Blood Bath, A Paranormal/Urban Fantasy (The Maurin Kincaide Series Book 4) (29 page)

She fisted her hand in my hair, yanking my head back. Her fangs tore into the base of my neck.
I bucked, pulled her hair and tried to flip her over my shoulder but she held on.

Too afraid the Retaliator's blade would snap, I gave up using the melee weapon. I clawed at her eye, pressing with my fingertips until I felt the
m slide behind the soft tissue.

She continued to maul my neck until I ripped out her right eye. Bathory unlatched her fangs but
stayed firmly attached to my back. Her right hand connected with my jaw and I heard something pop. It was definitely dislocated.

I didn't have the time or energy to heal it. My face was swollen, my neck shredded and I had a serious laceration on my stomach
from a blade that inflicted mortal wounds. I was knocking on death's door. If I didn't do something quick, death would answer.

I tried to spindled enough of the between to jump us back to the spot where she had appeared, back to
where I left Mason at the vamp house. Bathory felt my pull on the veil and slammed her fist into the base of my skull.

I went down, face first. She got up, flipped me over and dragged
me by the ankles like a rag doll to the center of her circle. She dug her toes into the gash in my abdomen. I would have screamed if my jaw worked. I clamped my hand on her calf, in a futile attempt to keep her from smashing my intestines.

She slowly wig
gled her toes out of my insides and sat on my pelvis. Under her full weight I felt something dig into my back. I still had a small stake on my belt. I slid my hand around and tried to work it free. Bathory clawed at my chest. Her fingernails pressing around my heart. She was knuckle deep in my flesh by the time I unfastened the stake from its holster. This was it. I had one stake, one chance to kill her. My heart pounded and I imagined it bumping against the tips of her fingers as they pried through my rib cage.

I aimed for her heart and drove the rowan wood into her chest. She swatted my hand away, snapping the stake b
efore I could pierce her heart. The splintered wood punctured her lung. It wouldn't kill her but it was enough to incapacitate her. Paralyzed, she collapsed on top of me.

It would have been so easy under the dead weight of the vampire to give up and let death claim me. I needed to move before I passed out.

I fought the blackness at the edge of my vision and pushed Bathory off. I rolled her onto her back. The shards of rowan wood weren't long enough. I needed something else. Too afraid to damage the Retaliator more, I scrambled to find one of my daggers. Blade on hand and completely exhausted I crawled back to the immobile vampire.

With my head on her chest I listened to the gurgling sound in her lungs as she uselessly gasped for air.
I tightened my grip on the dagger and drove it into her heart. I fought the pull of unconsciousness until I was certain she was dead. Lying face down in a pile of ash, I closed my eyes and welcomed death.

The between already reclaim
ed the grey spoiled by Bathory's manipulation of my powers. Matter shifted as the layers of reality settled back into place.

The ash and blood I spilled were absorbed as an offe
ring, payment for the damage done and the cost to repair it. I felt the vibrations from hooves pounding through the between - my ride to the Other World.

I should stand or at least sit up but the idea of moving exhaust
ed me. Shouldn't I be healed? I mean wasn't that part of the deal when you died? If I had to suffer through eternity with these wounds I would be pissed. If I could stay awake long enough to be pissed, that is.

It was true, what they say about your life flashing b
efore your eyes. Images of a lonely and unloved childhood, my sister Frankie the only bright spot in an otherwise bleak upbringing. My adoptive mother would be more upset that I met my escort to the Other World in tattered, blood soaked clothes, than my actual death. My time with SPTF, followed by a quick flicker of Matthison and Massarelli's faces. Arawn, my father. I finally had the parental love I craved all my life and now I was dying.

Aidan's face flickered in my mind. My heart hurt more than any other part of my body as I watched the memo
ries of us play out like a filmstrip in my head. We wasted so much time hurting each other. It was Mason's turn to make an appearance in the movie of my life. Tears streamed down my face as I imagined all the things that could have been. And then there was nothing, nothing but blackness and the physical pain that wracked my body.

***

Why did everything hurt? I was dead for fucks sake. I thought I lived a fairly decent life. I only used my powers for good. Well, except that time in high school, but Janie Bennett had it coming. I would think stopping Bathory and Caligula would have evened things out. I'm guessing not because this had to be what purgatory felt like.

"Open your eyes
, Maurin." Groaning in protest, I swatted at the hands stroking my face. "Come on, open your eyes. I know you hear me."

"Mace," I croaked. My throat was so dry and I sounded like I suffer
ed from laryngitis.

"There you are."

"Are you my escort?"

"I've been a lot of things but an escort isn't one of them."

"Then what are you doing here? Who's going to help me cross over?"

"You mean to the Other World?" He chuckled. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news but despite your best efforts you didn't die. You came pretty close, we thought we
’d lost you for a while there."

"What? But the Retaliator... How?" My brain felt foggy and I
had trouble stringing complete sentences together.

"The Retaliator will not inflict a mortal wound against the fae who wields it. Leave it to you to test the limits of that safe guard.
”

"So I'm not dead?" Blinking a few times, my mind cleared and I
took in my surroundings. There was a familiar crack in the ceiling next to the water stain from the melt after the last blizzard. The dark purple comforter I bought on sale at Bed Bath and Beyond a couple of months ago was pulled up to my neck. I was back in Salem, in my apartment, in my own bed. Home. It was enough to bring tears to my eyes.

