Blood bound, p.28
Blood Bound, page 28
They’re all confident about this plan, but if there’s one thing that I’ve learned, it’s that once you get a slimy feeling about someone, no amount of sob stories will take it away.
This Amara bitch is lying about something.
Leaning over the stone balustrade, I watch as Valentine walks with her to his car and opens the door for her. There’s some hectic sexual tension between the two of them, and it fucking pisses me off.
He’s tasted her blood, so he trusts her word, but I know a soul sucker when I see one. Christ, why won’t anyone listen to me about this?!
“Deep in thought there, Beast,” Xenia’s voice comes up behind me just as Valentine drives off and I turn my head to face them.
“Yeah,” I grumble and pick up the glass of bourbon on the stone balustrade and bring it to my lips. I don’t enjoy brushing Xenia off, but right now I have too much on my mind.
“Wanna talk about it?”
I turn my head to face them, narrowing my eyes at what I can tell is a concern in their voice. “Why would you want to listen to my gripes? I thought you hated me,” I say, raising my eyebrow.
They brace their elbows on the balustrade and let out a sigh. “I don’t hate you, Church. What gave you that idea?”
“You almost had me killed and asked for a potion to sever our Fated Bond. I don’t know, that feels like hatred and aversion to me,” I say, emptying my glass and setting it down again.
When Valentine told me what Xenia did and how he took my blood and gave it to them as a placebo potion, I nearly lost it. But then I found out they didn’t even take it and somehow that gave me some hope.
Now, I’m not so sure…
“That wasn’t hatred, it was fear,” Xenia says, looking down at the guards patrolling below. “I was raised to hate your type and kill them, only to find myself attracted to you even after you held me prisoner. If that doesn’t scream Stockholm Syndrome, then what does?”
“Only that wasn’t the case; we’re Fated—”
“I know that,” they interject, shaking their head. “And that somehow scared me even more. Why couldn’t I just let it go and take the potion? Why was I still holding on?”
I sigh at the question, remembering my own turmoil at seeing the Red Thread and how not telling Pres about it created a fucked up domino effect. He’s in this mess because of my choice, and I need to do everything I can to help him, even if he refuses to see what I see.
“Why do they call you Church?” Xenia suddenly asks, changing the subject so drastically and giving me fucking whiplash.
I swallow hard; the memories inching into my peripheral, and it takes everything in me to push them back down.
“Because that’s where the Pres found me before he saved my life - covered in the blood of the people who murdered my family and holding a knife to my own throat.”
Xenia’s eyes widen, and they actually turn to look at me. “That’s horrific. Murdered your family?”
I nod. “Think of something similar to the Donner Party,” I reply, looking down at my hands and seeing them covered in blood again.
It took me decades to learn to control my anger, but whenever I think back and see my little sisters laying in a pool of their own blood, the fury burns hot in my chest. Pres helped me through it, but it’s still there, brimming on the surface and hidden behind a cocky smile.
“So,” Xenia breathes, blinking rapidly. “If Church isn’t your real name, what is?”
I chuckle, about to utter a name I haven’t used since I was human. “Nikolas Mason. Yours?”
“Xenia Blake,” they reply, quickly looking away. I notice the redness on their cheeks and that they’re refusing to meet my gaze again for some reason, so I change the subject.
“What do you identify as?”
Xenia’s head whips up, and the blood drains from their face when I ask this question. “W-why do you ask?”
“When I tasted your blood, I sensed your turmoil at not feeling feminine enough, but not feeling masculine either. You used to think there was something wrong with you before you simply gave up and stopped identifying with either gender. But this was months ago; now, I’m not so sure and when I speak about you with Pres or Valentine, I refer to you as ‘they’,” I explain, pretending not to notice the relief washing over their face.
Xenia turns around and leans their back against the balustrade, bracing their elbows behind them.
