Chapter Thirty
After I ate, played with Ash, and talked with Lucy, I took a shower and then fell into bed. Sometime later, maybe an hour, maybe five, Jared slipped into bed with me. He pulled me against his bare body, wrapped his arm around me, and murmured, “Go back to sleep, Kait. I’ve got you.”
But his body was warm and smooth, and he smelled like heaven not just to me but to my wolf. And I didn’t want to go back to sleep. I wanted my alpha.
I turned in his arms to face him, slid my arm around him, and wallowed against him for a few seconds, my lips against his throat. “It feels better than anything has ever felt,” I whispered, “to be with you.”
He was hard immediately, and I pressed my body against that hardness before sliding my hand down to wrap my fingers around him.
He sucked in a breath and let me play as I would, and neither of us said another word. I forgot about the throbbing in my shoulder, because the throbbing between my legs was so much more intense.
I lifted my mouth to his, needing to taste him. He gave me everything I needed and more, his kiss slow, deep, hot. His touch was at once gentle and firm, and because he was my wolf’s alpha, there was simply nothing better than being touched by him. Loved by him.
He would feel the same about me.
For a while, there was nothing but Jared. There was nothing but my body sliding against his, his mouth on me, his heat as he slid inside me.
I wrapped myself around him, drinking him in, holding him as tightly as I could, and I would never let him go. Not ever.
He was part of me now, and if I lost him, I would lose myself.
I just would. Right or wrong.
“I love you so much, Alpha,” I whispered, my voice lost inside his mouth.
It didn’t matter. He heard me anyway.
He pulled back, just a little. “Do you know you’re everything to me?”
I did know.
“No matter what,” I murmured. “No matter what?”
He pressed his forehead against mine. “No matter what, little wolf.” And there was a smile in his voice.
My wolf purred, and I melted.
Eventually I slept, sticky and overheated, happy and secure in the arms of the love of my life.
When I woke up, it was just before noon and Jared was gone. But his text was the first thing I saw when I looked at my phone.
I will never leave you. Not forever.
I texted back before I even left my bed. I promise the same.
Zach was waiting downstairs when I followed my nose to the kitchen, where Lucy would always have food waiting for a ravenous wolf.
“Everything quiet?” I asked him, pouring a cup of coffee.
“Yeah.” He tossed Ash a small piece of meat. “Remy’s outside with a couple of Jared’s wolves. He tried to get one of them to fight him earlier.”
“He’s bored. Neither of you have to babysit me, you know. I can still kick ass when I need to.”
He grinned. “Lucy left you a plate on the stove. She and Sam went into town. Joe told me about the ghost you trapped before he went to sleep.”
I carried my heavy plate to the table and sat across from him. “Did he tell you the ghost was a vampire?”
He stared. “You’re not serious.”
I unconsciously rubbed my shoulder, and his eyes tracked the movement. “Vampire ghost,” I murmured. “The only one I’ve ever seen. I need to tell Bastien.”
He leaned forward, his hair sliding over the side of his face. “He bit you,” he said flatly. “Kait, did he bite you?”
I swallowed hard, unsure why I was so reluctant to admit that to him. To anyone, other than Joe. I hadn’t even told Jared. “Yes.”
“Can I see?”
“There’s nothing to see. It didn’t leave a mark. He was a fucking ghost.” My laugh just sounded bitter. “Daywalker bite on the back, vampire ghost bite on the front.”
“You felt him,” he said. Zach was a vampire hunter from way back. He’d grown up in a family of vampire hunters. After he was taken by Frederick Axton and held captive long enough to fuck up his head and nearly kill him, he’d declined to get back in touch with his people once he was free.
It wasn’t my business.
I yanked down the neck of my T-shirt. “Have a look if you want.”
He didn’t hesitate. First he ran his fingers over the back of my shoulder. “The daywalker bite scarred,” he murmured. “Even though you’re a wolf and should have healed it.”
I nodded. “It aches sometimes. Like he left something bad in there. Sometimes I think I should have Doc Hayes take a scalpel to it and see if he can dig anything out.”
His fingers were gentle as he traced the scars. There was no pain. Then he moved his hand over my shoulder and to the front, peering intently at the spot where the ghost had sunk his fangs into my flesh.
“Does it hurt?” he asked.
“Not as badly as it did,” I told him, “but yeah. I still feel some discomfort.”
