Bitter Blood (Blood and Moonlight Book 3)(70)

She felt the prick of pain as Paris’s mouth opened wider on her.

Vincent paused at the door and looked back at her. His lips twisted. “Oh, who am I f*cking kidding? I hope it hurts like a bitch, voodoo queen. I hope your last moments are agony and hell.”

Then he left her.

She shoved her hand down into her bag, her hand fisting over the wooden stake inside. She didn’t want to do this. Not to Paris. “Don’t,” she whispered.

Don’t make me end you. Please, don’t. Not to you. Not—

But his teeth slid away from her skin. Once more, she felt the hot stir of his breath against her neck. “Not to you,” he whispered, as if echoing her thoughts.

And he spun her in his arms so that she faced him. Annette stared up at Paris and she saw his clear gaze. Not filled with bloodlust, just…Paris.

“Had to make it…look good,” he muttered.

He had, definitely.

“I’m me.” He swallowed. “Don’t know how long it will last…but I’m me.”

Yes, yes!

“So, love, let’s think fast,” Paris said. “And figure a way out of this f*cking nightmare.”





Chapter Seventeen


“Never do this shit again,” Aidan whispered as he brushed a kiss over Jane’s lips. They were upstairs in his office and she’d just dressed in the last spare pair of clothes he had for her.

Aidan made a mental note to buy the woman more clothes to keep on hand at his club—lots of them—because he seemed to keep ripping her outfits to shreds.

Jane turned toward him, one brow raised. “What shit? You’d definitely better not be talking about the sex…”

His hand wrapped around her waist and he pulled her close, bending to press a quick kiss to her lips. Making love, sweetheart. You taught me that. “I mean you, risking your life, when I’ve gone over the f*cking edge.”

“But don’t you see, Aidan? I’d go over the edge with you, any day.”

She would, she had.

He kissed her again. Then he put his forehead against hers. Time for some hard truth. “I lost myself.” He knew it. “I was being ripped apart and I couldn’t stop it. I wanted pain. I wanted blood. I wanted death.” That shamed him.

“But you didn’t kill anyone…though you will owe your guard a serious apology bonus for that slice you gave him.”

Aidan winced. Dammit, he hadn’t meant—

“You came back.” Her voice was soft. “Whatever was happening on the inside, you beat it. You’re strong and you’re sane and you’re here with me.” Her smile made his heart ache. “Just the way it’s supposed to be.”

He could stare at her smile forever.

But….

Her smile slipped. “We have to go and talk to Drew. I have to settle things with him.” She pulled from his arms.

And he felt colder. “I was going to kill him.” Aidan wouldn’t lie, a big part of him still wanted to kill that little bastard for all that he’d done. If Jane hadn’t stopped him…

“I know,” she said.

He looked into her eyes and realized that she did know—exactly how he felt. All of his secrets. With Jane, his soul would always be bare.

But that was okay because he knew her secrets, too.

“I need to question him. Find out just what the hell is happening. It just…it doesn’t make sense to me that he’d hire Roth. And all those tests? Drew wouldn’t do that. It doesn’t fit.” She turned and marched for the door. “The pieces aren’t going into place. I’m missing something.”

He followed her down the stairs.

She was halfway down the stairs when she froze. “How did Vincent know we’d be at Roth’s?” Jane slowly turned to face him. “I didn’t…everything was happening so fast that I didn’t even question how he was there. I raced into the alley after you and he just…he appeared.”

Yeah. “The vamp has a bad habit of doing that.”

Jane licked her lips. “I can never detect his scent. He hides it somehow.”

With magic.

“I don’t know if he was there before we arrived,” Jane said, her gaze sharpening with suspicion. “Or if he arrived when we raced outside.”

Aidan stared into her eyes. “There was an awful lot of blood at that scene.”

“Only there was no blood on Drew’s knife. Or on him.” Her breath came faster. “If he’d just cut Roth’s throat, there should have been spray on him. There wasn’t.”

He strained, trying to remember. Had there been blood on Vincent?

“No blood was on Vincent,” Jane said, a frown tugging down her lips. “But he could have moved so fast, used that vamp speed…he could have killed Roth and never gotten so much as a speck of blood on him.”

While Drew wouldn’t have been so fortunate. “Drew was following us.” Aidan thought this through. “He could have been watching Hell’s Gate and when we left, he tailed us.” And Aidan had already been so f*cking on the edge he hadn’t even noticed the guy. “He was coming to kill us—”

“But Drew hadn’t killed Roth.” She spun around and raced down those last stairs. “He didn’t do it but Vincent sure as hell could have!”