"No, you're not dead but if you ever do something like that again
, I’ll kill you." He ran a finger along my collar bone. My body trembled as he traced the scars from Caligula's fangs. "Vampires are more of a threat to you than your sword. If Caligula hadn't taken so much of your blood you would have healed on your own."

"I dream
t of horses and the Cwnn  Anfwnn. It was so beautiful. They were going to lead me to the Other World."

"
I'm sorry to say, the Other World's not as quaint as you imagined. That was your father's idea of a rescue mission. He rode out with the Hunt, searching the between for you. It wasn't until after Bathory died and the darkness she created shifted that we found you."

"So you rode in on your white horse to rescue me?"

"Something like that." He gave me a little wink that had my stomach flipping flops.

"Do I smell coffee?"

Mason grabbed my favorite mug - the one with all the sugar skulls on it - off the night stand and held it out for me. "You really are a knight in shining armor, aren't you?" I pushed myself up so I could take the mug, wincing a little from the sharp pains in my abdomen.

"A noble knight wouldn't let his lady throw herself on her sword."

Finally positioned against the headboard for support, I took the mug. Amalie might be out of a job. The coffee was amazing. Or maybe everything tastes amazing when you wake up after you should be dead.

If I was a brave woman I would try eating anchovies to test that theory. Thankfully I knew it was stupidity and not bravery that had me doing most of the things I did because I hate anchovies and I seriously doubt a near death exper
ience would change that.

"
For the record, I didn't throw myself on my sword."

"Duly noted. Now let's have a look at that wound." He peeled back the covers and lifted my shirt - the same paj
ama top I slept in when at his house. "It looks better already. A couple days and you'll be good as new."

"So, your lady
, huh?"

Mason's hand shook a little as he poked at the tender, healing skin. He looked up at me expectantly. "Would you
like to be?"

"Maybe we should start with dinner and a movie."

22

Aidan
sat on the steps outside my apartment building looking a little worse for wear. It had been almost four weeks since I watched him hoist the last of the hostages before climbing out the window himself.

I'd given two statements to the Council on Caligula and Bathory. I'd met Amalie at the Daily Grind twice, had lunch with Cash a few times, hell even my father had been by to visit every week.

But the person who professed his love for me five weeks ago couldn't be bothered to check in on me after I almost died. It wasn't like I expected flowers and balloons or anything. I knew we were over. So I shouldn't have been disappointed when he never came by and the phone never rang. But I was.

I kept waiting for closure - that mystical thing
grown- ups talk about when love ends, the thing that is supposed to tell you it's okay to move on.

After a month of mourning a relationship that wasn't meant to be, of stalling and postponing every time Mason asked me out, I decided I wasn't getting closure. I convinced myself that a respectable amount of time had passed and I was actually ready to accept Mason's dinner invitation - the hunter had finally caught his prey. So of course Aidan s
at on my stoop waiting to have a heart to heart when I was supposed to be getting ready to go out.

"I don't have anything to say to you
, Aidan."

"You don't have to say anything. Just listen."

"What could you possibly have to say tonight that you couldn't have said a month ago?"

"
Hear me out, please."

I glanced at my watch. "Two minutes."

"Can we at least go upstairs to your apartment?"

"One minute fifty seconds."

"Jeysus, I see your stubbornness came back with you from the brink of death."

"You know, I wasn't sure you knew at first but after I reported to Agrona there was no way you hadn't heard what happened. A minute thirty seconds."

"I wanted to see you, to make sure you were okay. Especially after the way things ended."

"One minute."

"Would you please stop doing that?"

"Then get to the fucking point
, Aidan. You wanted to know if I was okay but what?"

"Jus primae noctis."

"You didn't bother with so much as a phone call because you've been busy deflowering virgins on their wedding night?"

"What? N
o! I turned Ryanne. Jus primae noctis for a fledgling refers to their first feeding. It's the sire's responsibility to ensure their child can feed on their own."

I didn't know what to say. That wasn't what I expected to hear. I didn't know exactly w
hat I expected to hear but Ryanne being turned into a vampire, his vampire, definitely wasn't it. "Fatherhood isn't everything you remembered?"

"She would have died that night."

"And you felt obligated to save her. A stranger, for all purposes. Looks like our taste in vampires isn't the only thing Ryanne and I have in common then."

"Maurin, don't. I had already turned her when I found out wha
t happened to you. Even if Ryanne's turning went perfectly - which it didn't by the way - I couldn't follow you into the between."

"You know what, you're right. We're not even together anymore.
So why I'm so pissed off at you?"

"The same reason a phone call wouldn't be enough for me. Because you still care."

"I'll always care about you but if you came here to salvage things, please don't. Don't say all the things I wanted to hear weeks ago. I don't think I'm strong enough to walk away from you if I'm not angry. You'll tell me all the things I want to hear and I'll believe you because you mean it. In the end we'll hurt each other again. You should go. Mason is picking me up in thirty minutes, I'm going to be late."

"I just wanted to say I'm sorry."

I'm sorry. They were only words but my heart softened at the sound of them. I didn't need to hate him to let him go. "Me too, Aidan." And I was, sorry for what happened and what could have been. So this is what closure feels like. I let him pull me into a  hug. He moved in to kiss me and I turned so his lips landed on my cheek, to afraid to get caught up in emotions. He lingered in the embrace longer than necessary, breathing in my scent one last time.

"Am I interrupting something?"

"Mace." I seemed to be out of breath every time he was around me lately. My heart picked up its pace, beating wildly in my chest.