Asylum (Causal Enchantment #2)(5)

Anxiety tore at my insides. I needed to know the truth. Had he lied to Evangeline? Used her to get here? If they had . . .

I’d tear them all to pieces.

I stepped forward, keeping my target in sight as my mental eye scoured my insides for a spark. I only needed one little helix to read Caden’s soul. Just one tiny little bud, even . . . .

Mage stepped in front of me, blocking my path. “Move,” I growled.

“You cannot blame them for deceiving Evangeline to get what they wanted. After all, you did the same,” Mage reminded me.

“What I did was nothing like that!” Go away! You’re distracting me! I sidestepped around her. Just one spark—one—and I’d burn them to the ground. There! I found one floating beneath my left lung. I plucked at it, pulling it up and forward, releasing it from my fingertip. The tiny, glowing purple bud, visible only to me, sailed toward Caden.

A sharp spasm shot through my back as something dug into my collarbone. I lost my grasp on the helix. Flinching, I watched it drift up and away, now worthless. “I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” Mage’s voice hummed in my ear. I turned to see her hand on me, and one eyebrow raised. How did she know what I was doing? Vampires couldn’t see magic . . . “You mustn’t blame Evangeline. Many were tricked. Even other powerful vampires.” She gestured with her chin toward Rachel, lying under a charred tree.

That’s right! I had forgotten. Was the whole Rachel-Caden thing a charade as well? Desperate for answers, I spun on my heels, breaking free of Mage’s grasp, and flew to the raven-haired demon. Bending down, I tore the Merth bindings from her wrists and legs, wincing at the sting.

She was on her feet in a second, her hate-filled yellow eyes locked on Mage. I watched a secret look pass between them.

“No harm intended, Rachel,” Mage offered mildly.

“No. Just trying to leave me in that hell hole,” Rachel responded coolly, her pinched nose and pouty red lips rendering her face beautiful yet unpleasant.

“Well, you’re here and you’re free. Bygones, right?” Mage matched her coolness, unruffled by whatever had transpired between them.

“Right.” Rachel displayed a toothy grin. She turned to Caden, fury flashing over her face, her hands flexing as if about to rake his eyes out.

“So was all that an act, too?” I asked Caden, leaning in to scrutinize his every twitch, his every shift, for some clue.

“No. That was an added bonus,” Caden answered, adding with thick sarcasm, “thanks so much for letting her loose.”

Rachel’s eyes narrowed further. The hatred was genuine, I decided. But all this just couldn’t be . . . Was it all an act? It would certainly be smart of Caden, distancing himself from ties to Evangeline, making himself less of a target for Viggo and Rachel. Again I reached inside for a bud, desperate to read Caden, to end this question once and for all. Regrettably, I couldn’t find even one.

“I don’t believe you,” Viggo finally stated, crossing his arms over his chest.

Caden only shrugged, an infuriating gesture, based on the fleeting twist of Viggo’s mouth. If they kept this up, act or no act, Viggo wouldn’t restrain himself. I had long-since dissolved his patience.

“Well, while you’re not believing, where are the humans? I’m parched,” Bishop piped up with an obnoxious grin.

“You’ll have to ask Sofie if she can find you—” Viggo began, but voices from inside the building interrupted him.

“Are all the servants on vacation?” a female exclaimed angrily.

Right on cue.

Heads whipped around as Camila Forero stormed through the red doors into the atrium, followed closely by her husband, Carmelo—Viggo and Mortimer’s Colombian “beard” family, and the only two humans left in the building. Their children had left with Evangeline for no other reason than that the sweet, optimistic girl had begged me to save them. These two, I’d intentionally left behind.

Camila stopped dead. Her dark brown eyes grew wide as they flitted over the smoldering corpses and landed on the crowd of strangers regarding her with intense interest.

One . . . two . . . . there. Forty sets of nostrils flared. The scent of human blood coursing through delicate human veins had reached the Ratheus vampires. It was all they needed. Eyes began morphing into the hideous red globes of ravenous vampires, the only time one of our kind could be considered grotesque.

Camila’s jaw dropped. Her terror flooded my mind like a potent memory. Another vampirism. I knew the others would sense it as well. It would only feed their lust. Camila’s feet began sliding backward as she edged stiffly toward the building. Her four inch snakeskin heels scraped against the concrete steps. She stumbled into her husband before pushing past him to run, Carmelo on her heels. I sighed. Bad move, running.

“The garage!” I heard Camila whisper to her husband as surely as if she stood next to me.

So they thought they could hide? Despite myself, I chuckled. Silly humans. There’s no hiding . . .

The swarm took off, Caden and Amelie in the lead, tearing into the building after the humans, in a race to see who would taste human blood first. Sympathy for Evangeline swallowed my anger, the likelihood that her friends had deceived her growing with each minute.

“Wonderful!” Viggo muttered sarcastically, throwing his hands up in the air. “Who’s going to clean up the blood?”