Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
“Still got your guard dog?” Mike shouted the minute he saw Nicole step onto the wooden porch.
Keenan locked his back teeth. The human had been given every chance, but still he sought death. Humans . Didn’t they understand it really was all about free will?
Mike could have walked away instead of coming straight for death.
“You gonna hide behind him again this time?” Mike stalked closer, and then his left hand came up—a hand holding a gun. “Do it. Because I want to see just how strong that bastard is.”
Keenan rolled his shoulders, but Nicole jumped in front of him. “My fight,” she whispered to him, then she raised her voice and called out to Mike, “This is your last chance. I don’t want to kill you!”
“I want to kill you, bitch! I want to slice your throat open, rip out your heart, cut the skin right off?—”
“ I don’t want to, ” Nicole yelled over his threats. “But I will.” Absolute certainty. Then, voice dropping, turning mean and cold, she said, “Just like I killed your brother.”
The five men on the motorcycles behind Mike didn’t move. Mike’s face hardened, twisting with hate.
“This time, I’m the one who’s winning.” Mike aimed the gun at Nicole. “Ready to die, vamp?”
“You mean again? ” Nicole asked.
Keenan knew that even during the day, bullets wouldn’t kill her.
She stalked toward Mike. The thud of her footsteps seemed to echo as she headed down the front stoop. “No, I’m not particularly ready to?—”
He shot her.
She’d dodged to the side, so the bullet missed her chest, but Keenan heard it thud as the bullet went into her shoulder. She trembled a bit and slid back a step. But then she shook her head. “Try again.”
Keenan’s admiration for her kicked up a notch.
She glanced back, and her gaze met Keenan’s for an instant. “Stay back. It’s my fight.”
The others didn’t get off their bikes. Didn’t make a move for their weapons. Maybe they were just there to watch the show.
He’d be sure to give them a real fine show.
Her blood was dripping on the ground.
Did she really think he was just going to stand back and watch?
His fingers began to shake, so he balled them into fists. The wind kicked up and blew against his face.
“You’re weak!” Mike snarled, that gun still up. “Can’t take much more of this before you go down.” He fired again. Missed her. Aimed. Fired.
Hit.
This one grazed her arm. Slowed her a bit. More blood flowed. She was halfway to her target.
Mike smiled. “ Now! ”
Then his buddies stopped watching. Their hands dove into their satchels, and they all came up with bottles.
“Burn the bitch!” Mike ordered.
They started throwing the bottles right at Nicole. She swatted them away. More bottles flew, some with burning rags in them.
No!
Not just her fight— theirs.
Keenan flew off the porch. He grabbed her in his arms and turned so that when the Molotov cocktails hit, they crashed into his back. The bottles rained down and a fire sprang at their feet.
Nicole screamed, and he saw the fire eating at her shirt.
The hunters had been prepared this time.
“Special brew, bitch! Something I picked up from a voodoo shop down here! Something to burn a vamp right to ash!”
Keenan held her tightly and raced forward. He shoved through the fire that circled them. Once they made it past that line of flames, they crashed onto the ground. The fire was on him, eating at his skin, but he barely felt the pain.
Not like when I fell. Nothing would be like that fire.
He rolled Nicole and slapped at the flames on her clothes. She was crying. Thick tears rolled down her cheeks. Angry red blisters were all over her.
But his skin was already healing.
“It’s okay,” he rumbled, the rage making his voice lethal. “I’ve got them.” He’d always known some humans deserved death. Deserved to scream and beg for mercy.
He wouldn’t give mercy this time.
He kissed her cheek. Tasted her tears. The scent of blood and fire filled his nose. “Nicole?” Fear had his gut clenching.
But she nodded. “I-I’m okay.” Bleeding, burning, but alive.
Until the next attack. With Az breathing down her neck, she wouldn’t survive many more hunter attacks. And the bastards were laughing as she bled and ached.
