Bound in Death (Bound #5)(25)

He shut off the bike.

“It makes me…weak.” A stark confession. She was sure that lethargy would hit her any moment. She needed a place to crash.

“You have my blood. You’ll be stronger now.” He seemed so certain. She wasn’t.

Jane hopped off the bike. Took off her helmet. She started to walk toward the shelter of the rest area.

Alerac caught her hand in his. “I know more about vampires than you do.”

He knew more about everything than she did, and that fact pissed her off. She was walking blindly, and she hated it.

“We’re close to my home. Just a few more hours to go.”

The sun was stretching higher into the sky with each moment that passed. The weakness hadn’t started.

Yet.

“A few more hours in sunlight,” she muttered as she tried to tug her hand from his. “I don’t want that, okay? I don’t want to fall off the bike. Don’t want to slam into the pavement and have you drag the poor, beaten vampire away.”

“That’s not going to happen.” A pause, then he said, “Trust me.”

She stopped tugging her hand and stared up at him.

“It’s okay to be afraid.”

Good. Because she was shaking in her shoes.

“But my blood is in you now. Werewolf blood is very strong. It’s going to protect you.” He kept staring into her eyes. “Trust me.” Then he pulled her straight into the faint sunlight.

She expected the lethargy, the weakness to hit her.

It didn’t.

“I told you, my blood protects you.”

Her breath caught. The sunlight was warm on her skin, and she didn’t feel the usual weakness. Not even a little.

His gaze seemed to see right into her soul. “You have nothing to fear from me.”

In that instant, standing in the sunlight, strength still coursing through her, she almost believed him. But deep inside, a soft voice whispered…

He lies.

***

“Tell me about the man who took Jane.”

Hannah Wylee frowned across the bar. The place should have been closed. It was long past dawn, and she should be at home, sleeping.

But just as she’d been ready to leave, he’d come in.

Tall. Muscled. With icy eyes that seemed to see right through her.

She didn’t even remember when everyone else had left. Didn’t remember how she’d wound up alone with him in that empty place.

“Jane,” he repeated the name softly. “Where is she?”

Hannah shook her head. “I-I don’t know.” Jane had run off, left without a word. Damn inconvenience. Now she’d have to get another waitress. She’d tried to call Heath and ram into him about Jane. Talk about ungrateful. After all she’d done for the woman. But Heath had been dodging her.

Probably because he knew how pissed she was.

“Someone else was here, someone was after Jane.” His voice seemed to pour into Hannah.

Her brow furrowed. She felt like they’d been talking about Jane for a long time, but she couldn’t be sure.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Hannah,” he murmured. There was no accent in his voice. Just darkness. “But I will, if you don’t tell me what I need to know.”

His words should have terrified her, yet she found there was no room for terror. She felt frozen. No, she was frozen. Hannah couldn’t make herself move.

And he was coming ever closer to her.

He lifted his hand. His fingers curled around her neck. “The last night that Jane was here, what happened?”

“A-a man came in.” She remembered that. That guy had filled the doorway, catching her eyes. Big and rough—scary. “I think Jane ran from him.”

Those fingers tightened on her throat. “What did his eyes look like?”

She frowned, searching her memory. “He…he had on glasses.” Sunglasses, inside the bar. More memories pushed through her mind. “I sent my bouncers after him.” No one messed with her staff.

“What happened to them?”

“The guy took ‘em down.” She’d had to fire them. What good were bouncers who couldn’t control one guy?

His hold was heavy on her throat. “And did he hurt Jane?”

She shook her head, or tried to. “She left. Ran out the front. Alone.” Hannah thought that was the truth. “I haven’t seen her since.”

He stared down at her.

She couldn’t look away from him.

He sighed. “Hannah, I need to know the truth. Don’t worry, it will only hurt for a moment.”

He was beautiful. Gorgeous. The best-looking man she’d ever seen. And something was wrong with her. He’d done something to her, she knew he had. Because she wouldn’t have told him so much about Jane. Wouldn’t have shut herself in there alone with him.

What did he do?

She forced herself to speak. “Wh-what will hurt?”

“This.”

She expected him to strangle her. But his head ducked toward her throat. Something sharp sliced across her jugular.

Hannah didn’t even have the chance to scream.

***

It was cold. The air had grown increasingly chilled as they drove—drove up higher and higher into the mountains.