Stephen (2 page)

“
She saved your ass?” Stephen shook his head. “But here you stand. Wanna tell me why that is if she didn’t save you?”

The humor in Samuel’s voice pissed him off slightly, and he wanted to tell him to fuck off. It had been a strange morning, and he didn’t think it was going to get any better with telling him that she’d only wanted to save Joann. He was just there when she did.

“
I was secondary in her plan. And now because you have blocked my way, I don’t know where to find her.” He went to the booth and picked up the money. Taking it to his nose, he inhaled much like she had the cup and found nothing. Not a single scent was on the money, neither the bill nor the change. Nor was there anything on the full cup of tea. Stephen turned to Samuel. “I’ll have to report this. The fucking bastard tried to kill me.”

“
Yeah. I hate when that happens.” Stephen growled at his friend. “I’m only saying. But just so you know, the woman told me something else too. She said you’re a target now. That I should keep you away from others until somebody finished the job they were sent out to do. She didn’t sound all that upset that you might be killed soon.”

“
You mean there are others coming for me?” Stephen wasn’t overly concerned about that. He’d been a hunted man for over three thousand years. “What for? I’m not doing anything to anyone.”

“
Don’t know. But you being one of the others, as she called them, could get you killed. Other than you pissing in his oats this morning, what other reason could Jared have had to murder you?” Samuel sat in the chair he’d been in earlier and looked at the blade still laying where it had landed. “You recognize those markings?”

The handle as well as the blade was covered in scroll-like work. Stephen picked it up and looked at the small curls and swirls and realized it was writing. He put his hand around the pommel and looked at Samuel. This was bad. Really bad.

“
It’s my language. The language of my kind. This sword…I’m sure it’s the original, and had been hanging in the castle where I grew up. It’s from my family.”

His crest, the one from his family, was on the tip of the pommel, and he stared at it as memory after memory flooded his mind. His father and mother, his little sister and brother…all of them dead now, and none of them anything but a distant memory after all this time. He started to tell Samuel what he felt like, needing to share for some reason, when he saw the spot of blood.

Walking toward it, he knew it had to be the woman’s. The vampire Jared’s blood would have disappeared when he did, leaving nothing behind to show that he’d ever been there. Kneeling down to it, he ran his fingers over the now cooled blood and brought it to his mouth. He licked it off his fingers before he could think of the several million reasons why he should not do it. The dizziness that swamped him made him fall to his ass, and it took him several seconds to realize that he’d passed out. Samuel smacking him in the face was his first clue. He grabbed his hand just as he drew back to hit him again.

“
Christ. You scared the shit out of me. What the fuck happened?” Stephen stood up when Samuel helped him. “Stephen, what happened?”

He couldn’t tell him. He doubted that Samuel would be upset. More than likely he’d think it funny. But if her blood gave him that sort of rush, then she could only be one thing to him, and he wasn’t ready for a mate this late in his life. Never would suit him just fine and dandy. Instead of answering Samuel, he changed the subject.

“
I’ll have to contact the others to let them know what happened. And you’ll need to help me with what the girl said to you about more gunning for me.” Samuel looked like he was going to ask something but only nodded. “Jared was going to remove my head from my shoulders. I don’t know about you, but that sort of pisses me off.”

“
I bet.” Samuel walked to the clothes that were lying in a pile on the floor. Dust flittered about the room before it, like the man it had come from, disappeared as well. Stephen felt the pull of the sun take a little of his energy but ignored it for now. There were things he had to do before he could take his rest. Samuel looked at him with a cocked brow, and Stephen knew he’d missed something.

“
You do know that whatever is going on, that girl might have more information than we do right now.” Stephen nodded, knowing that he wasn’t going to go looking for her no matter what. “I’ll send some of the wolves that are wandering around the property over to your home. They can keep a look out and get some exercise too. They’ve been looking for things to get them running again.”

Stephen pulled out his wallet and handed Bob what he had there. He knew that it was too much, that there was really very little damage done, but he wanted to get out, and haggling over the cost was just something he wasn’t going to do. As he left the building, Samuel was right behind him.

“
The girl? What did she say to you?” Stephen looked at Samuel when he didn’t answer him. There was a knowing look on his face that Stephen didn’t care for. “Whatever you’re thinking, just get it out of your head right now.”

“
She’s your mate.” Stephen stopped walking and stared at his buddy. “I don’t know how I know that other than your reaction to her blood, but I’m willing to bet that’s what she is. Am I right?”

“
No one likes a know-it-all.” Samuel crossed his arms over his chest and did the eyebrow thing again. “Okay, yes, she’s my mate, but I can’t smell her, nor do I know a damned thing about her. And I’d very much like to keep it that way. And if you tell me it’s a done deal, I may drain you.”