“I’ll kill them for you.” A simple promise. Right, wrong. It didn’t matter anymore. He brushed a shaking fingertip over her cheek. “ I’ll kill them. ” He was on his feet. He ran toward Mike and the bastards with him.
Mike and his men were already on their motorcycles and revving their engines. Trying to get away.
Mike’s motorcycle flew away in a hail of gravel. Two others followed him.
No, they wouldn’t get away.
Keenan lunged forward and caught one bastard around the neck and yanked him off the bike. Seconds later, the man’s head—minus helmet—slammed into the ground.
Keenan jumped on the bike. He locked his hands around the handlebars and leaned in low as the motorcycle leapt forward. You’re not escaping. He’d hunt the bastards down. He’d take them out.
Nicole would be safe.
The roar of his rage was the only sound he heard.
Death.
“ Keenan, no! ” Nicole was on her feet, her arm throbbing, her side aching, her clothes— still smoking —and she shouted as loudly as she could.
But Keenan didn’t stop.
She knew he wouldn’t, not until...
I’ll kill them for you.
Was this really what she’d done? Turned an angel into an assassin?
Her breath hissed out at the pain as she hurried to the man on the ground. She needed blood. She’d have to take his. Donating was the least the guy could do for her considering he’d tried to burn her alive.
She dropped to her knees, reached for him, and realized, too late, that he was dead.
His horror-filled eyes stared up at her. His mouth was wide open while his face was frozen in a mask of pain and terror.
Her hands ran over him. No broken neck. No broken bones at all. No wounds, no blood, nothing. But still very, very dead.
As she stared at him, trying to understand what had happened, a new scent teased her nose. Wild, musky, like an animal.
“You really are just a baby to this game, aren’t you?” A male voice asked, one with a hint of Mexico purring beneath the words. “Querida, you don’t even know what I am, do you?”
Slowly, carefully, she turned her head to the right. A man walked from the woods. His shoulders were pushed back, his pace slow and steady, and a wide grin stretched across his handsome face.
Dark hair. Dark eyes. Square jaw. Cruel lips.
A face she’d seen before.
Mexico. Carlos.
Prey that had become hunter. Nicole jumped to her feet and felt the lash of pain sweep over her. “What are you doing here?” Dumb question. Like the others, he was there to kill her. Because of what she was.
His smile widened even as his gaze raked her. “That looks like it hurts.”
It did. She wouldn’t stop hurting until she drank and healed.
“Off to stop them, isn’t he? Off to kill them, for you.”
She needed a weapon stronger than her claws. “I wasn’t going to hurt you that night. I was just?—”
“Thirsty.” He smiled, and his teeth looked far too sharp to be human.
Vampire? No, a vamp wouldn’t care if she got a little hungry.
He lifted his hand and his claws were out. Not sharpened, razor-sharp fingernails like she had but actual, real claws. The kind an animal would have.
Oh, shit.
That scent, the claws—dammit.
“Figuring it out, eh? Took you long enough.” He sauntered closer.
Weapon! The fire sputtered on the ground but there was a broken bottle nearby. She grabbed it and held the jagged glass toward him. Glass had worked for her once before.
“Did you think that since you’re undead, you’re at the top of the food chain now?” His teeth snapped together. “Not even close.”
“You’re a shifter.” She should have realized that fact sooner. But she’d been so hungry in Mexico. She’d noticed his scent was off, but, hell, bad mistake. Nicole knew she should have paid far more attention when she first met Carlos. The hunger had blinded her.
“Um. Guess I am.” He shrugged. “That glass isn’t going to hurt me. Unlike you, I’m not weak during the day.” His dark gaze dropped to her neck. “If I wanted, I could rip out your throat right now.”
As weak as she felt, that might be a possibility.
Ten days. Nine, eight—who knew what was left?
Her nostrils flared. Was that the scent of flowers in the air? Did the smell come from the woods or from a watching angel?
Time’s counting down.
“But I don’t want to kill you. Not yet, anyway.” Carlos leapt at her. He grabbed the broken bottle and yanked it from her hands. He hauled her close to him, and the slam of his body against her burned flesh had her screaming in agonized pain. He caught her hair and wrenched her head back. “I fucking hate vamps!”
