Claimed, a vampire romance (Lost) (7 page)

He sat there still and silent until the pair had left. Sat there longer, until the sun began to glow on the horizon and his phone began to buzz.

Dorian and Nancy, looking for him and Rachel too.

It was time he left and told them how completely he'd failed her.

o0o

Rachel woke unable to breathe. Something heavy and scratchy covered her face. She lashed out, desperate to free herself from whatever had her in its grips. The covering fell to the side, and sunlight streamed into her face.

She blinked and squinted. She was, she realized, in the backseat of a car that was moving at a good clip. She could hear the tires traveling over what she guessed was an asphalt road and the wind caused by the vehicle's forward progression whistling around her. She could hear breathing too, from the front seat, and squeaks as the car hit some tiny bump or the driver shifted.

She could hear everything. Even her own heart and her own breathing seemed insanely loud.

She clamped her hands over her ears and moaned.

“Awake?”

She glanced up to see Bryce's eyes looking back at her in the rear view mirror.

“Ah. The hearing. Smell will come next. It can be killer.”

What... She smelled it then, flowers and gas and garbage and... road kill.

She flipped to her side and threw up on the floor.

“That,” her driver noted, “will not help.” He put on the turn signal and headed toward an exit.

They pulled over in a gas station parking lot. Bryce jerked open the door, letting even more sunlight stream into the small space. Rachel pulled the scratchy blanket back over her face.

With the door open, the noise level reached new, excruciating heights. Birds tweeted. Car horns honked. And people yelled.

The smells were worse too. Gas. Nacho cheese with jalapenos. And more trash.

It smelled as if the world was rotting.

She rolled over to puke again and was jerked outside by her wrists.

“Take a breath,” Bryce ordered. “And focus on me.”

Barely able to stand, Rachel did as he asked, or tried to.

“There. Better?” He dropped his hold on her arms and walked to a gas pump. After returning with a handful of paper towels, he went about cleaning up her mess.

Completely out of sorts, she could do nothing but stare at him, but then slowly, some kind of calm settled around her, and she found that the light, smells, and sounds, while still more intense than she had ever experienced before, were tolerable.

She sucked in a breath and looked around. A sign next to the gas station declared that they were in Deep Lake, at least three hundred miles north of Crystal City.

“Where's Shelby?” she asked. Standing on the porch trying to get her friend inside was the last thing she remembered.

Without answering, Bryce walked to a trash can and deposited the used paper towels inside.

“Get in,” he responded.

She hesitated. “Where's Cameron?”

“Crystal City. He sent you with me.”

She shook her head. “He wouldn't do that.”

Bryce sighed. “He did. Get in the car, and I'll tell you why. And I'll tell you what happened to Shelby.”

Cameron had sent her away, and something had happened to Shelby. Both could be lies, but somehow she knew they weren't. Anxiety crawled over her.

“Rachel.” Bryce stared at her. His face was open, and his eyes were soft.

She knew then something had happened not only to Shelby, but to her too. Something horrible.

She got in the car.

o0o

Cameron's father leaned forward and placed his hands on his desk. “You did well.”

Cameron didn't meet his gaze. He hadn't asked for this meeting. He didn't want this meeting. He didn't want anything from his father ever again.

“What about the male and female who left? Did you learn where they were headed?”

Cameron's gaze shot to his father. “Why? They're gone. That's enough.”

His father sighed. “That's what we had thought in the past, but this recent uprising has proven us wrong. We've decided we need to eliminate the vermin shifters once and for all.”

Cameron bit down on the inside of his cheek. His face calm, he asked, “We?”

His father waved one thin, white hand. “The Senate.” He lowered his hand and rolled his chair closer to the desk. “They aren't happy with us.”

“And that bothers you?” Cameron's father prided himself on being independent of the rest of the country's vampire politics.

“No. Of course not, but they do have to be appeased every now and then. If the cost is only a few wolves...?” He lifted one shoulder.

Cameron'd had as much of his father as he could tolerate. He stood. “There is no evidence that any wolves besides the pack we eliminated here are of any threat.”

