Bound In Death (A Vampire and Werewolf Romance) (18 page)

The sun was still out, and it should have weakened her when she pressed open that glass.

It didn’t. Just as it hadn’t weakened her when she’d been on that motorcycle with him.

Because of his blood?
Alerac had told her the truth. It sure seemed as if she’d built up some kind of immunity to the sunlight, thanks to him.

She saw Zoe and Finn. They were rushing toward the main cabin, with—with
Heath
between them?

“What the hell is he doing here?” Alerac demanded.

“Jane!” Heath shouted, looking up at that same moment. Blood dripped down his face and neck. “Help me!”

She started to race down to him.

“No.” Alerac wrapped his hand around her wrist. “He’s working for Lorcan.”

Heath looked as if he were dying. 

Alerac’s gaze found hers. “We’ll see him together. I want to discover just what game the doc thinks he’s playing.”

“What if it’s not a game? What if he just needs help?”

“He sold you out before.” His eyes narrowed. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s a killing crime.”

She glanced back down at Heath’s slumped figure. To her, it appeared as if someone had already tried to kill him.

And, if Heath didn’t get help soon, he might not survive much longer at all.

Zoe and Finn dropped Heath on the floor. The doc hit the wood and moaned. A pitiful sound.

An annoying sound.

Jane attempted to hurry toward the guy.

Smothering a sigh, Alerac just blocked her path.

“Would you stop that?” Jane snapped at him.

No, he wouldn’t, because he didn’t trust the guy. “You searched him for weapons?”  Alerac demanded of Zoe and Finn.

Zoe glanced up at him. “No guns. No knives. No stakes.”  Her nose wrinkled. “Just a bloody and beat-up human.”

“Where’d you find him?”

“He was dumped on the south side of our land,” Finn answered quickly. “Found him when I was patrolling to make sure Liam hadn’t come back.” 

Dumped—or delivered?

“Pl-please…” Heath muttered. “Help…”

Jane shoved Alerac out of her way and knelt next to the doctor. She turned him over, and when she got a good look at his face, Jane gasped.

His nose had been broken. His left eye was swollen shut. Blood dripped from his mouth—
aw, did the doc lose some teeth?—
and gaping wounds covered his throat.

“He’s…insane…” Heath whispered. “You…you have to help me…”

Zoe and Finn were still standing close by.

“You need to be taken to a hospital,” Jane said. She looked over at Zoe. “We’re going to need a car to transport him.”

Heath grabbed her hand.

Alerac tensed.
You’re about to lose that hand.

“N-no, hospital.  I’d—I’d have to explain…the bites…”

“You’re hurt. You need help,” Jane told him. “You could die!”

“N-need blood…”

The hell,
no.

Alerac marched forward. He grabbed Heath and hauled the guy to his feet. “Tell me that you’re not this much of a dumbass.”

The man blinked at him. 

“You don’t seriously think,” Alerac continued, letting his disgust show, “that you can drag your carcass in here, after what you’ve done, and get
blood
from Jane?”

“D-dying…” Heath whispered pitifully.

“Bull.” The wounds actually seemed to already be…healing.

Healing as Alerac stared at them.

Suspicion churned in his gut.  “You bastard.”

Heath tried to pull free.

Alerac wasn’t letting him go. “You were her doctor, her
friend,
for these last six months. She trusted you—and you…you took her blood, didn’t you?”

Heath was fighting to get free now. 

Alerac turned his bright stare on Jane. “He took your blood.” Certainty. Rage.

She rose to her feet. After a moment, Jane gave a faint nod. “Samples. He said that he needed them for tests.”

Alerac shook his head. “No, he needed the blood for its power.” He lifted Heath up into the air, and the smaller man dangled above the floor. “You think I don’t know your type?  Greedy, desperate, willing to trade anyone and everyone for the promise of immortality?”

Heath stopped looking quite so beaten. His lips twisted in a hard snarl. “Isn’t that what you did when
you
took her blood? Werewolves aren’t supposed to live as long as you have. You found out that vamp blood can extend your life. You found—”

Alerac’s claws were out. “This is the part where you die.”

“No!”  Jane jumped forward. “Dammit,
no!

Heath started to smile.

But then Jane continued, “We can’t kill him yet. We have to find out what he knows about Lorcan first.”

That wiped Heath’s smile away.