Samuel’s laughter did nothing to improve his mood. It wasn’t so much the woman but all of it. He now had to go to the Vampire Council and explain to them how a slip of a woman had killed the leader of their little group. They were not going to be happy when he told them she’d gotten away too.

~~~

Clar moved to the cave slowly. She was hungry and pissed that she’d left her tea sitting there untouched. And she’d paid for it too. Moving deep into the cave, she sat down on the blanket she’d found this past summer and tried to brace herself for looking at her wound. The vamp she’d killed had hurt her when she’d knocked the sword from his hand. His claw-like hand had torn into her quicker than she’d expected.

He’d turned at the last second to grab at her arm, but had grazed her belly instead. Normally she would have been able to dodge him, but she’d been talking with the lion. Who knew that a lion would be in charge of so many different people? Taking a deep breath, she pulled up her shirt.

It was bleeding profusely, and when she tried to wipe away the blood, more moved across the seam of the wound like a zipper. When she finally got a look at it, she closed her eyes. He’d really hurt her.

“
Figures. You do something for somebody and you get the shit knocked out of you.” Standing up, she went to her medical kit. Over the years it had gotten larger because she cared for herself, and some of the things in it were things she’d picked up out of peoples’ trash cans. Like the pain killers. But there were things in it she could use now, like the needle and thread, as well as the thick gauze and tape. It was going to be a long morning.

Debating on whether or not to take one of the pain pills now or later, she set it aside and pulled out the needle and thread. If she sewed it up, she might not get weaker. But knowing from past experience with supernaturals, their wounds didn’t always act like the ones she got on her own. Starting a fire, she put a pot of water on the stones around it to heat up. The cave had a great many things in it that she’d made herself, and the fire pit was one of the things she loved the most. She looked around the cave and smiled. It was her home and she loved it.

The things she’d managed to bring here were great. Most of them were discards she’d picked up around the richer neighborhoods. But there was also the clothing bank that she’d hit in the warmer months when she had managed to get a coat, gloves, and a nice warm hat. The boots she’d found were not all that warm, but they did keep her feet dry. The blankets too had come from the clothing place. And then there were the crates.

She’d stacked them in such a way that they looked like a large wall unit. And she’d filled it with things that she’d found on her walks, along with her clothing and shoes. She also had some candles that people had used nearly up and tossed out. Some nights they were her only source of light.

It took her almost an hour to sew the wound together. The pain wasn’t as bad as it could have been now that she’d taken the pills, but it still hurt like hell. Then there was the beating she’d taken before when some asshole had decided he wanted her to fuck him. When she lay back on her bed, she closed her eyes and tried to think of anything other than how badly she hurt. The vamp at the counter entered her thoughts.

He was handsome. No, that wasn’t right. He was devastatingly handsome. His dark hair hung down past his shoulders, and his face looked like he might have been a model for some of the Greek gods she’d seen in the museums she used to go to. And when he’d stood up…Christ, he was so tall she knew that if she stood next to him she’d reach just to his chin, and she was tall at almost six foot.

“
And he probably hits hard too.” Clar smiled at the echo of her voice as it circled around and came back at her. “Hello” would echo for twenty minutes it seemed sometimes, and Clar pulled her pillow from her head and put it on her wound so she could get a little more comfortable.

How had she gotten here? Smiling, she thought about her journey to her newest address. This had been the longest she’d been at one place since her flight away from her family all those years ago. In the eleven years, she’d moved about eight times and this one, this last one had been over eight months. But the weather was turning now, so she’d have to find something with more heat if she wanted to live through another winter. Her mother…it took her breath away when she thought of her and her death. Her mother would have a fit if she could see her little girl now.

Clarice Kelley had left home at the age of seventeen. Her only thought at that time was to get as much distance between her and her stepfather as she could. If there was ever a meaner man in the world, she never wanted to meet him. Her stepfather, Edward Barron, was a prick of the first order. And he hated her with all his being.

“
I suppose it didn’t help that I didn’t care overly much for him either.” And she hadn’t. She wasn’t really his daughter, not even his stepdaughter, but a “product,” as he’d called her, of an unfortunate first marriage her mom had had. Clar’s real dad had died a few months before she was born, but she knew a great deal about him. Clinton Kelley had been a bad choice in marriage, as her stepfather had said. But he’d loved her mother more than anything, and he’d died proving it to her.

Edward, as she’d taken to calling him since her mother married him, had made no bones about how much he hated her. He wanted a son…many sons, he told her once, but she would be his pawn. A pawn in what she’d had no idea at the time, but he’d told her later…the day she left, as a matter of fact. And just a mere month after she’d gotten out of the hospital following injuries she’d suffered when her mom was killed. Had it only been three months after her mother died that her stepfather had tried to make her do something her mother would have killed him over?

“
I’ve made some arrangements now that your mother is not here to tell me no. You’ll marry my vice-president, and he’ll take you out of my sight.” She’d shaken her head, and he slapped her hard enough to knock her off the chair she’d been told to sit in. “I didn’t ask you if you wanted to, Kelley, but said you would. The marriage will take place right after Christmas, and you’ll be gone from this house for good. The only time I ever want to see your face again is when there is no other choice. It’s cost me a great deal to have this fixed, and you’ll be a dutiful wife and give him whatever he wants.”

“
I don’t care how much it cost you. I’m not marrying an old bastard on your say-so.” She moved before he could hit her this time, and he lunged for her. Clar had kicked out and got him in the balls and smiled when he cried out. “Next time you think to order me around, Edward, I suggest you do it with me tied up.”

“
You’re going to pay for that.” She kicked him again, this time in the head. With a quick check of his pulse when he didn’t get up right away, she knew that she couldn’t be so lucky. It was too much to hope that he was dead. And with another kick to his big gut, she walked out and up to her room to gather what she could. Once she was outside, Clar had never looked back.

“
But he still tries to bring me in.” Just a year ago she’d had to move on again. This time she’d moved almost within spitting distance to her old home, and chuckled every time she walked past one of his minions. None of them would recognize her now. She was a good hundred pounds lighter than she’d been at seventeen, and her blonde hair had darkened over the years. Sometimes Clar didn’t even know herself when she chanced a look in a mirror.