Death Wish (Alexa O'Brien, Huntress #5)(2)

After brushing myself off the best I could, I risked a glance in the side mirror of a nearby car: a bloody lip and nose, bruised cheek and black eye. Not bad. It would heal by morning if not sooner.

My body ached, but all I could think about was what the vampire had just said. There was a price on my head. I replayed those words, searching them for a lie and finding none.

Sudden paranoia had me listening extra hard to the sounds of the city. I’d had the wrong people take a dangerous interest in me in the past, but this was a first. A hit. On me? The idea was incredulous. Wasn’t it?

A deadly chill stole over me. Someone out there had a price tag with my name on it.

Chapter Two

It was past dawn by the time I got home. I felt Arys’s cold vampire energy long before I reached my front door.

He was a vision of naked splendor, lying in my bed with his head propped on a mountain of pillows. Arys dropped the book he held when I entered the room.

“What happened to you?” His midnight blue eyes were intent upon me, taking in my cuts, bruises and bloodied attire. Small, silver rings shone in his ears, nose and lower lip. With his sexy mess of black hair, he looked both bad ass and beautiful.

“Where do I begin?” I sat on the edge of the bed and started peeling off my clothes. “I tangled with a vampire who informed me there’s a price on my head. Is that news to you? Because it sure as hell is to me.”

“Tell me you killed him.” Arys’s watchful gaze was heavy upon me as I struggled out of my clothing.

“Hell yes I did.” I kicked the jeans across the floor, wincing as pain shot through my ribs. Damn vampires. I crawled into bed beside Arys, collapsing gratefully into the soft mound of blankets. I should have dragged myself through the shower, but I was too exhausted.

“Too bad you couldn’t beat a little more information out of him first.” Arys pulled me close and pressed his lips to my forehead. “Anyone who f**ks with you is going to be wearing their insides on the outside when I’m done with them.”

His soft kisses were a gentle caress down the side of my face until his mouth claimed mine. The touch of his tongue was hot against my bottom lip. A rush of power burst through me as our energy joined with a jolt of electricity.

“You have to be careful.” Arys spoke between kisses, his hand lost in my long blonde locks. “It’s got to have something to do with what Maxwell knew about us. Others are figuring it out.”

I realized the book he’d been reading was his own journal, the one he’d given me for my birthday. I hadn’t read very much since receiving it a few weeks ago despite Arys’s nagging at me to do so. It was hard to take in too much at once. Since Maxwell had revealed that Arys had known about me long before I’d been born, things had changed. Arys was more neurotic than I’d ever seen him.

He feared what he’d been told, that his darkness would destroy us. I didn’t want to believe it, though somewhere deep inside I knew it to be true. Two different witches had warned us at very different times about the dangers of our connection. Yet, I knew there was more to it; something was missing…

I snuggled in against him, reveling in the way his body felt alongside mine. “You’re the calm and cool one. I’m the nutcase. Don’t go changing that on me.”

He chuckled, a low sound that made me smile. “You’re right. I’ll let you be the crazy one since you do it so well.”

I pinched him playfully, satisfied when he made a pained noise. He lightly bit my earlobe, moving to graze my neck with his sharp fangs. I closed my eyes, content to be in his arms. Wrapping me tighter in his embrace, Arys’s energy was warm and comforting.

When it became clear that sleep planned to evade me, I sat up and grabbed the old leather journal from where Arys had abandoned it on the bed. He’d closed it so I couldn’t tell what page he’d been reading. I’d only made it through a handful of pages myself.

I propped myself up against the pillows and rested the book on my lap. Arys remained close, his face buried in a pillow and an arm across my waist.

“You’re never going to finish that, are you?” His voice was muffled, and his eyes were closed, but I knew he was alert. He wasn’t as relaxed as he appeared.

“I will. I’m just not sure when. It feels weird, reading your personal thoughts and feelings from so long ago. It’s hard to wrap my mind around it all.”

I flipped the journal open to the first page. I’d read it so many times already, but I often came back to it. The words were faded but legible.

October 14, 1849

I saw her again in my dreams, the wolf. I wish I knew her name. All I know is that when I see her, she is mine. She haunts me. The image of her lingers long after I wake. I have yet to see her true form. In these dreams, she is always wolf, but I know that’s not her true face. She is human, too, but whom she is, to me, remains a mystery. I’ve known the love of many women. Yet something about this wolf makes me feel like no other woman has. Alive. And somehow, complete. I don’t know who she is, but I know I must find her.

To know that Arys had seen me in his dreams more than a century ago was mind blowing. I still couldn’t quite comprehend how that could happen.

The only witch I knew who had known about things of this nature was dead. However, Lena believed that Arys and I were meant to be together, two beings cut from the same magic cloth, destined to unite.