Who didn’t? She bit her lip to hold back another cry.
“You’re a screamer. Ah, I like that.” His claws slipped down her cheek. “Before we’re done, I’ll make sure you scream plenty.”
Her own claws were lengthening as the rage and fear built. Her fangs burned and if she had the chance, she’d?—
“What?” He wrenched back her head. “You want my throat?”
Yes.
“You wanted it that night in Mexico, too, didn’t you?”
She’d wanted blood. “Not like I can stop the thirst,” she rasped.
His brows lowered. “No, I don’t guess you can.” He shrugged. “You still smell fresh, not like the decomposing piles of shit vamps usually are.”
Well, great for her.
“Didn’t introduce myself formally before,” he murmured and finally lifted those rip-me-open claws away from her. “Name’s Carlos Guerro.”
“I don’t care who you are!”
“No, you never did. That was part of the problem.” The faint lines around his eyes tightened. “You just wanted to drain me.”
She swallowed. The pain was making her nauseous and the throbs from the blisters wouldn’t stop. “He’ll be back,” she whispered. Keenan hadn’t deserted her. She’d seen the fierce rage in him. He’d gone after the hunters, but he’d be back.
“Good.” His smile flashed once more. “I’m rather counting on that, querida .”
Keenan’s entire focus centered on the hunter, Mike. Keenan’s motorcycle sped up as the bike ate up the road. He drove faster, faster.
As the group roared down the road, two of the men lost control of their bikes. They crashed and their rides slid right off the road.
Mike didn’t slow at the crash. Just revved his engine, and drove faster.
But not fast enough.
Keenan had the bastard’s scent. Fear and fury and fire. Mike wouldn’t get away.
Keenan could still see Nicole’s tears.
His front wheel pushed into Mike’s bike. With a scream of metal, the hunter’s motorcycle flipped and sent that jerk flying through the air.
Mike’s two surviving men kept racing away. Keenan didn’t go after them. He’d get to them later.
The fire of his vision centered only on Mike. On the man who was scrambling across the road, moving like a crab and laughing as blood poured from his nose.
“Bitch is dead!”
Keenan’s fists were at his sides. “She didn’t plan to kill your brother. Another vampire forced her to attack him.” If this Mike was really a vampire hunter, he would know all about mind control and compulsions.
Mike lifted his gun. Aimed and fired. Over and over.
The bullets tore right through his body, but Keenan didn’t so much as flinch.
“What the fuck?”
“She gave you the chance to walk away.” Everything around him was red. The fury nearly blinded him. “Then you came back, and you burned her. ” He shook his head. “It’s ending. You’re not hurting her again, you’re not?—”
Mike’s laughter stopped him.
“You left her.” Mike spat blood and what looked like a tooth onto the ground. “You fool. You did just what he said.”
The wind seemed to chill. “Who? Who said?”
More laughter. “Left her. She’ll be dead before you get back.”
No, her attackers had been gone. She’d still been conscious, and he’d stopped the fire. She’d said... I-I’m okay.
The breath burned in his lungs.
She’d been alive, and he’d left her. The fury had been so strong and the need to punish had been driving him to kill.
“Bitch will suffer!”
His breath heaving out, Keenan stalked across the road. “No, she won’t.”
“She is!” Mike’s wild laughter tossed on the wind that shouldn’t be there. “She’s suffering now.” His lips were curved wide, showing that bloody grin. “Justice.”
Keenan shook his head. Bull. No one was left to hurt Nicole. She was?—
“He said you’d leave her.”
“He?” Get back to Nicole. The whisper filled in his mind and had his body tensing.
“He’ll kill her.” Mike’s laughter choked in his chest. “When you find her, the vamp will be ripped open.”
Keenan lunged forward and grabbed Mike, yanking him up. “Who? Who’s after her?”
