Twilight Vendetta (23 page)

The other guy had been looking out the back of the truck, holding open a flap of canvas there. He shot his comrade an irritated look. “Shut the hell up, Morrow, something’s going down.”

Emma could see out the flap, probably better than the men could. There was a giant tree lying across the road behind them, and behind that, a convoy of Jeeps and other vehicles. Gunfire broke out, and she saw the muzzle flashes from those vehicles.

The crow let the flap fall and came back, rapping hard on the wall behind her. “Go!” he said. “Go, it’s an ambush!”

The truck lurched into motion, jostling her body, and she winced as her arms were jerked yet again. But then there was another crash, followed by an explosion that lifted the truck right up off its tires, then dropped it again, wrenching a cry from the depths of her being.

The truck took off at a wild, break-neck pace through the forest in the dead of night and she was jerked between the chains, her knees pounding up and down on the floor.

Her attacker had managed to get his pants done up, and both of them had drawn their weapons. She closed her eyes and prayed for it all to just stop. The pain was too much to bear.

There was a whoosh of energy, like a brief blast of wind in her face. But it wasn’t wind. It was him. It was Devlin. He’d arrived like a force of nature, and his anger vibrated right to her soul. She forced her eyes open and saw him snap the neck of one of her guards and toss his limp body out the back of the speeding truck. Then he gripped the remaining man, drew him close, and sank his teeth into the man’s throat.

She knelt there watching him, mesmerized, and she felt her eyes grow hot and her mouth begin to water. Devlin held her gaze as he feasted, and then he withdrew his incisors from the trembling man’s neck, grabbed him by his shoulders, and turned him to face her, forcing him to his knees in front of her. “Drink from him, Emma.”

She looked from Devlin’s red, glowing eyes and his face, flush with fresh blood, to the tiny holes in the man’s throat, and the pearls of blood squeezing out of them. Something in her growled with need. But something else was repulsed by the thought.

“I...can’t.”

“It will take away the pain.” He pushed the man closer. The crow whimpered with fear. “Just try a sip, you’ll see. It’s what you are now, Emma. They did this to you.”

She was hurting so much, so much. Devlin gripped the man by the top of his head and shoved his neck right up in front of her lips. Emma didn’t tell herself to take just a taste, but she did anyway. Her tongue darted out and touched just one ruby droplet. A surge of energy shot through her, a surge of ecstasy with it. Everything in her focused on the blood, on the power of life itself, and with a snarl, she clamped her teeth around her tormentor’s neck and drank. Oh, it filled her! It filled her with heat and with energy. The pain melted away and she felt so powerful she thought her entire body must be glowing with it. And then Devlin was pulling the man away from her, and she was yanking at her chains and snapping her teeth at his retreating neck.

“No, Emma. He’s gone now. We don’t drink from the dead. We stop at the final heartbeat. Do you understand?”

She knelt there, all but naked, looking at him, seeing him, for the first time
truly
seeing him. My God, what a beautiful being he was. The shape of his jawline, the swirls in his hair, the crook of his full eyebrows, and every single black velvet lash. Look at the colors in his eyes, she thought. She’d called them dark, ebony even, but now she saw so much more.

The truck was still careening through the forest, but she’d forgotten to notice. She was no longer weak. She was strong. She could do anything.

Devlin came to her, slid his hands over her face, and lowered his head to kiss her mouth, and she wondered if he was as high as she was from the blood. She wondered if every molecule inside him was singing the way hers were.

Yes
, he whispered without taking his mouth from hers.
Yes, it’s just the same for me, Emma. Sweet Emma.
He was still kissing her, speaking mentally, she realized, and taking her mouth with his tongue now. She tugged at her chains as she tried to put her arms around his neck, but they refused to give. He kissed her neck, and then made a path down it to her shoulder. He nipped the skin there, making her gasp, and then moved on to her breast, capturing it in his mouth and sucking hard, flicking with his tongue, pinching with his teeth. She threw her head back, panting with need.

