Tall, Silent & Lethal (Pyte/Sentinel #4)(45)

She ignored the agonizing pain, the blood pouring down her throat forcing her to swallow or choke, the bastard on top of her, and the fact that she was going to die. She put every last ounce of energy that she had into biting down harder and digging her nails in as far as they would go, deciding that if she was going to die like this that she would inflict as much damage as she could to the ass**le on top of her. Right now she hated him more than anything, even the monsters that had killed her family, because he’d made her feel safe and it had all been a lie, an illusion that she’d foolishly believed when she’d known better.

Now she was paying the price.

Why hadn’t she left the first night when he’d made it more than obvious that he hadn’t wanted her there? She should have just called up the agency, arranged to have someone replace her and found another job. It would have been quick and painless for everyone involved. For any other job she would have done just that, but there was something about Christofer that had grabbed her attention and held it.

At the beginning she’d told herself that she was staying to help Marta, but that had been a lie. She hadn’t stayed because of Marta no matter how much she liked the older woman or how much she wanted to help her. She’d stayed because of the man that she’d met in the pharmacy, the one that had made her smile, eased the fear that ruled her life.

She’d stayed for herself.

She’d been drawn to him from the start-even when he’d been a jerk, she’d still craved being around him. She’d wanted more of it, needed it and she’d been willing to tell herself a thousand and one lies in order to get it. Needing someone, anyone, was dangerous and something that she’d never allowed herself until the day that she’d walked into that pharmacy and sat by a man wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt.

A choked cry escaped her as she felt his teeth tear through her throat. She closed her eyes, squeezing them tightly shut as she used every last ounce of energy that she had to dig her nails further into his skin and bite down harder on his shoulder, hoping, hell praying, that he choked on her blood. If he thought that she was going to go quietly then he was wrong.

She might be quickly fading away, but she wasn’t going to go easily. She was going to keep this up until she passed out or he realized that he was hurting her and released her.

Then she was going to kill him.

She might not have been able to stop the monsters that had killed her family from hurting someone ever again, but if she got the chance, she would do that with this monster. She’d end this here and now if she was given a chance, but as her energy began to drain, her hands trembled and the effort to bite down became too much, she realized that she wasn’t about to get that chance.

Her eyes flickered open as her body went boneless. She stared aimlessly ahead, barely seeing the ceiling hovering several feet above her. The sounds of Christofer growling as well as the sounds of her choppy breaths coming too quickly slowly muted out until all she could hear was a soft humming noise. The pain of having her throat torn open evaporated, leaving her feeling oddly numb and tired.

“Cloe?” the choked whisper drew her attention to the beautiful blue eyes staring down at her in horror. “Oh………God………”

It was funny, she thought as everything slowly faded away, all the times she’d thought about dying and how it would happen, she’d been right.

She’d always been destined to die in the arms of a monster.

Chapter 19

“Don’t f**king die on me, mein Schatz,” he whispered harshly, shifting his attention from the blood soaked towel he had pressed against the side of Cloe’s neck to the alarm clock by his bed.

“Come on……come on!” he growled, waiting impatiently for another minute to go by and when it did, he couldn’t help but sag with relief.

“Thank f**king God,” he mumbled, pressing a quick kiss against Cloe’s cold forehead as he placed her on his bed, gently laying her down as he stood.

She was deathly pale, her heartbeat was sluggish, he’d taken too much blood and her throat had been viciously ripped open, but he couldn’t help but feel relieved. Somehow she’d made it to the ten-minute mark after consuming his blood, something that had never happened before. Whenever he’d been forced to watch as some unsuspecting volunteer received his blood he’d always kept his attention on the large clock hanging on the wall across from his cage, counting down the minutes as he waited for the inevitable to happen.

Before the clock managed to tick off ten minutes, the foolish volunteer who had been lured to his doom with promises of immortality and unimaginable power had been screaming in pain, begging for help and eventually praying for death. While the doctors had stood around, taking notes and clearly frustrated that their plans had failed again, he’d sat in his cage, torn between relief and horror that people reacted so violently to his blood. Those experiments had made it impossible to deny what the doctors had claimed the moment that he’d opened his eyes to find himself locked up in a small metal cage and chained to the bars.

He was a monster.

He was also a freak accident, one that couldn’t seem to be repeated no matter what they tried. The only thing that they’d managed to reproduce was a horrifying death. This time shouldn’t have been any different, but somehow Cloe had managed to escape the violent death that his blood should have delivered.