from defensive. “If there’s an issue in the city you need addressed or solved, you can make an appointment with my office, and we’ll talk.”
The danger didn’t dissipate, despite Sebastian’s reasonableness. The air was thick with malintent and threat, and my breaths were shallow. I tried not to move. I didn’t want to draw any more attention to myself than was necessary.
I’d always been under Francois’s protection before, but perhaps Sebastian’s protection didn’t mean the same to these guys.
My humanity was a weakness I’d never had to consider before.
Nevertheless, I was human, vulnerable here—even more so because of Naomi’s failed spell—and that fact hadn’t escaped me.
The one who’d spoken before laughed loudly. “New Orleans will never accept the Baton Rouge king. You have no position here, no power. Your brother needs to stop overreaching, and you need to go home.”
Sebastian hissed quietly, and I flinched at the sudden sound, but his fingers found the hem of my dress, and he stroked against the back of my thigh softly. The touch was a calming one rather than an arousing one, and I relaxed against him a little, trusting him that I’d be all right.
One of the other vampires stepped forward. “Yeah. New Orleans should have a New Orleans king to lead us. Go home.” He spat the last words.
But Sebastian merely chuckled. “You must be very young vampires to think in such a territorial fashion. The best vampire to be king is the one currently in the position.”
He sounded both scathing and pitying, and I flinched. The tone wouldn’t go over well.
“I’ll discuss this further with you if you make an appointment,” Sebastian continued. “Have a good evening, gentlemen.”
His words were a clear dismissal, but the vampires didn’t back away or turn around.
Instead, they growled and the one who seemed to be the leader launched forward.
Their fingernails had become claws, and their faces were those of monsters.
Sebastian acted fast, shoving me out of the way, to the side of him, and leaping forward to meet the attack.
My heart hammered against my ribs as I leaned against the brick wall, my fingernails gripping the rough edge behind me, and I couldn’t draw a breath fast enough.
The blurred movement was difficult to see in the dark, but there were two loud cracks followed by thuds, and two vampire bodies suddenly littered the ground in front of me.
I craned my neck to see better, but I was suddenly whirled away, and the scent of decay and copper blood surrounded me, as arms gripped me across my chest like a vise, my back resting against a wall of muscle.
I squeaked my panic, and every spell I’d ever known rushed from my mind as fast as the breath left my lungs.
Sebastian turned around at the noise I made, and his eyes widened.
He held his hands out placatingly. “Look, just let her go. You can have anything you want. I’m the regent.
I can offer you property, money, power. A position in the new regime?
” His tone was less reasonable now, and there was an edge of panic that hadn’t been there before.
He’d spoken fast, almost like his words were without thought.
The vampire holding me took a breath, but it was shaky.
I glanced up at him, moving my head slowly until I could see him, and his eyes were wide and round, his lips slightly parted.
I’d never seen a vampire be afraid, but his boss was dead on the floor in front of him, and the man talking to him could kill him as quickly as look at him.
Before I could take in any more about the situation, he shoved me roughly away, and I landed hard against the cement. He leapt over me, but before both of his boots hit the ground, he fell forward, his head rolling in a separate direction than his body.
An ache echoed through me from my knees to my elbows, and I groaned.
“Kayla.” I was lifted quickly from the ground and cradled against Sebastian’s chest as he brushed the hair back from my face and examined me with his gaze. “Are you hurt? Did he hurt you? Are you okay? I need to get you home.”
Usually, his thoughts were more structured and ordered than this, but he asked rapid-fire questions and left no room for me to reply.
He lowered me slowly to the ground. “I need to call Kyle and Andrews to come pick us up. We need to get back to the house.” He drew me against him as he made his two phone calls, and my breathing steadied as my legs stopped shaking.
Kyle arrived first, seeming to detach from the shadows like they were part of him or he was part of them.
He surveyed the vampires on the ground. “What happened?”
“We were attacked.” Sebastian bit out the words.
“You didn’t come off worse, though.”
I almost laughed at Kyle’s casual tone. There was a note of disrespect in his voice, and it spoke of the relationship between him and Sebastian. Moments later, Sebastian’s car drew up at the curb and Sebastian took my hand to start leading me toward it. He glanced over his shoulder at Kyle.
“I need to get Kayla back to the house and safe. I know this is usually Jason’s territory, but can you handle clean-up then meet me later for a debrief?”
Kyle grunted acknowledgment, and I shuddered.
Clean-ups were probably handled regularly on the New Orleans streets, but I never wanted to know any more than that.
It certainly was never anything Francois had involved me in.
I slipped into the back seat and shuffled over, and we rode back to the house in silence, our evening meal… No…our date ruined.