And then the truck came to a sudden, jarring halt, slamming Devlin against her. He lifted his head, his eyes glowing like illuminated rubies as they stared into hers.

“If you stop now, I’ll die,” she whispered.

“We’re not alone, Emma.” And to her utter regret, he straightened her hospital gown, fastening the snaps over her bared shoulder and covering her nakedness. “I met a pair of friends. They took over the truck and drove us out of harm’s way.”

Then the canvas flap was flung open and two strangers jumped into the truck, a woman wearing a silk bandana knotted around her head, with glossy black curls spilling from beneath it, large gold hoops in her ears, a paisley print blouse draping off one shoulder by design not by accident, and a pair of tight fitting leggings. There was a colorful scarf knotted around her hips, its ends dangling. She was either a pirate or a Gypsy.

“Gypsy,” she said, moving to Emma’s wrist and fiddling with the manacle there. “My name is Sarafina. This is my husband, Willem Stone.” The cuff snapped open, and the Gypsy woman moved to the other one. Soon both her hands were free and Devlin was gathering her into his arms.

“Sarafina?” Emma asked.

“We need to get away from here before they catch up,” the woman said. “Can you run, do you think?”

“She’s been tortured,” Devlin said. “She needs more blood–”

“I could fly if you want.” She held Dev’s eyes as she said it and warmed at his approving nod.

Willem Stone was pulling a pack off his back, tugging things out of it. “Here are some of ‘Fina’s clothes, Emma. Put them on as quickly as you can.”

Emma took the things from him, pulling the leggings on and up underneath the gown. Then, turning her back to them, she stripped off the hated hospital gown and put on the blouse. It seemed more like several silk handkerchiefs sewn together than it did a top. She noticed the deep marks on her own wrists, then glanced down at her chest and saw that it was a patchwork of burns in the shapes of those paddles. Thank goodness the blood had taken the pain away. But the marks....

“They’ll heal with the day sleep,” Sarafina said. “And you’re still weaker than you know. But you’re going to be all right. And then you can begin learning how to guard your thoughts so we only hear what you want us to hear.”

Emma smiled a little as she turned to face them all again. “I know how. I just keep forgetting.”

“Sarafina and Will are going to take you to safety,” Devlin said, leading her to the back of the truck, then jumping to the ground. He reached up to grip her waist and lifted her down as well. “I need to go back.”

She sank her fingers into his shoulders when he would’ve turned away. “For what? The twins are long gone. My father’s not there. They’ve abandoned that camp. There’s nothing left.”

He met her eyes. “I won’t be long.”

And she knew what he was doing. Going back to kill every one of them. And despite what they had done to her, the notion made her sick. But she also knew his feelings on the matter, and she knew arguing for peace wouldn’t do any good. Especially now. So instead, she said, “Devlin, please don’t leave me. Not again.”

“I won’t be–”

“Please. I’m changed. I’m a different...being. Everything is...strange and vivid and wonderful and terrifying. I need you. I need you to stay with me.”

He frowned, dragged his eyes from hers to look in the direction he wanted to go, then stared back into her eyes once more. “They don’t deserve to live.”

“No. No, they don’t. But Dev, you’ll have plenty of chances to remedy that. You’re immortal.” She blinked as it slowly sank in, and then said it aloud. “And so am I.” She almost smiled. There was this giddy sense of invincibility overtaking her more and more with every moment she spent as this changed, empowered being.

“I have to do what I have to do,” he said, cupping her face with one hand.

“I need you right now–”

“I won’t be long. And Emma…it gets better, you know. The power. The strength. The heightened senses. Better and better. Go with Will and Sarafina. I promise, I’ll join you soon.” He nodded to the others. And then he was gone.

Devlin raced back through the forest feeling the wind on his skin and the earth beneath his pounding feet as never before. Everything had changed. Emma was one of them now. A vampire. Immortal. A creature of the night.

