Eternal Beast: Mark of the Vampire (31 page)

The ancient
paven
’s favored reality was an endless strip of sun-warmed beach. To the untrained and virginal eye it seemed tranquil, harmless, but to anyone who’d ever been there for any length of time, they knew the ocean, sand, and palms beyond were a never-ending trap.

Cruen’s fire-blue eyes moved over Titus piteously. “You appear weary, Brother. Hungry.” His mouth tipped up at the corners. “How about you tell me what you need and I will tell you what you will give me for it?”

“I cannot revert back to Breeding Male status, Cruen,” Titus rasped, looking for something to catch his weight but finding nothing.

Nothing but Cruen’s outstretched arm.

He turned so that his pale wrist was exposed. Titus’s fangs extended and his mouth watered.

“I cannot become an animal, a rutting monster that is reviled and feared,” he continued desperately.

“You will go to Mondrar,” Cruen said flatly. “You will make sure the
mutore
female…”

My daughter
.

“…finds and removes Celestine Donohue from her cage.”

Through his haze of blood lust, Titus tried to make sense of such a request, but it was impossible. Hunger clawed at his insides, roused the Breeding Male.

“Yes, Cruen,” he cried out. “Yes.”

Only when his fangs were an inch deep within Cruen’s vein and suckling down his wondrous, magical blood did Titus recall the evil
paven
’s final words.

“Then bring the mutore to me
.”

“Hey, sleeping beauty.”

Gray opened one eye to the sun pouring in from the skylights. His head was pounding jackhammer style. What the hell? Then he remembered taking Dillon’s memories—then he remembered those goddamn memories themselves, and a fresh wave of vitriol battered him.

“Dillon.” He reached for her.

“She’s gone.”

Piper’s voice. He sat up, his eyes narrow slits through the slamming of his brain and realized it wasn’t the sun at all. It was still night and all three Warriors stood at the end of his bed, one of them holding a flashlight.

“Get that thing out of my face, Rio.”

His own face a mask of disgust, the military Impure eyed the bed. “Don’t need to ask what you’ve been doing.”

Gray turned his gaze to Piper. “Do you know where she is?”

Piper shook her head.

“I can’t fucking believe that
veana
,” he grumbled.

“Really?”

Piper jabbed the male in the side with her elbow. “Shut up, Rio.”

“So you had one hot night,” Rio amended, his tone a little more sympathetic. “It’s not like you—”

Gray flattened him with a look. “Love her?”

The male shrugged.

“Love doesn’t solve the big problems, G,” Vincent said coolly. “Trust me, I know.”

Piper sideswiped him with a glare. “No, Gray. Trust
me. I
know.”

Gray wasn’t in the mood. For their jokes, their bitching, or their advice. Last night had been one of the greatest fucking nights of his life. He’d made love, straight up and real, to the
veana
he loved; he’d heard her tell him that she loved him too; and he’d finally been allowed inside her head, her heart, and her past.

How could he have possibly known she’d regret it all, cancel out everything they’d built together in the last several hours, and bolt?

He got out of bed, nude and head pounding, and went into the closet. He flipped on the lights. “Tell me you have something for me, Pip,” he called out. “I need to get my mother out of that bullshit hellhole, bring her here, and then we’ll get back to work.” He pulled on his clothes with far too much venom, then walked back into the bedroom. “I won’t be deterred again after this.”

“I’ll go with you, if you need a second.”

About to pull on his shoes, Gray eyed Rio. “You’re serious.”

His face contorted with irritation. “’Course I’m serious. Fuck you.”

“Well, I appreciate that, man. I do. But I’m going to go in quick, quiet, and solo, just like at the Paleo.” He nodded at the male. “I’ll contact you if I get into trouble.”

“You do that,” he said. “And, you know, I hope your mom’s okay.”

“All right. All right,” Piper said loudly. “One more word from the penis gallery and I think I’m going to stick something sharp in my eye.”

Vincent turned to stare at her. “Penis gallery?”

“Yeah, I said it.” She nodded at Gray, pulled out a piece of paper. “Finish up with the shoes there, and I’ll show you how you’re going to get into Mondrar.”

