Chapter 20
Chapter
Twenty
The loud scream from one of the cave exits made my body jerk.
Next to me, Hayden rolled his eyes, and my mouth fell open.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Torin likes to make an entrance,” Hayden said and sighed.
He seemed alert but calm while my stomach knotted, and my nerves frayed. Torin was walking into a trap that would leave all of us dead, captured, or eaten.
Another scream echoed, followed by a body flying into the darkness under the bridge.
Torin stomped inside, dragging another bloody vampire guard by his collar. Then he also tossed him into the abyss. I couldn’t even hear the thud of the body hitting the ground.
“I don’t do well with a blindfold,” he said in a steady voice, searching for me.
Among the three of us—Hayden, Torin, and me—the Alpha was the only one who knew the way back up to the library entrance. I was sure that Torin had memorized his way through the maze of underground tunnels.
When Torin saw me, he scanned my body. He must have been satisfied that I hadn’t sustained any new injuries because he finally looked at the vampire master, who dashed toward the Alpha.
The vampire master’s demeanor changed entirely to submissive and obeying. He even made a small bow to Torin, and I did a double take.
“Alpha Torin.” The vampire master’s voice shook. “I’m so honored to meet you in person—”
Torin raised a hand. “I need you to shut up and release Breanna and Hayden.” In his other hand, he carried my book. He waved it and said, “You can have it once they are freed.”
The vampire master almost bowed again. “Yes, of course—”
“No,” Veronica said, and Torin frowned at her. “I know how valuable the girl is to you, and I plan to use it to my advantage.”
She had the audacity to unleash her seductive smile at the Alpha, who only seemed to grow more impassioned. Torin walked closer and halted at the beginning of the bridge.
“You’re wrong,” he said.
Veronica’s eyes flashed her wolf’s, but she only planted her feet wide, standing her ground.
“You’re mates.” She shook her head slightly as if she couldn’t understand why the Fates had paired me with Torin.
Hayden’s body tensed next to mine, and he narrowed his eyes at the Alpha but remained quiet.
“I can’t let her die under my watch since she’s the King’s daughter,” Torin said, and his gaze darted around but returned to Veronica.
He was pretending to buy himself time. I’d felt how much Torin cared for me despite his past trauma. Not that it was any excuse for his cold and hot behavior.
Torin took a few additional steps and was only a few feet away from us. What was he going to do exactly?
But then he walked to the edge of the stone bridge, and a cold chill ran through my body. He kept tossing the book—my magic book—from one hand to the other as if it were a baseball or a toy.
“Let me get this straight,” he said. “You have no intention of letting the girl go, do you? You’ll hand her over to the vampire Queen to use against the King and me or kill her. Either way, Princess Breanna won’t be walking away with me. Am I right?”
“That’s the plan.” Veronica grinned. “I didn’t expect the Alpha to be so stupid to walk into a trap.”
Torin smirked, and our gazes locked. “It’s only a trap if I didn’t know about it.”
He spoke the exact words I had when I met him in the boardroom. I held my breath, hoping Torin would not hand over my book to the traitor.
But when Torin dangled my book over the bridge, my lungs constricted.
Veronica shouted at him, “Hand over the book, Alpha. You have too much to lose over a book.”
I didn’t know how to feel about Torin playing with my and Hayden’s lives and threatening to toss my book down into the darkness. After all, Torin had come here to save us, but what would he do next?
“Why do you want the book so badly? You don’t know anything about it,” Torin said, holding the book with his arm still outstretched.
“Did you make a deal with the vampires? He gets the book, and you get…what? Me?” He tilted his head, studying Veronica carefully.
“Why did you betray me and your pack? Joining forces with our number one enemy is the lowest one can go.”
Veronica’s eyes had grown big and were firmly set on the book.
“You’re one of them, Alpha. Did you forget that?
” She finally moved her gaze to Torin. “I watched you for so long and did everything for you. I served you for years and was loyal to you. No matter how hard I tried to get your attention, you had no time for me.”
Veronica’s eyes moistened, and I had a little more sympathy for the crazy woman because I, too, knew how it felt to ask for someone’s attention only to be rejected in return.
“But now I know that your mind was occupied with”—Veronica looked at me with disgust—“that little human.” She let out a bitter laugh. “But you had me fooled, Alpha, when you rejected the princess for her cousin. For a moment, I believed the princess meant nothing to you.”