And she glowed with her newfound power. As uncertain as she had been about making this decision, it was clear now that she was relishing her new nature. Emma Benatar had been born to be a vampire. Even as a human she’d been doing things that seemed impossible to other mortals. She’d already been head and shoulders above other women. Powerful. Confident. Fearless.

There would be no stopping her now.

He’d told himself he couldn’t trust her, and wouldn’t feel anything for her. He’d written off her allure to the natural bond between his kind and The Chosen. And yet now, that was all gone. All his reasons had been obliterated by those bastardly scientists and their desire to keep her alive so they could torture her and learn his whereabouts.

They’d changed her. They’d done it with his blood. He was alive inside her now. He was coursing through her veins.

A sudden burst of gunfire had him diving facedown into the fragrant leaves on the forest floor even before he realized that no one was shooting at him. How could they when he’d been moving too fast for human eyes to see? But he lay there all the same, in the dampness of decaying leaves, and opened his senses to attune to everything around him. He heard the surprised grunts of men, and felt the sensations of pain exploding. He smelled blood and gunfire, each with its own hint of sulfur, blending and mingling together to create a distinct aroma. And the energy of death, dark and heavy, was settling over the area like a thick fog. Humans were being shot down.

A lot of them.

He sprang to his feet and raced forward again, arriving almost instantly at the scene. Crouching behind one of the military vehicles, he tried to see what was happening. The rapid patter of machine gun fire went on, making men in black fatigues dance like marionettes as bullets riddled their bodies. They fell to the ground as the gunfire halted.

He shifted his gaze from the dead to the killers. Three men with automatic rifles, and one standing beside them. Hobbs. He’d held up a hand to tell them to stop shooting. The three had tears streaming down their faces.

“It was necessary,” he said. “You’re heroes, though you don’t yet know it. And those men gave their lives for the cause. This will be the turning point. And all because of you. Thank you for your service.” He paced behind them as he spoke, and said, “Ten-HUT!”

They snapped to attention. Hobbs pulled his service pistol and shot them each in the back of the head.
Pop, pop, pop
! Just that fast. The men dropped as if their legs had dissolved. Dead. Every single one of them. It happened so fast it was over almost before Devlin realized what was happening. And why would he stop the man, anyway? He was doing exactly what Devlin had planned to do.

And now only one remained. Hobbs himself.

Dev started to straighten from his hiding place, but motors came roaring, even helicopters were swarming overhead. Hobbs picked up the three dead assassins’ machine guns and tossed them into the woods, then pressed his pistol to his own belly and pulled the trigger.

Pain exploded from him and he fell to his knees. He managed to hurl his handgun into the woods, all the same.

And then more vehicles were arriving and men came pouring out of them, weapons drawn, fanning into the forest while others ran to check on the dead. Devlin retreated, but not too far. He gave a mighty leap, and landed on the large limb of a redwood. Well hidden there, he resumed watching.

Some of the newcomers were the ones who’d been cut off from the convoy by the first dropped tree. He didn’t know where the choppers had come from. Someone must have called for reinforcements. One fellow knelt beside Hobbs and shouted for a medic then asked, “What happened, Commander?”

“It was an ambush,” Hobbs said, his voice quaking with pain. “That vampire, the one that got away. I saw him and I don’t know how many others, but I know he wasn’t alone. They disarmed some of the men and then just....” His voice broke. “They just shot us all. It was a mass execution. It was brutal.” He nodded in the direction he’d tossed the weapons. “They were over that way.”

And as a few men rushed off in that direction, Devlin understood Hobbs’ plan. He’d murdered his own men to prove to the world that vampires were heartless, evil predators who needed to be wiped out for the good of mankind.

Hobbs looked at the medic who was pressing white pads to his belly to stop the bleeding. “Leave me and see to my men!”