Ash watched us intently, wagging his tail when I looked at him. “Good baby,” I said. Then to Zach, “You can’t see anything?”
“No. But I can feel something.” His fingers were soothing as he stroked the invisible wound, his brow furrowed.
I said nothing more, because obviously Zach was lost in his thoughts and in the feeling of the injuries, and I was a little curious.
His touch became a little firmer as he impatiently pulled the neck of my shirt out of his way, then began wiping at my skin like he was taking a squeegee to shower doors.
Eventually I stretched my shirt enough to take my entire arm out, giving him access to my shoulder without the fabric getting in the way. And when I looked up at him, there was something in his eyes I’d never seen before. I didn’t know what it was, but it looked like Zach wasn’t in there anymore.
His stare was distant, almost blank, and a fine sheen of sweat covered his face. He was exerting himself, but not his body. Not his muscles.
His magic.
I closed my eyes as I remembered something about Zach. Frederick Axton had said that Zach had the mad seer Kaloni’s magic inside him. That was one reason he’d wanted Zach back so desperately.
I’d believed that bad magic had dissipated with the vampire master’s death. His spark was surely needed to keep it alive.
Wasn’t it?
I wanted to ask him what he was doing with those bites, but I kept my silence and let him work. Chances were good that not even he knew what he was doing. I’d gotten the sense that he was working entirely on instinct and something not-so-natural inside him.
He was drawn to bad vampire magic, but I wasn’t pointing that out. He’d been through enough.
I stared down at my plate of food, thinking about eating while he worked, and just when I reached out to pick up a fat French fry, the slight pain and throbbing of the injury began to change.
I frowned and forgot about the food, a little nervous. “Zach? What’s happening?”
He didn’t respond. I didn’t think he even heard me.
It was like the two wounds inside me had begun to heat and melt beneath Zach’s hands, and they drilled deep through my shoulder to reach each other. They joined, and when they did, I felt it.
I didn’t like it, but I trusted Zach. Even if he didn’t consciously know what he was doing or why, I trusted him. He wouldn’t do anything he thought might harm me.
The bites joined together and then they began to slide through me. Down my chest, my arms, my abdomen. Up my throat, into my face, my head.
Maybe they were being diluted. Maybe he would press them right on out of my body.
I heard a car arriving, and then the front door opened and footsteps headed toward the kitchen. No matter who it was, they knew someone was always in the kitchen.
Rick walked in and saw me sitting there with Zach massaging my shoulder, and he didn’t bat an eye. He poured himself a cup of coffee, then came to sit at the table.
“What’s happening?” he asked.
“I got bitten by a ghost last night. I think he’s…” I hesitated. “I’m not sure.”
I felt like someone had attached electrodes and was sending tiny shocks through my entire body. The zaps weren’t painful, but they were distracting.
“You look pale,” Rick said. “And your eyes are jumpy.” He frowned up at Zach. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
Zach didn’t answer. His focus was complete.
“Do you need me to stop him?” Rick asked.
“No,” I told him. “Do you want some late lunch?”
He shook his head. “I ate a couple hours ago.”
“Then just sit there and drink your coffee and let me look at you.”
Honestly, I hadn’t meant to say that last bit, but sometimes my mouth got away from me and caused all sorts of trouble.
Rick’s eyes twinkled, and he hid his smile behind his coffee cup.
And he sat there and let me look at him. It was a satisfying way to pass the time and did go a long way toward taking my mind off the strange zaps shooting through my body.
Did Zach know what he was doing?
I really hoped so. I didn’t want any part of Frederick Axton inside me.
Rick was dressed in a suit, his badge clipped to his belt, his gun hidden beneath his jacket. He still looked a little tired, with the faintest dark smudges beneath his eyes. His dark hair had grown a little longer than usual, but it suited him.
He stretched his legs out and slid down a little in his seat, and as he watched me watching him, his eyes grew heavily lidded and the nearly always-present tension in his face slipped away.
Without thinking about it, I pushed my plate out of the way and moved my hand nearer him, palm up. He laced his fingers with mine, and we sat with that quiet, undeniable connection, with the heavy realization that things had changed between us.
He stroked my palm with his thumb and I shivered, licking away the sudden dryness of my lips. His stare fell to my mouth, and I was sure he was thinking about how I’d tasted. The same thing I was thinking about him.