“The moment puberty hit me, my boobs filled out and the stares I got disgusted me. I went from a flat-chested kid to a girl with the biggest cup size in class within the space of a month. The leering from both boys and men put me off wanting to feel like a woman, so I started acting more like a tomboy.”
“But I didn’t feel like a boy either. Whenever I had sex, I wouldn’t feel a thing - it is like the act made me feel more like an object than a person and it made me withdraw even more.” They say, then turn their head towards me as a small smile plays on their lips. “Until you ripped it all away.”
There’s no beating heart in my chest, but I’m sure if I had one it would sound like a University drum line.
“What did I do? All I did was torture you,” I scoff, trying to make light of the situation, but Xenia simply chuckles.
“The way you would look at me made me feel wanted, sexy… desired. The heat in your gaze made me feel more like a woman than I ever have before. So… I started seeing myself as one.”
My eyes widened. “You’re comfortable in your identity now?”
With a shake of their head, they answer. “Uhm, it’s not that clear cut. I still have days where I feel like a blank piece of paper, but I think I would like it if you… referred to me as her.”
I step in front of her and brace my hands on the balustrade on either side of her body, caging her in. “Does this mean I’ve won this little game?”
She chuckles and places a finger underneath my chin. “Do you see me on my knees, Beast?”
Her answer makes my cock twitch, and I move my face closer to hers. “No, but I know you’re dying to be there, so why don’t you be a good girl and submit to me?”
The way her breath hitches in her throat and the sound of her heart racing lets me know that I’ve hit the nail right on the head.
But knowing my Hellcat, she won’t give in so easily and she proves it by leaning forward and copying my move from the other night.
She draws my bottom lip in between her teeth, but then she flicks her tongue over it and it gets my cock harder than fucking concrete.
“Where’s the fun in that?” she asks, leaning back with nothing but lust in her eyes.
I spin her around and press up against her, loving the way she gasps when she feels my cock against her perfect ass.
“Trust me, I’m not finding this game fun at all,” I murmur into her ear, nipping gently at her neck and kissing her pulse. “Being this close to you is fucking torture.”
“Then why… endure it?” she gasps, leaning her head back as if offering her nape to me. I slip my hand between her thighs and cup her mound, knowing that she’s absolutely soaked for me already.
“Because you’re worth the wait,” I say, placing a soft kiss on her neck before pulling away from her and walking back inside the mansion.
Yes, I want nothing but to give in to Xenia; Entwine, and have her be mine forever. But I can’t… not when we have enemies on the way here.
I’m the weakest and youngest between Valentine and Pres, so if the council finds out about my Fated being a human, they’ll take advantage of it.
They’ll use her to get to me and use me to get to Pres. I can’t allow that to happen, so for now I’ll keep my distance from Xenia even if it fucking kills me.
GABRIEL
I’m laying with Katherine in between my legs, holding up her hand and adoring the way my mother’s ring perfectly fits on her finger. As if it was always meant to be there. She’s naked while I’m only wearing boxers, so the ring isn’t the only thing I’m admiring.
“Katherine Priest - who would have thought,” she says and I can tell she’s smiling, but she’s got something wrong.
“Katherine Preutescu. Priest is just a last name my father took on when we moved here.” We all hated the name, but my father insisted on it since we had to hide from the council. It stuck even after they found us, though.
“Oh, I wondered why your family tomb had that name and why Eirisse called you that. Well, either way, I’ll be happy to take your name and get rid of my own which means Death,” she says while twirling the ring around her finger.
Katherine Preutescu; fuck, I love the sound of it.
“What was your mother’s name?” she suddenly asks, snapping me out of my thoughts and threading her fingers with mine.
“Ileana,” I answer with reverence. “If there was ever a person I respected more than my father, it was my mother. My father saw to our safety and protected us, while my mother held everything else together. They were a powerful couple; something I wish you and I would grow into.”