Mondrar was truly hell aboveground, which made Dillon feel oddly at peace there.

She had been inside the six-floored domed structure with its open, forget-about-privacy cells and aniselike scent twice. Both times she’d gone undercover as a guard looking for criminals who’d had political connections to her human senator. She’d paid killer bank to learn about the secret tunnel that had been dug by two former inmates over a fifty-five-year span. Granted, it was blocked up with four feet of moss and a metal container, but the thirty-minute dig to get inside was worth it. She would locate the
veana
and get her out, bring her back to her son—to Dillon’s true mate.

Prove to him that she loved him.

Jesus, she really had become a pussy.

As the sky outside turned a steely gray, Dillon slipped on one of the sets of Mondrar inmate clothing hidden inside a metal box within the floor, grabbed the other and the heavy broom beside it, and began her search.

She moved quickly and quietly, inspecting one floor after another, careful to keep her eyes down. She acted as if she was just another one of the low-risk prisoners assisting in maintenance. But by the fourth floor she
started to grow concerned. She’d been inside Mondrar for thirty minutes and she hadn’t found Celestine. The longer she stayed, the more dangerous it became.

Just when she was about to change her plan, head up to the top floor and work her way down, a voice called out to her from one of the cells.

“This way,” the male voice hissed. “The one you seek is here.”

Dillon couldn’t see where the voice was coming from, but she followed it, moving down a long row of open cells, her hackles raised. She wasn’t about to trust anyone, but information from a fellow prisoner could yield something new.

“She is at the end of the cell block,” the male voice uttered, but from where, Dillon could not see. What the hell was this? And who was this?

But then she spotted the
veana
at the far side of one of the wide hallways, just as the voice had said, and she broke into a relieved grin. She looked around, her eyes darting from cell to cell, searching for the voice, the face. Her jaguar was on edge, claws out, ready to strike. Who was he? And why would he want to help her?

“Go to her,” said the voice, strong, older. For a moment she thought she’d heard it somewhere before, but then he uttered more forcefully, “Now,
Veana
. Before they come for the morning meal.”

Damn it
. Dillon had a choice to make and fast. Still vigilant, she left the mysterious voice and ran down the hallway, straight to Celestine Donohue’s cell. Supplied inside the container, she had the key that opened every cage on this floor and she quickly used it to open the door.

The older
veana
was alone and curled up on her pallet. Dillon raced inside and gave her a shake. “Wake up and put these on. We need to go. Now!”

The
veana
looked up, her eyes tired and confused—and startlingly like her son’s. “Who are you?”

“A friend of Gray’s and Sara’s. I’ve come to take you home.”

Cellie’s gaze flickered to the open cell door, then the set of work robes Dillon had tossed on her lap. In seconds, she was on her feet, robes on, following Dillon out into the hallway.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” she said, her gaze flickering every which way.

“Me too.” She handed Celestine the broom, and the two of them kept their heads down and slowly made it to the stairwell. Once inside, they took off, racing down the steps. At the bottom, Dillon motioned for her to follow and they headed toward the metal plug and the moss. But just as they rounded the corner, a figure dressed only in a black robe and hood flashed in front of them.

Dillon shoved Celestine behind her, dropped into fighting stance, and hissed.

“I am not here to stop you,” the figure said.

Dillon recognized the voice at once. “It’s you. You helped me find her, get her out. Why?”

The robed figure shook his head, raised his arm. Dillon braced herself for something—she wasn’t sure what. But once his arm was above his head, he froze.

“What is this?” Dillon demanded, ready to rip the hood right off this male. “What are you doing?”

“I am sorry,” he said, dropping his arm. And as he
did, the metal plug opened to reveal the strange blue light of a nearing dawn. “Go. Just go. Quickly.”

Dillon didn’t ask anything more, didn’t even give him a second thought. She grabbed Celestine’s hand and ran through the opening.

“H
oly shit.” Lucian let out a low whistle to accompany his curse.

“How many know about this?” Alexander asked, taking in the lavish interior of a cabin that, from the outside, appeared to be falling down.

“Only my father,” said the young female. “He assists Master Cruen in exchange for blood and…other things.”