Alerac nodded.  Then he said, “Finn, get some rope. I want to make sure this SOB is tied up tight.”

Heath was fighting now. Too late.

Jane stared at him, anger coursing through her veins. “You really were just going to sell me out that night, weren’t you? Just hand me right over to Lorcan—”

“Not to Lorcan, not then.”  He huffed out a hard breath. “To the other werewolf.”

Rage nearly choked Alerac then. “
Liam.”

A frantic nod from Heath. “H-he was the one I called. He arranged for the guys in those SUVs to meet us.” His words tumbled over each other. “Man, I swear, I didn’t even know Lorcan then.” 

Then.
Alerac dropped the bastard to the floor. “So when did you make Lorcan’s fine acquaintance?”

Heath didn’t rise from the floor. He curled in on himself. “A-after.  The men who were left…they were trying to figure out how to get Jane—”

Alerac growled.

Heath flinched. “But Lorcan found us first. It was like hell came at them.  Lorcan broke into the house, and he killed them all in seconds.  Every last one.  He took their heads.” A thick swallow. “Their organs.”

Same old twisted Lorcan.

“But he let you live?” The question came from a doubting Zoe. “Your story is crap.”

Heath’s head lifted. His eyes slid toward Jane. “He smelled your blood on me.  He let me live because of that. I told him that we were friends.  Th-that I could help him to find you.”

“No,” Alerac wanted to rip him apart, “what you told him was that you’d betray Jane, that you’d sell her out.” And he already had a pretty good idea of the price that Heath would have demanded.  “Let me guess. You’re gonna trade Jane for immortality?”  Probably a fat wad of cash, too.

Heath shook his head. “No! You don’t understand!” His eyes locked on Jane. “He doesn’t want to kill you! You’re part of his clan. He just wants you back.”

***

They’d taken the human inside. 

Lorcan smiled.  Either Jane would trust the doctor—or Heath would die. 

When he’d first found Heath, the human had been so desperate. Crying. Begging. 

Once, Lorcan had enjoyed it when his prey begged. Now it just bored him.

But he’d spared Heath because Lorcan had known that he could use the human as a distraction, at the right time.

The time is right now.

He lifted his hand to his throat. It still ached, but the pain was more of a memory. Lorcan had long ago grown used to pain—both giving it and taking it.  He’d made sure that the doctor enjoyed plenty of pain before Heath had been allowed to venture to Jane’s side.   

He knew what was happening inside that wolf pack. The betrayal.  The battle.

Liam had turned on Alerac.  He’d thought the two wolves were as close as brothers. But even a brother would kill you if there was enough power involved.

Lorcan had killed both of his brothers centuries ago. A witch had come to Lorcan long before he’d ever tasted his first sip of blood. She’d told him that his brothers were destined to destroy him. 

He’d destroyed them first.  As their blood had soaked the ground beneath his feet, he’d learned just how valuable a witch could be.

A witch’s power could change the world.

And the right vampire—he could
rule
the paranormal world.  

Normally, he wouldn’t give a damn about werewolf politics, but Liam had crossed the line. He’d
hurt
Jane.

Twice, Liam had sent vampires after her.

My own damn kind.
The knowledge still burned.

Those vampires could have killed Jane. They hadn’t realized just what an immense mistake they were making.

No one could kill Jane.  She belonged to him. Not just as a clansman, but so much more.

He was the only one left who remembered the bond that had been forged so long ago.  Perhaps it was time for him to enlighten the others.

For them to truly see that there was no hope for Jane and Alerac. The lovers weren’t going to get some romantic, happy ending.

It was too late for that.

Jane was already linked to another, through blood and pain, until death.   

***

“He doesn’t want to kill you! You’re part of his clan. He just wants you back.”

Right. Jane didn’t buy that line for an instant. Not with the images of Lorcan still swirling in her mind.

Finn came back into the room, holding thick rope in his hands. Alerac dumped Heath into the nearest chair, and they tied him up tight. Tight enough to cut off the circulation.

Then Alerac backed up. He cocked a brow and glanced at Jane. “Want to go first?”

Yeah, she had plenty of questions for her
friend.
“How did you know to find me in that swamp?” When she’d been walking alone, covered in dirt and grime. Her mind broken. Her body convulsing from hunger. “It wasn’t some vacation trip. Some coincidence.”

Heath’s gaze glanced around, sweeping the room.