She sighs. “I’m sorry… about what my family did—”
I hold two fingers to her lips and shake my head. “You are not the one who drove that stake through their hearts. Your leaders fooled all of you and made us out to be murderers of humans when we simply use them to feed before healing them afterward. Not all vampires decide to take the path of the Devoid.”
“Devoid?” she asks, turning her head.
“They are vampires who drain humans to the point of death, the ones who kill innocents and think nothing of it. Devoid of empathy and feel nothing when they kill others.” I explain, remembering my father’s lectures.
She shivers. “Like Eirisse Vasile; she seemed a lot colder than Kazimir.”
“That’s because she is. While Kazimir uses mind games to avoid the change in his eyes to hide his true nature, Eirisse doesn’t care much for it. She killed her Fated after he gave her two children. According to rumors, she had no need for the emotions she felt for him and saw him as a burden.”
I don’t tell her Kazimir uses mind games as a means to placate victims and trick them into trusting him. Most vampires are terrified of Eirisse, while Kazimir is the veritable monster.
Katherine remains quiet, as if deep in thought, and I wonder if I scared her off with my description of the twins. I don’t really want to talk about them, but I know the topic will come up soon.
“Hmm, I’ve been thinking about baby names,” she says after a while with a giddy tone and turns her head to face me. “If it’s a girl, I want us to name her Gileana; it’s a mesh of our mother’s names.”
The change of topic is so fast that it takes me a while to register what she’s just said.
“Giselle and Ileana,” I smile. “I love it. But what if it’s a boy?”
She screws up her face and shakes her head. “I don’t know yet. No way am I naming my child after my father.” She says in disgust before leaning back into my arms. “I’ll leave naming the boy to you.”
“I’ll happily take the honor,” I say, kissing the side of her head and breathing out a content sigh.
We’ve been holed up in this hotel room for the last 24 hours with nothing but each other for company. Katherine has blossomed within these few hours, talking openly to me about everything; her dreams, her fears, what she hopes we would grow into, and her excitement about her pregnancy.
It adds to my guilt knowing that I’m not being truthful with her, but I’d rather have her out of the way than have to worry about her safety.
“... what do you think?”
I blink when I hear her voice and realize too late that she’s been talking the entire time while I’ve been deep in thought.
“Sorry, love. What was that?”
She turns her head and frowns. “Where were you just now?”
Offering her an apologetic smile, I sigh and hold her tightly. “Someplace where my mind shouldn’t wander off to - DA work,” I say, watching her expression turn into a pout.
“You’re thinking about work while I’m laying in between your legs?” she asks, then turning around and straddling me. “Am I not doing my job here, King?”
She leans down, trailing kisses down my chest and nipping with her fangs against my skin. My eyes immediately close at her touch and I groan. “No, clearly not,” I tease, and she huffs before raking her nails down my sides.
My cock hardens as she strokes it through the fabric of my boxers with a grin on her face and my back arches in anticipation of her mouth. But just as she’s about to wrap her lips around my length, my cell phone rings.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” she groans, poised with my cock to her lips, and sighs. “Guess you better get that since you set it to ring only if Valentine or Church calls.”
I swear I’m going to murder whoever just got in the way of what she had planned, but her words break through my lust and I realize she’s right. If Valentine or Church calls, it has to do with the council.
“Sorry, little lamb,” I apologize yet again when I get to my feet. She huffs out an ‘it's okay’ before turning on her side away from me. It’s so odd to see Katherine emotional at times when I’m used to the cold hunter who wanted me dead; so I never know how to deal with it.
I sigh and grab my cell phone from the nightstand, noticing Church’s number and answering immediately. He speaks in Romanian and informs me that the council should arrive soon and I respond in English with I’ll be there soon.
I made sure that I’m not that far away from the estate, so I’ll be able to drive there under the pretense of a meeting and get back before she even realizes what happened.
Everything comes to an end tonight.