“Master Cruen?” Lucian uttered with a sneer. “That’s what you have to call him?”

The female looked surprised. “It is how many Impures refer to the Purebloods who employ them.”

Not my little Impure, Alexander thought blackly as he moved to the far end of the room where a small laboratory was set up.

“When was he here last?” he asked the female as he picked up a glass jar and examined the contents.

“Hasn’t been this month at all.”

“Does he come frequently?”

“Varies,” she said, her nervous gaze continually checking the window. “There’s never a pattern to it.”

Frustration built within Alex. Without a pattern, it was going to be difficult to lay a trap. It wasn’t as though they could camp out here and wait for the
paven
to show up.

He dropped the jar back on the metal table with little care. “How does he manage to get inside the
credenti
without being seen?”

“He is Order.” As if that explained it all—and maybe it did. “But he was seen,” she added cryptically.

Alexander’s brow lifted.

She smiled shyly. “By me. It was how my father found out…how he got the job—”

“Alex, get in here.” Lucian’s call from the other room interrupted their discussion and had Alex on edge.

With the speed gifted to a morphed male, he was by his brother’s side in under five seconds. “What is it?”

Lucian’s eyes were strained, his mouth grim. “Check out the painting. Over the fireplace.”

Alexander turned. For a moment he wasn’t exactly sure he was seeing what his brain was telling him he was seeing. “Is that…Cellie?”

“Unless she has a twin we don’t know about,” Lucian said blankly.

“Why would Cruen have a painting of her?”

“No idea. It’s fucking creepy, though.”

“She’s in
swell
.”

Lucian neared the canvas, squinted at the bottom right-hand corner. “Look at the date.”

Alexander moved beside his brother, leaning close
to the wisp of black scribble, confusion assaulting him. “That can’t be right. That’s after Sara and Gray were born.”

“Unless she had another kid,” Lucian uttered.

Before Alexander could respond or even process, the young female burst into the room. “We have to go,” she said, panic threading her tone. “Someone’s coming, and the light of a new day threatens.”

The bargain he’d struck with the Pureblood at his side made Gray fierce with anger, but at least he was inside. The Pureblood, who’s name was Jem, had assured Gray that his mother was well and that they would have zero problems getting her out. Sounded great, sounded perfect—hell, it sounded too perfect. After the night he’d had—shit, the year he’d had—Gray wasn’t trusting anyone.

Dressed in the uniform of a guard, Gray moved in the same brisk manner as Jem, trying like hell to mute the sound in his head. Like the Paleo, this place was a constant buzz of thought. He had to work hard to sift through the barrage and find the one he’d come for.

“How close are we?” Gray whispered tightly as they passed row after row of cell blocks.

“She’s on this floor,” the
paven
answered. “Down at the end.”

Gray’s hands balled into fists, itching for his blades. He sure as hell hoped so. Because if this
paven
was wrong or fucked him in any way, he was as good as dust.

When they came to the end of the hallway, Jem sank back into the shadows and Gray followed. As two
guards walked past, Gray tried to pull in the thoughts of the male beside him, but he couldn’t grasp on to anything except the chaos of level upon level of inmates.

“This way,” Jem whispered, moving out of the shadows and back into the light. “Hurry.”

As the din on the floor continued to grow, Gray followed the
paven
to the right, then walked down a length of empty cells.

Finally, the
paven
slowed. “Here it is.”

Everything happened fast and furious then. Jem had the door of a cell pulled wide. Inside Gray’s mind, he heard the cry of a woman, saw a blanketed figure inside the cell, and rushed at it without listening to his screaming instinct. The cell door slammed shut, the blanket dropped to reveal nothing at all, and the Pureblood who had screwed him was slowly backing up.

But not fast enough.

With a feral growl, Gray shot forward, thrust his arm through the bars, grabbed Jem and yanked him forward, clipping his forehead against the metal bars. “You fucking asshole.”

The Pureblood struggled to get free, but Gray had
her
blood inside him, along with a torrent of adrenaline. He was every bit the Beast his mate was.

Jem looked terrified and confused as he tried to turn his head, twitching both ways.

“Looking for help?” Gray asked.