His father's eyebrows rose. “Of course they're a threat. Their very existence is a threat. I hadn't involved myself in worrying about the wolves outside of Crystal City before, but now that the Senate requests it, I shall, and so will you.” He stared Cameron down, his eyes probing and his face rigid.

Cameron glanced to the side. “Dorian is leaving,” he announced. “I talked to him last night, and he's decided to leave Crystal City.”

Their father sighed. “He'll be back. He has a new toy now, but she will grow stale. Then he'll be back. We weren't discussing your brother, unless you're suggesting since he is leaving Crystal City anyway, he and his new courtesan could follow the Senate's directive?”

Before Cameron could reply, his father continued.

“It won't work. Dorian has proven his inconsistency, and this new harlot is a complete unknown. You are the heir. You will fulfill this job. It will serve both you and me well with the Senate. Follow the two wolves that escaped and see where they go. They will predictably lead us to the bigger pack. Then we can move in and rid ourselves of the wolf intruders once and for all.” His father turned to a stack of papers as if the matter was settled.

Cameron's nostrils flared. He turned on his heel and left.

Chapter 8

Rachel rolled over in her bed and stared at the cornflower blue wall. She'd been here a week, been a werewolf a week, been alone for a week.

The alone part wasn't technically true. She had the pack now, but their existence and attempts at support had done nothing to ease the ache inside her at losing the life she'd known and Cameron.

Vampires didn't like werewolves. Bryce had explained that. He'd told her that the faster she accepted what she had become and her new wolf family, the easier her first change, when it came, would be.

She didn't care, not about the change or the pack or anything. She only wanted to burrow under the covers and wake up back in her sorority house with her friends alive and happy around her.

And Cameron. She wanted him too.

Someone tapped on the door. No one knocked around here, or banged or slammed a door. No one did anything even slightly noisy, at least around her.

Maybe she should appreciate their care for her still-delicate senses, but it just served as another reminder that she wasn't who she used to be, wasn't even what she used to be.

“Rachel?”

At the familiar feminine voice, Rachel sat up. The door cracked open. Nancy stood on the other side, her face pale and her expression worried.

For the first time in days, Rachel ran fingers through her hair and wondered how she must look.

Seeming not to notice either Rachel's rough state or her concern over it, Nancy walked into the room and shut the door behind her.

Relief was obvious in her smile. “You're okay.”

Rachel was a monster. She knew that, but her friend didn't. She closed her eyes and wished she could disappear.

Nancy hurried toward her, her feet making barely any noise on the wood floors, even to Rachel's sensitive hearing.

“I know.”

Rachel opened her eyes. Nancy stared back at her.

Unblinking, she said it again. “I know.”

For a moment, Rachel couldn't move, then, realizing Nancy knew what she’d become, she collapsed against her friend. Tears wet her eyes but didn't roll down her cheeks. She was past crying. She'd thought she was past caring too, but that had been a lie.

“I'm... I don't know what. Something from a nightmare.” Her words came out stuttered. She hadn't said this yet to anyone. She stared at her arms as she had been doing for the past week, waiting for the hair to thicken until she was completely indistinguishable from her favorite childhood fairytale’s villain.

“No. You're not. You're you. The same trusting, loving, wonderful Alpha that you ever were.” Nancy led her to the bed and pulled her to a sit beside her.

Rachel shook her head. The shortened version of her sorority house had new meaning for her now. She could never think of herself in that way again.

“No. I'm not. I haven't...” She couldn't say the word, couldn't voice what she'd been told was still to come. “But I can tell. Things are different. I'm different.” She stared at her fingers, imagining how they would look after her change, short and with... claws.

Her friend grabbed Rachel’s hand in her own, breaking her focus on what was to come. “Things are different, but you aren't. I know that.”

Again Rachel shook her head. “You can't understand. No one can.”

For a moment Nancy said nothing. Then she sucked in a breath and looked away. “There's something I haven't told you.”

Rachel lifted her gaze.

Nancy’s eyes were solemn and her face drawn.

Irrationally, dread wrapped around Rachel. There was nothing Nancy could say that would make things worse.

“I've changed too. I didn't know how to tell you before. I was afraid like you are, but now...” She shook her head and lowered her chin.