“You don’t have to say anything, just be back before sunrise,” she says before I can even spin a lie and somehow it makes me feel a thousand times worse.
Sighing, I walk towards her and get on my haunches next to her side of the bed, but she doesn’t look at me. Instead, she looks pissed off. I guess this is understandable since I said no work and yet now I’m about to run off to so-called work.
“I won’t be long, I promise,” I say apologetically, stroking her hair and moving it behind her ear. “I’ll make it up to you when you get back.”
She shakes her head, then looks at me. “You don’t need to. Just hurry back, okay?”
I get up and kiss the side of her head. “I will. I love you,”
“I love you too,” she murmurs.
I have to make this up to her when I return, and as much as I hate lying to her, this will probably save her life. There is no way I will allow Kazimir to use her as a means to get to me. He tried that when he touched her, but I won’t allow it to happen again. This is how Kazimir killed my sister, Lucienne, in front of my father and I’ll be damned if there’s a repeat of it.
Getting dressed, I grab my phone and walk out of the hotel while calling the others and letting them know to meet me at our appointed spot. Gustav will be bringing the eldest Vasile along too, someone who I am dying to meet.
A sliver of excitement shoots through me when I get on my Harley and floor it out of the underground parking lot, throwing the DA facade away and slipping back into my Devil’s Void role.
If I’m going to take Kazimir down, I’ll do it on my terms, not his.
Gabriel thinks he’s the only one who can catch someone out on a lie, but I know him well enough to see when he’s doing the same to me. I knew it the second he brought up going away for a while, because why would he want to take me out of town when the council was informed of his so-called traitorous ways?
I gave him these two days to come clean, but he hasn’t, so now I’m taking things into my own hands.
The moment I hear his Harley driving off, I get up from the bed, head to the shower, and afterward throw on a pair of jeans, combat boots I snuck into my luggage, and a t-shirt with a leather jacket. This is my so-called hunting uniform and I have a feeling I will need it.
With a thudding heart, I pick up my phone, hoping Xenia hasn’t gone to sleep yet when I pressed the call option and thankfully she answers on the third ring.
“Kat? Aren’t you supposed to be getting loved up right now?” she asks while trying to stifle a yawn.
“You wouldn’t lie to me, right Xen?” I come straight out with what I want to say. There’s no use beating around the bush when it comes to my best friend, anyway.
“No? Why what’s up?”
I sigh. “Has something been off at the estate? By that I mean, has Valentine or Church been acting shifty?”
She keeps quiet for a little while before she answers. “Now that you mention it, yeah. Church is ignoring me more than usual, and Valentine always seems to be out with that Fae. Why do you ask? Has Gabe been acting weird as well?”
“Yeah and I think he’s heading back to the estate right now. He just got off the phone with someone and it sounded like Church,” I say. Sometimes I think Gabriel forgets that I’m a vampire now and that I can hear exceptionally well. “Church spoke in Romanian too; a dead giveaway that there’s something they’re not telling us.”
“Ah, that would explain the way he looked earlier when we spoke; he had just got off the phone about fifteen to twenty minutes ago.” She answers, sliding the puzzle piece into place.
So it was Church, and Gabriel is heading over to the estate as we speak. We aren’t too far from the border, and knowing how Gabriel drives on that Harley, he’ll probably be there in no time at all.
“I’ll be there in a few hours; meet me at WNC to gear up. I have a feeling we’re going to need to slip into who we used to be,” I say, asking her to meet me at the Washington National Cathedral knowing we have ammunition there.
“Okay, but why? Do you think something is about to go down here?” she asks, and I can hear her shuffling through her closet.
“Yeah. I think Kazimir is on his way,”
“Oh, fuck.”
“Oh, fuck is right and Gabriel has me holed up here away from everything. I know he doesn’t want me there when something happens, thinking he’s keeping me safe, but this is just pissing me off more.” I grumble, grabbing the SUV keys and heading to the door.