Mike’s eyes widened. His breath rasped. Pain and fear tightened his face. “W-wings,”
And he died.
He just died. Right then. Right there.
Keenan stared down at his hands. Hands that had grabbed Mike.
One touch.
Death.
Keenan’s hands lifted. Mike’s body dropped to the ground, as hard as stone. Frozen in death. Sam had been right. All the powers were coming back, and Keenan had just gotten the power he’d dreaded the most.
“No.” Keenan stumbled back and then stared up at the perfect blue sky. “ No! ”
If his touch could kill, then he couldn’t touch Nicole again. Couldn’t ever touch her.
The vamp will be ripped open.
He couldn’t let her die. Keenan shoved back the rage and trapped it deep inside his body. He spun and ran back for the motorcycle. The wounds from the gunshots were already healing. No mortal weapon would ever slow him down for long.
He’d stop whoever was after Nicole. Stop him, kill him—with a touch.
Because the angel of death was back.
He could almost feel the beat of his wings as he raced down the highway.
When Sam came upon the battered motorcycles on the old highway, he smiled. And knew that his plan was working.
He braked his truck—he rather enjoyed that truck—and climbed out to survey the wreckage. Two men, still alive. Groaning and twitching on the ground. One man…
Sam walked closer, his booted feet thudding on the concrete.
One dead.
Sam’s head cocked as he crouched and studied the body. Big Mike. A semi-legend in vampire-killing circles. Mike and his brother Jeff had followed the motto that the only good vamp was a dead one. So they’d staked every vamp they could find.
At least, they had until Jeff had gotten good and drunk one night and let a sweet little newbie vamp with a good ass and a bad bite get too close.
The urge to fuck could blind even the smartest hunters.
Sam’s gaze tracked over the dead man. No wound that he could see. Not on the outside, anyway. But if Big Mike had died the way Sam suspected, the marks would be on the inside.
Smiling, Sam rose. So the Fallen had come into more of his old powers. Good. Keenan would probably be afraid now. Worried that he’d kill every person he touched.
Sam sauntered back to his truck.
Keenan should be afraid. Very afraid.
That was why Keenan would be so glad to see him. Ah, yes, the Fallen was just where Sam wanted him to be.
My game, my rules.
“ Nicole! ” Keenan yelled her name as he jumped from the motorcycle. Smoke rose, curling in the air above the dying fire. Blood stained the ground, but Nicole wasn’t there.
“ Nicole! ” His voice thundered out as he ran up the porch steps. Maybe she was inside. Maybe Mike had just been messing with his head.
Yes, she was inside. Probably cleaning her wounds or getting ready to rip into him for leaving her behind. She was inside. She had to be.
Two minutes later, he realized she was gone. All that remained was an empty house and a blood trail that led to the woods.
He stared at those woods. Had she gone chasing someone? He sucked in a breath and ran into the brush as he tried to follow the light spray of blood that he saw on the ground. He shouted her name as he ran, afraid that he’d be too late.
Stay away from her, Az.
He hadn’t fallen just to lose her.
The woods cleared up ahead. An old, red dirt road cut through the trees. Fresh tire tracks had marked the dirt.
The blood trail disappeared.
Gone.
No, not gone. Taken.
And he’d killed the one man who could lead him to her. Mike had told him... He’ll kill her.
Who the hell was “he”?
Nicole was strong. She wouldn’t be easy prey. But she’d been bleeding and covered in blisters and burns. His head tilted back as he glared up at the blue sky. The sunlight would work against her.
If she could just survive until night. Until he found her.
Stay alive.
Because if she died, there would be hell to pay.
He whirled and began running back to the house. Mike might be dead, but two of those bastards in his gang had survived. Keenan would find them and they would talk—or they’d die, too.
His legs pumped as he ran faster, and the trees passed him in a blur.
Is she hurting?
He burst out of the woods—and found Sam lounging against the side of a shiny black pickup truck.
Sam lifted a brow when he saw Keenan. “Everything okay?”