Rachel edged forward on the mattress. “What?”

In answer, Nancy lifted her head and reached for Rachel's hand. Then she opened her mouth and pressed Rachel's index finger against the tip of one tooth.

It was sharp. Too sharp. Fang sharp.

Rachel jerked her hand away and stood.

Nancy stayed seated on the bed. Her hands in her lap, she lifted her shoulders. “I didn't know how to tell you.”

“You're a vampire. How...” It was a stupid question— Rachel knew how this had happened. “Dorian,” she muttered. Rage built inside her. Her eyes narrowed and her skin prickled. She wanted to find him, to hunt him down, to...

She shook herself, startled by her own emotions.

Nancy sprang to her feet and grabbed Rachel by the hands. “It wasn't like that. He saved me. The wolves... I told you it was bad. I didn't tell you how bad. This...” She pointed at her mouth. “Was the only way.”

Rachel pulled away and paced to the other side of the room. It was too much. Her world was too foreign. “Vampires hate werewolves,” she said.

“I don't. Do you hate me?”

“No. Of course not.” Rachel frowned. Nancy was right. She was different, but she was the same too. She wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed. “Cameron sent me away.”

Nancy frowned then lowered her eyes.

“What?” Rachel could see her friend was hiding something.

“Nothing.” Nancy walked around the room, picking up random objects and setting them back down. “It's nice here, and the people seem nice too.”

Wolves, she meant. Rachel knew that was how Nancy thought of them. It was how Rachel thought of them. Maybe with time that would change, but for now she couldn't look at any pack member without remembering that they weren't human, and now neither was she.

But that wasn't important, not at the moment. Her friend was hiding something from her.

Finding a boldness she didn't know she had, she stepped in front of Nancy, cutting off her wanderings. “You know something about Cameron. Tell me.”

“It's... he's...” Again Nancy looked away.

“Tell me.”

Finally, Nancy set the picture frame she'd been holding down and met Rachel's gaze. “He's been assigned to eliminate the wolves.”

“Eliminate? Assigned? By who?” She knew Cameron had wanted the wolves in Crystal City dead, but they'd been responsible for her friends’ deaths and Nancy's... conversion.

“His father, his and Dorian's.”

“His father, because he’s a vampire?”

“Not any vampire, the head of the coven in Crystal City, but it's more than that. There's a vampire Senate too. It oversees all of North America. They want the wolves destroyed too.”

“And Cameron is coming to do it?”

Nancy pressed her lips together. “We think so. He isn't talking to Dorian, but the wolves have been watching him, and he seems to be...”

“Seems to be?”

“Hunting. You or Bryce, maybe both.”

“That's impossible.” Cameron might not want to be with her now that she was tainted or however a vampire might think of her new state, but he wouldn't hurt her, ever.

“He has weapons. Lots of them. All silver.”

“That doesn’t mean he’s hunting us. There’s another explanation.” There had to be.

“There isn't, Rachel. He's the heir to his father's world. He's doing what he has to do to survive in it.”

“So if he doesn't kill us, what will happen?”

Again Nancy looked away, but before she could move, Rachel grabbed her. “Tell me.”

“Dorian says his father won't tolerate it. He says if Cameron doesn't do as he's been told, he'll see Cameron as a threat. He'll be staked.”

An image of Cameron pinned to the ground, dead and bleeding, shot through Rachel’s mind. A shiver passed over her. “His father would do that to his own son? But what about Dorian? Is he in danger too?”

“Dorian says he's different. That his father never saw him the way he sees Cameron. Cameron is the golden boy with all the promise. Dorian was the screw-up, the weak link. So Dorian can leave, but Cameron...” She tilted her head to the side.

“But Cameron can't.” Rachel sank onto the bed.

Nancy sat down on the mattress beside her. “He won't find you. We've laid a false trail. By morning, he'll be a hundred miles away, by tomorrow night, even farther. You're safe, Rachel. Forget Cameron, and concentrate on learning what you need to learn here.”

Forget Cameron. Ignore the fact that his failure to find and destroy her would put a death sentence on his head.