“Don’t expect Liam to come to your aid,” Alerac snapped at him. “The pack knows he’s a traitor. He’s been hunted now.”

Heath’s Adam’s apple bobbed.

“
Tell me!”
Jane demanded.

“L-Liam told me where to find you. Said he’d drunk the memory from some vamp years ago. The enchantment that held you prisoner was supposed to fall away this year, and he figured that if you were strong enough, you’d crawl your way to freedom.”

“Where was she?” Alerac’s voice was low.

In his binds, Heath shrugged. Some blood still dripped from his wounds. “All I know is she dug her way out of a grave in that swamp.”

A grave.  “I was buried alive? All that time?”

Another shrug.

“How could even a vampire survive that?” Zoe asked as sympathy flashed across her face. “Wouldn’t you need food?  Air? I mean, you breathe, right?”

“It was the spell,” Alerac said, voice wooden. “It locked in the air in her lungs, froze her body, and made it her prison. She could feel the bloodlust and hunger, but she couldn’t move.” His face was tight with fury. “Magic can do anything, if it’s strong enough.” Alerac yanked his hand through his hair. “
Liam knew.”

Jane tried to focus on breathing. She’d been shoved in the ground somewhere out in that swamp, buried alive for all of those years? A prisoner, in her own body.
I don’t want those memories back.
Maybe that made her a coward, but she didn’t care.  Screw the past. She was ready for the future. 

“It was gift, you know?”  Heath was staring at her now. “Once I went with Lorcan, I realized that.”

What? Now she was the one grabbing for Heath as she lunged forward. “Being imprisoned was a gift?”

“No.” His chin lifted. “Losing your memory was.  You should thank Lorcan for that. He was merciful to you. If you’d kept those memories, you’d probably be insane.”

She was
staring
at someone insane. “Oh, I’ll be sure to thank him, all right.” She’d thank the bastard by taking his head.  That’d really show her gratitude to the jerk.

“Why did he send you here?” Alerac asked as he pulled Jane away from Heath.

Heath’s gaze jumped to him. “Because I promised him that I could deliver Jane to him.”

She laughed at that. 

“It’s a promise I’ll keep,” Heath swore.

“I don’t see how,” Zoe said as she lifted a brow. Finn stood just behind her. “I mean, considering you’re tied to a chair right now, and you look like werewolf chow to me.”

Finn growled.

Heath licked his bloody lips. He turned his head, and his eyes found Jane once more. “If you don’t go with me, Jane, if you don’t go back with me to meet Lorcan, then he’s going to hurt someone that you care about.”

She frowned at him. “I should believe you because…?”

“Lorcan thinks I’m here to use our friendship.”

They didn’t have a friendship. They had lies.

“But I saw. I
saw.”

Good for him. Disgusted, she turned away from him. She didn’t want to hear any more of his stories.

“Did you know that you have a brother, Jane?”

Yeah, she did. Jane hesitated. Her gaze slid toward Zoe.  The other woman gave an almost imperceptible nod.

“Did you know that he’s about to die?”

The guy was bluffing. Jane spun to face him, and her hands fisted on her hips. “I don’t think so.”

“He has poison in his veins. Poison that Lorcan put there.” The hair at his temples was wet with sweat. “Lorcan has the cure to that poison. If you go to him, you can take the cure.”

Her heart kicked into her chest. “That’s a lie.” Another one. Ryan would have mentioned his imminent death, wouldn’t he?

Alerac was now staring at Zoe, too. “Bring the vamp in here.”

“But—but the sun—”

“I don’t care if he’s weak, I want him in here.”

Zoe nodded, then hurried from the room.

Jane kept staring at Heath. “It’s just another lie,” she said, sadly. “Another trick. Maybe you were supposed to come here and try to get me to your side, but when you started to heal, you realized that wasn’t going to work because we’d all realized that you’d been using my blood—”

“No, dammit, I’m telling you the truth!”

But his truth sounded like lies to her. 

Heath exhaled. “It’s true, I swear it is. The guy is going to die unless you go meet Lorcan.”

She just gazed back at him.
Liar, liar.

Heath swore and jerked against his ropes. “Don’t believe me? Then just
drink
me. Vamps can see memories. As old as you are, you should be able to control the memories you pull up. Lorcan does. He can see anything he wants when he drinks from prey.”