My face heated. Actually, my entire body heated. The zaps Zach was creating inside me only added to a sexual tension that seemed to grow more intense every time we were together.
I wasn’t ready for it when the zaps became explosions, and I stiffened in my chair, crying out, jerking away from Zach’s hands.
Rick was on his feet immediately, grasping my shoulders and narrowing his eyes at Zach. I didn’t even remember standing.
“It’s okay,” Zach said, but his voice was thick and sounded nothing like him. “It’s okay now.”
I turned to face him. “What is, Zach? What did you do?”
He shook his head, rubbing his hands on his clothes. “I’m not exactly sure. I just…I knew I needed to do it.”
“Do what?” Rick asked.
Zach looked at his hands, and finally, his eyes cleared. “There was magic inside me. It’s in you now. It’s…” He shrugged, looking for the words. “It’s bossing around the daywalker and ghost bites. Changing them into something good for you.”
I began to tremble. “Zach,” I murmured. “The magic from the bites—and from you—belongs to me now?”
I realized I’d rather have bad magic inside me than no magic at all.
But that was something I’d never admit to anyone.
“Yeah,” he said. “I feel free. Light.” Then he seemed to realize he’d somehow transferred something potentially awful into me, and he paled. “Kait, I hope—”
“I can handle it,” I said, my voice stronger. “Once upon a time, I absorbed magic. I thought that was gone. But…maybe it’s not all gone.”
Rick helped me put my arm back into my shirt. “You’re okay with this, Kait?”
I was more than okay. I was jumping out of my skin with excitement. I was thrilled. I had magic. I could feel it inside me, clawing at my insides like an eager cat. I wasn’t sure how to use it, but I knew one thing for certain.
Like all magic, it would come out when I needed it to come out.
Just like my psycho, my blood magic, my shapeshifter.
Magic left inside Zach from the former county vampire master had mixed with the distorted magic from a daywalker and the unheard-of magic from a vampire ghost, and I was nearly certain that strange recipe had created a magic no one had ever had before.
I needed my blade, because that was the missing piece. The demon piece.
Or was the demon piece already inside me?
Anika believed so. She’d felt it.
But I felt like I needed the blade to direct and expel the magic, like a witch’s wand.
“I feel like I’m getting back to normal,” I said, even though that wasn’t exactly what I felt like. I felt like I was getting something abnormal, and damn me, but I liked it.
I walked to Zach and despite the fact that he wasn’t a touchy-feely kind of person, he leaned into my hug. “Thank you, Zach.”
“I think I did something wrong,” he murmured against my ear, “but I couldn’t seem to help it. I hope it doesn’t hurt you.”
“You didn’t even know it was in there,” I replied, then realized immediately that I was wrong. He’d known something was inside him, though he likely hadn’t known he could somehow shove it into my overly eager and accepting body. But I was the sponge, regardless of what Anika had sucked out.
I was still a sponge.
Not quite as absorbent and maybe a little worn out, but still.
And now I’d have a little something extra with me when I returned to the council the next night. Something extra to help me fight the demon elder and get my blade back. He’d fight fair, whatever that might mean, because the council had “rules.”
It occurred to me that maybe he wouldn’t even be there to fight. That he would have taken my blade and fled, knowing that was the only way to keep it out of my hands forever.
He might also pull me into hell with him, especially if the council asked him to. Maybe they no longer wanted me in their hair.
But I wouldn’t think about that.
“How is Emma?” I asked Rick as I finally began eating my dinner.
“She’s healing,” he said. “She has a long way to go, but it turns out that she has a sister and two brothers. They’re happy to reconnect.
All of them knew something was wrong in that marriage, but then Lee moved Emma away and…
” He shrugged. “Emma’s sister has already arrived in town. She’s taking care of Emma’s cat.”
“I’m glad,” I said. “And Lee Shope?”
“He’ll be going away for a long time if he doesn’t kill himself first.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “He’s suddenly suicidal?”
“He claims Emma was all he had to live for. He’s on suicide watch.”
“I hope he finds a way. I don’t think Emma will ever stop looking over her shoulder, not as long as he’s alive.”
“I have to get to work,” he said. He lingered, though, watching me. Finally, he murmured, “You look different, somehow.”
Deep inside me, the new magic mixed with the old, and I smiled.
Because maybe I felt a little different, too.