He didn’t hesitate. He ran right for Sam. The death touch never worked on anyone with pure angel blood. So when he drove his fist into Sam’s stomach, he didn’t worry about killing the bastard. It would take a lot more than a punch to kill Sam, but the jerk could be killed.
Sam took the punch and didn’t even flinch. “Ah, good to see you, too, Keenan.”
Keenan grabbed Sam’s shirt. “Where is she?”
Sam blinked at that question. “Uh, which she?”
His back teeth ground together. “Nicole.”
“Oh, yes. Your little vamp.” Now his brows lowered as his gaze darted toward the house. “I thought she was inside.”
“No.” If Sam didn’t know where she was, Keenan was wasting his time. He thrust Sam away and jumped on the motorcycle.
But Sam was there beside him, moving with his enhanced speed. A speed that hadn’t returned fully to Keenan, not yet.
“You’ve got the touch back, don’t you?” Sam asked and he was smiling.
Keenan revved the engine.
“I saw the little playdate you had with Big Mike out on the road.” Sam’s appreciative whistle rose even over the howl of the motorcycle. “Playing rough, are you?”
Big Mike.
His head turned, slowly, and red began to flicker over his vision once more. “How did you know I was out here?”
Sam shrugged. His gaze didn’t waver. “I knew the minute you bought this place. Little happens in New Orleans that I don’t know about.”
Time seemed to slow down. No—maybe he just moved real fast. Because in the next second, the motorcycle was on the ground and he had his hands around Sam’s throat.
Sam was still smiling. “Getting your speed back, too.”
“ Little happens that you don’t know about? ” His voice was a growl, all he could manage with the fury choking him. “You knew Big Mike, you knew where I was hiding with Nicole—you knew it all! Dammit, where is she? ”
“Easy.” Sam wasn’t fighting back, yet. “I don’t?—”
“It was a trap! They came at her with bullets and fire while she was weak. When I went after them?—”
Sam knocked his hands away. “You shouldn’t have left your girl. You never leave her behind, not if you?—”
“They tried to kill her! They weren’t getting away!”
Sam nodded. “Still don’t have control, do you? I thought that after six months, maybe you’d be used to the emotions by now.” He rocked back on his heels. “Guess not.”
“Where is she?”
Sam stabbed a finger in Keenan’s chest. “Get control. Emotions are shit. They screw with your head. Fear. Anger. Need. Lust. Humans are born with those feelings, and they still drive them crazy. What do you think they do to beings who’ve been without them for centuries?”
They tear me apart.
Like Nicole’s captor was tearing her apart?
The wind whipped against his face.
“Control,” Sam snapped out. “If you lose it, you’ll be no good to her.”
“I have to find her!”
“Then let me help you.” Sam’s voice seemed so sincere. Sam was very good at controlling his image, Keenan understood that. “I know where Mike’s men would run. I can show you where they went to lick their wounds.”
“If she dies…”
“That will really suck, won’t it? You fell to save her, and those bastards up there still take her from you.” Sam’s voice thickened. “It’s about time someone showed those assholes that they aren’t the only game in town. About time they realized even precious angels can suffer.”
Keenan swallowed his rage. Control. “Take me to his men.”
“You’ll owe me if I do,” Sam said, his eyes watchful.
“Take. Me. To. Them.”
“Then I guess we have a deal.” Sam held out his hand. “I was coming out here to say I’d have your back, that you could count on me.” He still sounded so sincere, but Sam’s eyes showed no emotion. “I never expected to find this .”
Keenan couldn’t believe him.
Sam’s offered hand didn’t drop. “Do we have a deal? I’ll help you, and when the time comes, you help me.”
Help you do what? Did it matter? He grabbed Sam’s hand. “Deal.”
The scent of brimstone teased his nose.
“Then let’s go find those hunters.” Sam’s smile was evil. “And make them beg to tell us everything they know.”
Keenan nodded and finally realized just how far he had fallen.
Because the brimstone scent wasn’t coming from Sam.
It’s coming from me.