“She doesn’t mean anything to me.” Torin’s amber eyes glanced at me and averted back to Veronica. “But you’ll have to release her because I don’t wish the King’s wrath upon me.”
Veronica snorted and walked behind me. My body froze with anticipation of something terrible happening. The woman was irrational.
“Let’s test that theory,” she said.
She grasped my shoulder. Her hand partially shifted into her wolf claw, and one sharp talon punctured my flesh. I winced and took a sharp breath. Blood seeped out.
I wanted to curse her out, but chaos broke around me.
The vampire master’s eyes brightened, his nostrils flared, and his red eyes set on his prey. Me.
Another pair of crimson eyes aimed at me, too. I looked at Torin to find him shifting into his full vampire form, his gaze zeroing on my shoulder. I swallowed the dryness in my throat.
Not again.
“Enjoy your meal. She’ll be delicious,” Veronica said, but I wasn’t sure if she spoke to Torin or the vampire master.
Both vampires watched me with red, hungry eyes.
As the vampire master glided toward me, Veronica pulled a dart gun from her back and pointed it at Torin. Was Torin going to intercept the vampire master, or was Torin going to deal with Veronica before she shot him? Either way, it didn’t look good for us.
Torin tossed the book to the side on the stones and watched as Veronica picked it up, smiling.
“Now,” she shouted, and vampire guards flooded the cave from both exits.
As they sprinted toward us, I could make out the details of their guns. Tranquilizers. They wanted Torin alive but wouldn’t spare me or Hayden.
After Torin’s silver hair appeared, his vampire completely emerged and attacked the guard who first got to him. His crimson eyes glanced at me and grew more prominent as the vampire master approached me. Torin seemed torn between his thirst for me and protecting me.
Sleepy darts flew everywhere, but Torin moved fast and dodged them. Watching him fight would be mesmerizing if I didn’t have to deal with a hungry vampire master.
He wrapped his hand around my throat and pulled me into his body. He leaned in, sticking his tongue out for the first taste of my blood on my shoulder, when I delivered my favorite hit. Knee to his groin.
Then I shoved the vampire hard toward Hayden.
The vampire bent over and was about to jump back on me when Hayden trapped him with silver chains around his neck.
He only grunted as the silver burned his flesh.
The sizzling sound of burning skin mixed with the whooshing of darts and grunting of the guards.
The vampire master elbowed Hayden, who slightly released his hold but lost enough for the vampire to duck down and escape.
“I’ll deal with you after I’m done with my meal,” the vampire master spat out and stepped into my space.
My wrists were chained, and I didn’t do much damage with my legs. My chances of surviving the vampire master’s bite were slim. I looked at Torin, who was preoccupied with guards piling over him.
Not only was he busy, but he was also gone, lost in his vampire. It was a massacre. Body parts flew around him as Torin tore them apart. He’d completely given free rein to his vampire.
The vampire master’s fangs protruded, and he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “You wouldn’t mind, Princess, would you?”
But right before he sank his teeth into the crook of my neck, Torin materialized behind him.
“I do mind,” he said, grabbing the vampire by his neck.
I breathed harder until Torin sank his fangs into the other vampire. He then released him and growled. Then gore and blood splattered everywhere. Torin tossed the limp body to the side, and I couldn’t swallow the knot that had formed in my throat.
I should have been happy that Torin freed me from the vampire master, but who would free me from Torin? His nostrils flared as he scanned my shoulder.
A sleepy dart whistled past me and struck a distracted and thirsty Torin in the shoulder. He whipped his head toward the owner of the gun and bared his fangs.
Veronica’s eyes went as wide as stones. She must have never seen her Alpha so terrifying. His anger was now aimed at her.
Torin was powerful, and one dart wouldn’t bring him down, but Veronica still had many more in her gun. If Torin passed out, we wouldn’t have a guide to lead the way through the underground tunnel maze.
“Torin, break my chains,” I shouted to get his attention.
I could only hope that he’d be in control long enough to help me and not taste me.
He sent one last glare at his former personal assistant, and his sharp talon cut through my chains.
I let out a heavy sigh. “Thank you.”
When Torin broke Hayden’s chains around his hands, he said, “I’m doing this for her.”
Hayden immediately worked on breaking the chains around his ankles while his hands burned from the silver.
Veronica used our distracted state and shot at Torin two more times. I immediately pulled out the darts from Torin’s back but wasn’t fast enough.